Intro Chapter 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21
In April 1989, the announcement of a merger between Novell and Lotus Development Corp. caused a sensation in the entire computer industry. The trade press gave it front page/special section treatment, and scores of analysts and industry pundits were interviewed for their reaction and predictions. Virtually everyone agreed that a major problem in the merger would be the clash of corporate cultures, as the yokels from Provo got down to business with the yuppies from Cambridge.
It seems odd, to the uninitiated, that culture should be an issue. Is Utah really so different from Massachusetts? Is life at Novell so unlike life at other computer companies? And if Novell's culture is unique, how important a factor has it been in the company's meteoric success?
In the early days, from its beginnings up until the late 1980s, most people in the computer industry correctly thought of Novell as a Utah company managed by Mormons. As the company grew through acquisition, both the reality and the public perception of Novell's nature changed. Yet in some ways, the perception has changed more than the reality, and Novell in the 1990s still retains many of the characteristics that distinguished it in its first decade.
Novell grew up in Utah. Most of its employees were Mormon Utahns (today about half are). As one might expect, this regional and cultural influence shaped the way the corporation went about its business.
Utah in a nutshell
Utah is a large, very scenic state located on the western side of the Rocky Mountains. It occupies an area almost the size of New England, yet only 1.7 million people reside there (as versus the 20 million or so in New England). Its climate is semi-arid and much of it is a high desert (Salt Lake City is about 4,000 feet above sea level). Most of the year, even in the winter, the weather is sunny and pleasant. Tourists come to Utah for the skiing in the winter -- state license plates boast "The greatest snow on earth" -- and for the spectacular scenery and recreational areas in the summer. The state is home to five national parks, several national forests, 41 state parks, and thousands of square miles of public land managed by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM). (About 50 percent of Utah is BLM land.) Besides the mountains and the canyonlands, Utah's most distinctive natural feature is the Great Salt Lake, a vast inland sea (salty because it has no outlet) some 100 miles long and fifty miles wide, but averaging only 25 feet deep.
These facts may be of some interest to Novell's U.S. customers. Although international customers seldom had trouble locating Utah, Americans in other parts of the country were sometimes deplorably misinformed. Some thought Utah was near Iowa, others placed it in the Northwest, and more than one believed it was somewhere in Canada.
The Utah territory was colonized in 1847 by the Mormons, the followers of the 19th-century prophet Joseph Smith. This group had been persecuted everywhere it put down roots -- from New York state to Ohio, to Missouri, to the Illinois country. In 1846, after Smith's murder by an angry mob, the Mormons commenced their great, thousand mile trek to Zion, their promised land. They went there by walking through wilderness -- there were no roads and the transcontinental railroad across that part of the US would not be built for another twenty years. They arrived in the valley of the Great Salt Lake in July of the following year, under the leadership of Brigham Young, the new church president. The Kingdom of Deseret, as it was called in the early years, flourished. By the time the nation's first transcontinental railroad was completed 22 years later in 1869 (the final spike -- made of gold -- was driven at Promontory, Utah), over 80,000 people were living in Utah.
Utahns are proud of their pioneer history, and for most, this history is also the history of their church. About 68 to 70 percent of Utahns are members of the Mormon faith, officially known as The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (informally referred to as the LDS Church). Their faith teaches strong devotion to family, strong devotion to community, and strong devotion to the Church. They believe that spiritual progress can be made by living in accordance with Church teachings. They are also urged to work towards continual self-improvement.
Like members of other faiths, Mormons are inclined to think of themselves as a people chosen and blessed by God. Indeed, the church doctrine holds that the early Native Americans were descended from the lost tribes of Israel, and the LDS Church used many of the terms and symbols associated with the Jews: "Zion" in reference to Utah; the six-pointed star of Israel; and "gentile" in reference to non-Mormons. They are active proselytizers. Between high school and college, many young Mormon men and women leave home to go on a one-year "mission" for the Church where they seek converts and spread the good news of their faith. (Many Mormon Utahns speak a second language fluently as a result of their missionary training.) Since the LDS Church has a lay clergy, an active Mormon may hold various positions within the Church hierarchy and may even rise to positions of Church leadership.
