Meg Whitman CEO HP: "The Price of Inaction is Far Greater than the Cost of a Mistake"

Meg Whitman on what it takes to lead, her best career advice, and embracing risks

American business executive and politician

Ambassador Meg Whitman has significant experience leading business organizations, from start-ups to large multinational companies in Silicon Valley. She has served as the President and CEO of Hewlett Packard Enterprise and the Hewlett-Packard Company, both multinational information technology companies. She also served as President and CEO of eBay Inc, an online marketplace and digital payments company.

Whitman has also been a member of a number of corporate boards of directors, including Procter & Gamble and General Motors.
Committed to equality in education and protection of the environment, Ambassador Whitman has been National Board Chair of Teach for America and has been a Member of the Board of Trustees of The Nature Conservancy.

Whitman was described as “relentlessly optimistic,” and those who worked with her said that her ability to stay focused and positive set her apart from most executives. Over the years, eBay continued to flourish under her leadership. When many Internet ventures had either failed or were struggling to survive, she managed to elevate the status of eBay from a small business employing a few dozen people to a major corporation employing some 15,000 and bringing in billions of dollars in revenue. Whitman retired from eBay in 2008.

In our conversation, Whitman spoke about the difference between leading a Fortune 500 company and a startup, how to decide what risks are worth taking, and her best career advice.

How did you decide what risks are worth taking?

I am a proponent of risk-taking. I always say the price of inaction is far greater than the cost of making a mistake. I have a bias towards action and I always just look quite carefully at what the risks are. I learned something very early on in my career at Bain and Company, which is: There are three really important constituents. First, it’s customers, second is your competitors, and third is what’s your cost structure to deliver that service. Whenever I’m looking at risk and say, who are the customers? What are the trends? Is there an open white space in the offering to meet that particular customer’s needs? Who we’re going up against as a competitor and is there a way to win? And then thirdly, what is the cost structure and what’s the capital structure of the company? Then I look at opportunities across those dimensions and say, okay, I think this is a risk worth taking.

What’s your best piece of career advice?

For young people who are coming out of college or graduate school for their first or second job, you should find a company that you really admire, that you really like the product, and admire and like people that you’re going to be working with, because I don’t know about you, but I spend more time at work than I do with my family and probably have over the last 40 years. My best career advice is to love the product, love the company, and admire, respect, and enjoy the people that you work for.

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