Who they are
Bill Hewlett (1913–2001) co-founded Hewlett-Packard in a Palo Alto garage in 1939 with David Packard, and together they wrote the original playbook for what became Silicon Valley. HP under Hewlett and Packard pioneered the idea of a values-driven, engineer-led company — "The HP Way" — long before tech had a language for culture. Referenced heavily in Beyond Entrepreneurship 2.0 as the canonical example of founders who built a great company by obsessing over people, principles, and long-term compounding over short-term performance.
Core Ideas
- The HP Way — trust, decentralization, and respect for the individual as operating principles
- MBWA (Management By Walking Around) — popularized at HP
- Profit is a result of doing good work, not the purpose of the work
Related
- Jim Collins — co-author of Beyond Entrepreneurship, studied HP deeply
- Beyond Entrepreneurship 2.0 — the book that anchors Hewlett's leadership lessons