Robert H. Smith School of Business - University of Maryland, College Park

Carly Fiorina's New Memoir Tops Must-Read List at Smith

I started out as a secretary, and success was never obvious, said Carly Fiorina, former CEO of HP and author of the new book Tough Choices: A Memoir at a book signing and Robert H. Smith School of Business alumni networking event on November 13, 2006. I wanted to tell the story of business the way I experienced it. I wrote it myself because I wanted it to be authentic, she said, explaining that she didn't use a ghostwriter or co-writer. The book is on the New York Times Best-Seller List.

Nearly 300 people gathered at the Ritz Carlton in Tyson's Corner, Va., to meet the iconic leader and listen to her describe her experiences as former CEO of HP and an MBA student at Smith. "I'm tremendously proud to be one among many of the great representatives of this school," said Fiorina, MBA 80.

I filled out a single application: to the Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland. At that time, it was the only accredited business school in the immediate area of Washington, D.C., Fiorina writes in Tough Choices. I received a rejection notice.

Fiorina was living in Italy teaching English and an Italian postal service strike prevented the application from arriving on time. She contacted Ed Locke, professor emeritus who at the time was head of the MBA appeals committee for admissions, and successfully appealed the decision.

Her application had come in late due to Italian mail, recalls Locke. Her record was a 4.0 GPA from Stanford and a very high GMAT score.

When she arrived at Smith, Fiorina used the same intellect and drive that earned her honors and distinction as an undergraduate at Stanford to earn straight As at Smith. However, Smith administrators and faculty noticed Fiorina for more than her ability in the classroom.

She took a doctoral course on motivation from me -- a very unusual step for an MBA student, says Locke. Her term paper was so good that we published it -- another very unusual event.

[Dr. Ed Locke] believed in my contribution enough to put his name alongside my own and publish the results. I felt as though I could conquer the world the day the journal was published, writes Fiorina.

Locke has kept in touch with Fiorina over the years and describes her as Nice, brilliant, hard working, and honest. I asked if she had considered becoming a professor, but she said she wanted to be where the action was. I thought she would become a CEO, and she did!

Bill Nickels, professor emeritus of marketing, hired Fiorina as a teaching assistant (TA) during her time at Smith.

Watching [Bill Nickels] teach, I learned the power of humor and the impact of storytelling. And working as a teacher myself (I taught eight undergraduate classes a week), I had also discovered that people sometimes learn best when they have to figure things out for themselves, writes Fiorina.

After a touching reunion at the networking event, Fiorina described Nickels as the first professor who let her argue with him in his office, in the classroom. To get a quality decision, you need to invest in a quality decision-making process, she said.

Carly was not set upon being a business mogul when she worked for me, says Nickels. In fact, she said she wanted to be a consumer advocate. Nonetheless, she was taken with the idea of industrial sales. The rest, as they say, is history. Carly taught several discussion sections in marketing. She came to my office early in the semester and asked whether or not she was free to teach in her own style. I said, yes, and she did. She was highly confident and professional. Teaching in front of several discussion sections enabled her to hone her presentation skills, which paid of tremendously in her career. She became a role model for dozens of other TAs who followed, says Nickels.

For whatever reason, the dean of the business school, Dr. Rudy Lamone, saw something in me, and one afternoon he asked me to come to his office. I was very nervous; perhaps Id done something wrong. Instead, he asked for my help in devising a more effective alumni program, Fiorina writes.

I asked Carly to study and evaluate our alumni program, says Rudy Lamone, professor emeritus and former dean of the Smith School. At the end of the project, Carly, in a very diplomatic and sensitive way, told me we were doing a lousy job. She also made recommendations on how to correct the problems."

Lamone remembers first meeting a persistent and confident Fiorina in 1978 when she was still a prospective student.

"My secretary called to say that a prospective MBA student wanted to talk to the dean about the MBA program. I told my secretary to tell her to go to the MBA Office. My secretary said she had already recommended that the student go to the MBA Office, but the student wanted very much to speak with the dean. So I said, Okay, send her in. After a brief introduction, she said, Do you think a liberal arts graduate can compete with the analytical jocks you bring into the MBA program? What I thought would be a five-minute meeting turned out to be almost a 60-minute meeting. And I knew that the Smith School would admit an MBA student who would leave an indelible mark on the history of the Smith MBA program," remembers Lamone. From an MBA student to the CEO of one of the world's top 30 corporations, Carly always believed that achievement was based on performance, not gender.

Lamone continues, "In almost all of her endeavors, Carly brings great passion, intelligence, commitment and vision. At HP, Carly led an extraordinary transformation of one of the great companies in the history of corporate America, redefining its purpose, meaning, and culture. Her book should be required reading for all MBAs, and others as well, who really want to understand what leadership is all about."

Video of Fiorina's Speech

▓ Alissa Arford-Leyl, Office of Marketing Communications
Mark Mulvanny, MBA Candidate 2007, Smith Media Group, contributed to this article