back to article HP contractor 'surprised and saddened' by Hurd sacking

Mark Hurd's nemesis is a former soft porn actress and a reality TV wannabe and she is "surprised and saddened" by his enforced departure from HP. And she has privately settled her sexual harassment claim with him. In a statement released on Sunday by her attorney, the celebrity lawyer Gloria Allred, Fisher said: "I was …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Hurd should get nothing!

    So whilst he was making thousands redundant , many without any form of compensation package, he was busy bedding a looser actress bimbo with blond hair who couldnt get a decent acting job. When the cocktail party circuit was ended, Jodie then sues for sexual harrasement and gets a private payout. Not bad . Thats one way of making money for nothing. Hurd is walking away for up to $50 million - thats another scandal. He shouldnt pick up a dime.

    He fiddled expenses to pay for this woman to be around him. He authorised the payment of them. When HP bought EDS, people lost their jobs overnight, with no payouts and for no reason other than Hurd cuts. He should have got the same - nothing.

    Hopefully his wife will sue the ass of him for more that the $50 million.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Pint

      You don't seem to like capitalism much, mate,

      but it's better than anything else so far.

      1. Trevor_Pott Gold badge
        Unhappy

        @AC

        You're wrong. Like Communism, Capitalism has failed. Like so many things, the true solution lies not at the extremes, but somewhere in the fuzzy middle. Socialism is the answer.

        Of course, this assumes you aren't a bigoted Tea Party member who can't tell the difference between Socialism and Communism.

        For the record, Socialism = Canada, goodly chunks of Europe and various other countries like South Korea and Japan.

        Communism = The former USSR or China about 25 years ago.

        Capitalism is by no means the best we’ve come up with so far.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Going, Going, ah,,,,, gone.... ah that's better...

    Obviously hadn't done the countless Ethics training courses that HP makes you do.

    Glad that he is gone, short term gain for long term pain. Wonder what numpty we are going to get next as CEO.

  3. DrXym

    To be fair to the lady

    Her career sounds a lot more accomplished than the one aspect the tabloids have latched onto.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Headmaster

      Darn those tabloids

      That being the one that got the CEO of the world's largest tech company sacked? Yes, why *have* they latched onto that anyway, rather than her role as "Marcie Ridlin" in one episode of Silk Stalkings in 1993?

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Black Helicopters

    in British Local Government

    At least where I am, it almost seems to be becoming almost routine to use inappropriate behaviour complaints to encourage an executive whose face no longer fits to move on. A quiet suspension: a good few rumours running round the place and the choice of either resigning quietly with a reference or 9 months of hell going through the procedures and pseudo criminal "investigation" with the constant threat of being made virtually unemployable if sufficient "evidence" can be "found".

    Worse still there is no especial relationship between face fitting and competence so although a few bad apples have gone that way so have some of the rare competent ones...

  5. TeeCee Gold badge
    Joke

    Typical.

    "Mark and I never had an affair or intimate sexual relationship..."

    So he blew a load of time and a fair amount of the company's money, but never brought the thing to a successful conclusion?

    I guess the EDS culture got to him........

  6. Moz
    Grenade

    Never her intention?

    "I was surprised and saddened that Mark lost his job over this,” she said. “That was never my intention.”

    Translation: I just wanted the money.

  7. John Savard

    Career

    Perhaps the aspect of her career that many find interesting enough for it to make the tabloids... is what gave her the self-confidence and courage to proceed with her real career!

  8. disgruntled yank

    never her intention

    Hiring Gloria Allred is the legal equivalent of accompanying an ultimatum with deployment of a carrier group. Prudent recipients will calculate the costs.

  9. This post has been deleted by its author

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    There was an...

    "an Australian tennis player angle", eh?

    Nudge nudge, wink wink, say no more!

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Guilty enough

    He was guilty enough of something that he was willing to pay out some cash.

    They might have a deal that requires both of them to deny any sexual relationship regardless of whether there was one or not.

  12. H2Nick

    Oh dear

    Looks like he let the little head do the thinking...

  13. me n u
    Alert

    When did Ashlee Vance leave?

    The most surprising part of the article was that Ashlee is no longer at the Reg! When did this happen?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: When did Ashlee Vance leave?

      September 2008!

      1. Allison Park

        He left because he was part of the pretexting issue at HP

        now at the liberal NY times

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: He left because he was part of the pretexting issue at HP

          Hmm. Your memory is faulty. Ashlee was not a victim of HP's pretexting shenanigans.

  14. 100113.1537

    Let's dig around to find something to sack him with....

    So the sexual harassment stuff didn't stick, but the mere fact that it had been brought was always going to come out sooner or later, so the Board managed to trawl up some dodgy expense receipts and forced him to fall on his sword.

    Sounds like the local government story by an AC up above has its parallels in HP.

    Not to speak well of the departed (and risking a serious flaming), but personally this guy was nothing more than a bean-counter who tidied up after Carly did the real job of turning HP into a modern IT company. He got credit for stuff that she had done and just needed time to come to fruition - an all too common story in publicly traded companies. The person with the vision to see what is needed is rarely still there when it pays off, having been sacked over the uproar (and resultant drop in share price) that goes with the upheaval.

    HP was old, lazy and fat and needed a kick in the pants. Now it one of the major players again. Do you think that was due to Carly or this guy?

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Pretty straightforward here I think

    The kindest explanation I can think of runs like this: he saw her, knew he had to have her and before you could say "bill and dave, fer chrissakes" he found an excuse to hire her (cmon, what part of her resume legitimately qualified her as a marketing person acting at the CEO level?). She took the money, then got cold feet when he started seriously hitting on her. It happens. That is why companies should institute a no-dating co-workers rule...

    As far as @100113.1537's comment that it was Fiorina who did all the legwork of turning HP around, I have to disagree. Those were terrible, terrible years at HP. I can't pin the Itanium disaster on her but the Compaq merger, the splitting off of some of the best business units into separate companies, and the plain old-fashioned arrogance still grate on me 5 years after her departure.

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Mark didn't own enough stock

    Michael Dell owns too much of the stock to get the same treatment. I wonder what marks vote on the board was.....I would vote to be fired myself and get $30M.

    I have started padding my expense account, and taking trade show booth babes out to business dinners so I can get $30M also. Maybe I will even get some unlike Mark...or did the ~$1.2M out of court settlement state she must say there was no sex involved?

  17. Keith T

    PR for her new reality TV series?

    Hurd was reportedly sacked for paying her for work she didn't do. I'm sure Fisher didn't have a problem with taking money for that.

    I expect she is exploiting her publicity in the hunt for a new reality TV series to participate in.

  18. amanfromMars 1 Silver badge

    Base Level Explores New Heights

    Crikey, .... Hurd Man Dives into Company Honey Pot and Lands in Sweet Sticky Pickle, says it all.

    Fortunately too, is the World Full of Fragrant Flowers and Exotic Blooms and Toxic and Intoxicating Agents.

  19. Alastair 7

    From the NY Times article...

    "Correction: August 8, 2010

    An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated Ms. Fisher's age. She is 50, not 51."

    Looks like she's putting her lawyer to good use!

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