At HPWorld 2002 a first happened in the history of the HP user group conference, the press was excluded from all the management roundtables. The story is that HP PR requested this of Interex and "someone" agreed, in the words of the Executive Director of Interex "HP did some favors for us so we did this favor for them". Many of us were outraged and Ron Seybold of The 3000 NewsWire was eventually allowed into the HP e3000 Management Roundtable through the intervention of people such as Ken Sletten. It should be noted that the virtual CSY management had no knowledge of the exclusion policy and in fact all panelists agreed that the press should be admitted. It should also be noted that two Board members of Interex were in the room and did nothing.

The Strategic Management Roundtable immediately followed and at the end when the floor was opened to questions, I rose and challenged the panel about the press exclusion policy. The only panel member willing to respond said it gave HP the opportunity to freely interact with its customers. I countered that for all but the hundred or so people in attendance the only way they would learn about the current thinking of HP management was from press reports.

Following the conference, I sent an e-mail to various members of HP management and Interex management. The only response I received was from Ann Livermore who promised to have someone look into the situation, though I never did hear anything.

Several weeks later, Interex issued an "apology" to its members, effectively promising not to let this happen again. The text of my original e-mail follows.

[The contents of this e-mail were publicly distributed via several forums and may be copied and re-distributed without restriction. It was addressed to the one Strategic Management Roundtable participant who offered an e-mail address, but is directed at HP management, and to the Board of Directors and Executive Director of Interex.]

I was the one who rose at the Strategic Management Roundtable to protest the exclusion of the press from it and all the other management roundtables. My current employer, Pacific Coast Building Products (PCBP), is a long time customer of HP and the pre-merger Compaq. PCBP has also been a long-standing member (at the site level) of the Interex organization. In my various career stops, I have been a continuous customer of HP and site member of Interex dating back to the 1970s (when Interex was the HP3000 International Users Group).

In the years that I could not attend the conference, or could not attend a particular roundtable, I relied on the press, including Interex's own press organization, to keep me up to date on important happenings.

Now, for the first time in the history of what Carly Fiorino herself referred to as the longest running user conference in the industry, the press has been excluded from some of the proceedings. This sends the wrong message about the "new" HP and about Interex's independence. And, it cuts off the vast majority of HP customers from information that might be important to their business.

Since I did not recognize any of the panelists, and thus suspect many came from Compaq, perhaps it would be worthwhile to go over some of the history of the Strategic Management Roundtable and how it has become increasingly irrelevant to HP's customers.

As recently as six or seven years ago, the Strategic Management Roundtable was a lively affair lasting several hours that required a room holding many hundreds of people. For many customers, it was the only opportunity to interact directly with top HP management. It provided a means for them to ensure HP management was hearing their concerns.

Was it at times rancorous? Of course it was. Were HP executives put on the hot seat? Yes they were. Were customers generally satisfied they had an opportunity to be heard? Absolutely. Was HP damaged by this free exchange? Not at all. That is unless you count the hurt feelings and sweat-stained suits of a few executives.

About six years ago, a generation of HP executives with thin skins took over and forced Interex (one can only speculate how much fight it put up) to modify the structure of the Strategic Management Roundtable into what it has become, a staged program that allows the panelists to give their best MBA-speak answers to prepared questions that are supposed to relate to issues raised in the annual Interex Advocacy Survey. Over the last few years, the canned questions have had less direct relation to the survey (this year approached zero) and the opportunity for audience participation has decreased to the point that I did not attend it last year and would not have attended this year had not the issue of press exclusion come up. One word sums up this year's Strategic Management Roundtable: boring. In a few more years at this rate, you'll be able to cancel it completely for lack of interest. Which, of course, may in fact be the goal. It is my impression that the current crop of HP executives is uncomfortable dealing with any customer not the CIO of a multi-billion dollar company. [Ok, I'll admit that was a gratuitous shot, but it underscores the passion I feel when barriers are put up against the free flow of communication.]

Consider this a public call for Interex (my user group) and HP (my "current" vendor of choice for computing solutions) to respond publicly and explain why they feel the need to limit opportunities for the flow of information between HP and its customers. Excluding the press was a blunder of such colossal stupidity that it calls into question the ability of the leadership of HP and Interex to manage their respective organizations.