惠普董事会接下来怎么办？

    本周二，雷•莱恩在惠普公司（Hewlett Packard）的统治时代宣告结束。惠普的员工应该感到高兴。虽然这位前任董事长最近还在担任公司的执行董事，但是他再也不能对惠普的董事会呼风唤雨。惠普宣布，维权股东和公司董事拉尔夫•惠特沃思将临时担任董事长。惠普将撤销董事会成员拉吉夫•古普塔担任的首席董事职位。

    此外，不属于莱恩嫡系的约翰•哈莫葛伦和肯•汤普逊也将离开董事会。而马克•安德森和拉吉夫•古普塔这两名地位高于莱恩的独立董事则成功地在莱恩任内大规模董事离职中得以幸免。

    处境艰难的惠普遭遇另一个剧变的直接原因是，股东在3月20日年度股东大会上对莱恩（41%投反对票）和另两位董事会成员投出高反对票。（46%和45%的股东分别反对哈莫葛伦和汤普逊。）

    或许，对改善董事会治理来说，由惠特沃思掌舵的过度时期是一个好兆头。但重要的是，谁才是担任长期董事长的合适人选？惠特沃思承诺，董事会将从现有董事会成员之外招聘董事长。鉴于董事会在许多事件中遭遇惨败，特别是近期的自治崩溃，这不失为一个好消息。

    由于莱恩亲自动手挑战董事会成员和CEO，而且最近还担任执行董事一职，他本人作为董事会成员的独立性颇受质疑。2011年2月，莱恩在接受《圣荷西水星报》（the San Jose Mercury News）关于董事会变化的采访时表示：“这是我的工作。我不得不为此负全部领导责任。”而在新提名董事、新任CEO玛格丽特•惠特曼在公司年度会议上被任命为董事会成员后的一周内，惠普在未向投资者发出任何先兆的情况下宣布，惠特曼将加盟莱恩的公司凯鹏华盈（Kleiner Perkins）。这简直就是在公开表明他们之间的相互勾结。

    虽然现在的董事会成员大换血可能有助于重振公司的监管（虽然实际效果尚无法确定），但是惠普确实走过了一段曲折的道路。在某种程度上，这是由于股东及其投票咨询服务公司对此前形势的误读。投资者和顾问在辨别莱恩的角色时反应缓慢。2011年，当莱恩接管他们的职位（违反了董事会指南），而董事会提名委员会完全支持莱恩的提名时，投票咨询公司ISS建议对资深提名委员会成员投反对票。另外，今年《华尔街日报》（the Wall Street Journal ）报道称，在投资者怂恿对哈莫葛伦和汤普逊投反对票时，莱恩还能用花言巧语劝说部分股东不要追随他。

    然而，惠普将何去何从？惠特沃思现在应该证明自己是真正的维权董事了，是他所谓的每个董事会中应该存在的“挑刺者”。为了重建信任，我们需要一份公正而完整的灾难自治报告。该报告应该指出惠普董事会和管理层在灾难自治中的过失，而且不能掩饰任何问题。

    此外，我们还需要看到薪水改革方案。CEO宣布大裁员3万人，结果还获得了1，500万奖金，这不是负责任的董事会应该做到的监管。在提名委员会的帮助下，惠特沃思需要对董事会的构成进行重新定位。莱恩必须彻底离开公司。新的董事会成员必须清楚他们的独立作用。其中的一位董事必须能够发挥建设性作用，担任董事长。现有的董事会成员必须表现良好，否则就会被淘汰。

    这一幕成为现实吗？笔者并不确定。问题在于，如果监管董事会成员的大多数人是大型公司的中层管理人员，他们会认为自己的工作还算过得去，需要随时出现并提出巧妙的问题。但是在董事会的工作中，紧靠点头或摇头（依照自治规定）来决策的后果是灾难性的。

    Ray Lane's reign at Hewlett Packard ended Thursday, and employees should be pleased. While the former HP chair and, more recently executive chair, will remain a director, hewill no longer run the HP board. Ralph Whitworth, a shareholder activist and HP board member, will take his spot on an interim basis, HP announced. The company is eliminating the lead director position that board member Rajiv Gupta had held.

    Two other directors, John Hammergren and Ken Thompson, who Lane did not handpick, will be stepping down from the board. With their departure, Marc Andreessen and Rajiv Gupta are the only two independent directors that preceded Lane and have survived the mass exodus of directors that has taken place on Lane's watch.

    The immediate impetus for yet another upheaval on the beleaguered tech company's board was high shareholder votes against Lane (41% voted against him) and the two other board directors at the company's March 20 annual shareholder meeting. (46% and 45% of shareholders votedagainst Hammergren and Thompson, respectively.)

    The interim time -- with Whitworth at the helm of the board -- may bode well for turning around HP's board governance. But the $64,000 question is who is fit to become chair longer term? Whitworth has pledged that the board will recruit a chair presumably outside the ranks of existing members. This is a good thing given the role of the board in so many fiascos, most recently the Autonomy debacle.

    Because of Lane's hands-on approach to picking board members and the CEO -- and his recent role as executive chair, his own independence as a board member is questionable. "This was my job. I have to take full responsibility for leading this," Lane said of the board changes he'd made in an interview in February 2011 with the San Jose Mercury News. Less than a week after one of the newly nominated directors, now CEO Meg Whitman, was confirmed as a board member at the annual meeting, HP, with no forewarning to investors, announced that she would be joining Lane's firm, Kleiner Perkins. It has been all too cozy.

    While the current board member shuffle may indeed help to revive oversight at the firm (and that is not certain), the company has certainly taken a twisted path to get here. In part, this is because shareholders and their proxy advisory services so badly read the situation early on. Both investors and their advisors were slow to recognize Lane's role. In 2011, proxy advisor ISS recommended voting against the old-time members of the board's nominating committee when Lane took over their role (contrary to board guidelines) while it supported Lane's nomination in full. And even this year, the Wall Street Journal reported that Lane was able to sweet-talk some shareholders into not going after him while the investors urged votes against Hammergren and Thompson.

    Where to from here? It is time now for Whitworth to show he is a real activist and the prickly devil's advocate he says every board should have. To restore trust, we need to see a candid and complete report on the Autonomy debacle that outlines the culpability of HP's board and management in the matter. No whitewash.

    We also need to see a pay overhaul. Rewarding a CEO who has announced 30,000 layoffs with $15 million does not represent responsible board oversight. And with the aid of the nominations committee, Whitworth needs to rework the composition of the board. Lane must go. New board members who understand their independent roles must be hired. One of them must be capable of being the constructive chair HP (HPQ) needs. Existing board members must shape up or ship out.

    Will this happen? I'm not sure. The problem is that most people observing board members would view them as doing a passable job if they held large company middle-management positions, showing up and asking intelligent questions from time to time. But in board work, head bobbing (a la Automony) can be disastrous.