Compaq alienates top boffins
Apparently, on the 2nd of August, Compaq's global research units were treated to a confidential strategic roadmap presentation by Dr. Alex Stepanov, VP & Chief Scientist.
Stepanov, a Russian, was brought in by chief technology officer Shane Robison to front the CTO's office.
Sources tell the INQUIRER that this office was largely responsible for the decision to sink the Alpha iceberg in favour of the Itanic.
Time to re-orient the whole research organisation and to look in a visionary kind of a way, ahead, then.
According to our fly-on-the-wall, this is what happened next: "Dr. Stepanov's presentation was not well received by the technical staff, most of whom are blue-chip PhDs from Stanford, MIT etc.
"Stepanov lost his cool and in front of the entire worldwide organisation watching by teleconference, started bellowing in his Russian accent: 'you can all quit! I have authority! Shane appointed me! You have never produced any good proposals! Research is not important!' and so on.
"In this debut presentation to the cream of the research staff, he alienated the staff and undermined the credibility of the CTO office. Things got so bad that people walked out of the talk, including the director of the Systems Research Center (who incidentally has resigned and will now head up the new Microsoft Research division in Silicon Valley).
"In short, the research component at Compaq is coming unglued, and the new CTO office is creating a hullaballoo. Morale has gotten very bad during the past year, since the new CTO arrived, but now it has gone beyond rock bottom. Expect a significant number of departures of talented research staff in the near future." µ
You can find Shane Robison's Compaq interview here. Compaq was not available for comment at press time but we will be very happy to present Mr Robison and Dr Stepanov's view of these proceedings. µ
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Whoever wrote this article should find a new career, clearly there is no hope for him as a writer/journalist. Alex Stepanov, firstly for those who have ever heard the man speak, is known for his very distinct British accent, although he is Russian, his accent does not reveal that. Also referring to one of the most well respected men in the industry as a Boffin is simply a disgrace. I am disturbed that the source of this article is described simply as "a fly on the wall" and such defamation statements against someone like Mr. Stepanov can be made without credible sources. Yet again your author is clearly not a reliable writer as he refers to Mr. Stepanov as Dr. Stepanov, he is not referred to as Dr. Stepanov, as he holds only as masters degree. Anyhow, shocking and disturbing but not surprising as often there are unreliable articles published on websites that do not require verifiable articles.
I have to agree, this article is a bad one. This is the only one speaking of Alex in such a terrible manner. It should be removed actually,since some of us in the scientific community find it offensive. Thank you. Dr. Moore