回忆史上最有争议的CEO：拉里•埃里森与我的一次面试

    具体细节我已经记不清了。那是1986年的11月份。我刚刚在斯坦福大学（Stanford University）完成计算机科学研究生学位。带着软件开发的特长，我开始寻找工作。

    当时还没有LinkedIn。虽然网络要等到十年后才会普及，但学校的计算机科学系已经能够连接互联网。当时找科技类工作的地方是Usenet，一款早期网络布告栏。其中包括9个主要类别的帖子，如“rec.”（代表休闲娱乐）和“sci.”（代表科学类主题）。每一类都有许多子分类。在Comp.jobs专栏可以寻找计算机科学类的工作。

    我找到两份与我条件相符的工作，并参加了这两家公司的面试。其中一家当时的知名度较小，主要业务是关联式数据库，在几个月前刚刚上市，有几百名员工。那家公司的名字叫甲骨文（Oracle），但我对它一无所知。

    当时，甲骨文还没有搬到位于加州雷德伍德的绿玻璃大楼，即众所周知的 “翡翠城”。那时候甲骨文的总部在一座小山坡上，位于贝尔蒙特戴维斯大街一栋普通的白色大楼里面。不过，公司当时已经拥有许多了不起的想法，在后来为其打出了知名度。我见到了几位衣着得体的高管，包括销售部门高管。销售人员以男性为主，他们在公司有很大的自由。其中一位高管开着跑车带我去吃午饭。我们来到一家俯瞰旧金山湾区的餐厅，这给我这个囊中羞涩的研究生留下了深刻印象。经过几轮面试之后，招聘经理告诉我，每一位新工程师都要见一下CEO。我当然没有问题。

    我被领进拉里•埃里森的办公室。他坐在桌子前面，透过一扇大窗户可以俯瞰湾区。他很随和，接下来15分钟，我们谈论了许多话题。我从学校里学到了什么？我想要做什么？在已经谈论过的岗位中，有哪一个最令我感兴趣？然后他站了起来，谈话到此结束。

    我当时并不知道，埃里森会成为史上最著名、最有趣、最有争议的CEO之一。也从来没有想过，甲骨文的股票会比公司首次公开募股时的价格上涨接近90,000%。当时的埃里森刚四十出头，才刚刚创业。他的资产净值根本不值一提。

    我收到了甲骨文的工作邀请，但最终还是选择了另外一份工作。那是另外一家上市公司——太阳微系统公司（Sun Microsystems），它与甲骨文给我的感觉截然不同。（当时我对商业的了解不多，还想不到“文化”层面。）这家公司的主力是工程师，许多人都拥有博士学位。我在面试的时候没有看到销售人员的影子。这种特别注重技术开发的模式，似乎更适合我。

    再次见到拉里•埃里森已是多年之后，当时我已经离开工程领域，成为一名记者。那次见面是在1999年，加州大学伯克利分校（University of California, Berkeley）举办的一次演讲，他在接受新闻学院院长奥威尔•斯科勒采访的时候，用了大部分时间抨击微软（Microsoft）。他已经成为一位傲慢、自大的亿万富翁。不论喜欢他还是讨厌他，他肯定比我在戴维斯大道见到的那个和蔼可亲的家伙更加令人印象深刻。

    上周四，甲骨文宣布埃里森将辞去已担任37年的CEO一职。虽然有人认为这只是形式，并非真正的变化，但对于业内最杰出的领导者之一，这将是一个有着重要意义的时刻。（财富中文网）

    译者：刘进龙/汪皓

    I don’t remember a lot of details. It was November 1986. I had just finished a graduate degree in computer science at Stanford University, where I had specialized in software development. I was looking for a job.

    There was no LinkedIn back then. Though the Web would not become popular for almost another decade, the computer science department on campus had Internet access. And the place to look for tech jobs was the Usenet, an early online bulletin board that organized posts along nine major categories like “rec.” (for recreation and entertainment) and “sci.” (for scientific topics). Each category had scores of subcategories. Comp.jobs was the place to look for computer science gigs.

    I found two jobs that seemed to match my qualifications, and I got interviews at both companies. One was a little-known firm specializing in relational databases that had gone public a few months earlier and had a few hundred employees. It was called Oracle, and I knew next to nothing about it.

    Back then, Oracle had not yet moved to its massive complex of green-tinged, glass towers in Redwood City, Calif., often called the emerald city. It was just up the hill from there, in a nondescript white building on Davis Drive in Belmont. But the company already had plenty of the flash it would later become famous for. I met with several well-dressed execs, including some in sales. The salesmen—they were mostly men—seemed to have the run of the place. One of them took me to lunch in his sports car. We went to a restaurant that overlooked the San Francisco Bay that was, without doubt, meant to impress a kid on a grad-school budget. After several interviews, the recruiting manager told me that every new engineering recruit had to meet the CEO. That was fine with me.

    I was ushered into Larry Ellison’s office. He was sitting at a desk in front of a large window that overlooked the Bay. He was casual and easygoing, and for the next 15 minutes, we talked about this and that. What did I learn in school? What did I want to do? Which of the many positions we had discussed was most interesting to me? Then he stood up and that was it.

    I had no way to know back then that Ellison would go on to become one of the most celebrated, colorful, and controversial CEOs of all time. Or that Oracle shares would end up climbing nearly 90,000% from the price of the company’s initial public offering. In those days, Ellison was just a startup guy in his early forties. His net worth was not worth mentioning.

    I was offered the job at Oracle, but I ended up taking the other job. It was at another company that had just gone public, Sun Microsystems, and it had a distinctly different feel. (I didn’t know enough about business to think of it as “culture.”) It was driven by engineers, many of them with Ph.Ds. Salespeople were nowhere in sight during my interviews. The intense tech focus seemed like a better fit for me.

    I didn’t see Larry Ellison again until years later, after I had left engineering to become a journalist. It was during a talk at the University of California, Berkeley in 1999 where he was interviewed by the dean of the journalism school, Orville Schell. Ellison spent most of his time bashing Microsoft. He had become brash, cocky, and a billionaire. Like him or hate him, he was far more memorable than the affable guy I had met back on Davis Drive.

    On Thursday, Oracle announced that Ellison was stepping down as CEO after 37 years. Though some say it’s more of a formality than a true change, it’s a moment of significance for one of the industry’s most prominent leaders.