Over six million people around the world belong to the LDS Church, but the largest Mormon population lives in the western United States, especially in Utah, Nevada, Arizona, Idaho, and California. The prototypical Utah Mormon has or comes from a large family, goes to Sunday services at the "ward" (the equivalent of a parish), and may devote one or two additional days a week to Church work or some other community service. He or she is likely to be well-educated, politically conservative, respectful of authority, an avid sports fan, accustomed to working in groups and committees, and closely involved in the affairs of the ward and community. Mormons abjure the use of tobacco, alcohol, and coffee. Utahns in general, including many Mormons, enjoy athletics and other outdoor activities.
Although Utah's population boasts a wide variety of ethnic groups, including many people of Greek, Chinese, Japanese, Italian, Irish, Dutch, Afro-American, and Native American descent, the vast majority are of English, Scottish, or Scandinavian ancestry. This makes for a rather homogeneous-looking population -- lots of tall, blond, blue-eyed people.
Life in Utah is a bit more placid and laid-back than it is in more populous areas of the country. There are virtually no traffic jams -- not by east or west coast standards, anyway. Sales clerks are mostly courteous; at grocery stores they not only bag your groceries but take them out to your car as well. Real estate prices are low, and gas is cheap. Cities are clean of litter. The airport is very easy to negotiate, Utah is only a two-hour flight from almost any point in the U.S. west of the Mississippi.
Utahns tend to be offended by direct, openly aggressive, or impatient behavior. Conversely, people who have moved to Utah from out of state are sometimes annoyed at the slower pace of life and business. And those individuals who do not share the values of the majority are sometimes made to feel unwelcome.
About seventy percent of Utahns live and work in an urban area about 100 miles long extending from Ogden in the north to Provo in the south (Salt Lake City is in between). Novell, founded in Orem and relocated in Provo, is situated in Utah Valley. Because the population there is nearly 100 percent Mormon, locals sometimes refer to it facetiously as "Happy Valley."
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To a large extent, especially in the early years, the culture of Novell reflected the culture of Utah. Most Novell employees were Utah Mormons. When people from other parts of the country -- customers, analysts, members of the press, and employees at field offices and at acquired subsidiary companies -- came into contact with employees in Utah, a learning experience was often in store for both parties.
Novell employees outside of Utah had a tendency to regard the employees at company headquarters as rustic, benighted, in thrall to a strange religion, and inefficient, if not downright incompetent. At trade shows or other corporate events, these non-Mormon out-of-staters would often get together for drinks at the end of the day and swap headquarters horror stories: problems that had been ignored; situations that had been poorly handled; bizarre executive behavior or decisions; steps taken to save money that ended up costing money; flagrant waste; employees who continued to receive paychecks for weeks or months after they had resigned or been terminated; headquarters employees who had lied in order to evade responsibility; and on and on. Although the horror stories were for the most part true, the laughter that attended the recounting of them derived from a sense of isolation -- geographic, political, and cultural -- that field employees felt in their relations with the home office.
Utah employees sometimes picked up on this "outsider" attitude. Their first reaction was usually shock or disbelief, because, like most people, they believe they live in the best place, and all other places are an inferior second choice. Some Utahns believe their way of life is pretty much the norm across the nation and are genuinely unaware of the diversity of ideas and cultures that also define America. Many other Utahns have experienced this diversity, have lived and worked elsewhere, and are in every sense citizens of the world. The second reaction to this condescending attitude of some outsiders is thus anger: "Where do you get off . . . ." Many headquarters employees looked down on the field employees -- especially those who worked in the acquired subsidiaries -- as pushy, abrasive, sinful, obnoxious invaders.
Such a clash of cultures occurs whenever people from different areas interact. The Dutch think their Belgian neighbors are rather dull-witted. New Yorkers think the worst drivers come from New Jersey. East Coast jokes about West Coast, and vice-versa. Yet the disparity in cultures is much greater between Utah and other areas of the country. Someone from Chicago would have an easier time adjusting to Los Angeles than to Provo.
Consider the case of one non-Mormon employee who was recruited to Novell from the East Coast in 1988. On moving to Provo, she was asked numerous times by both neighbors and coworkers the inevitable question: "Are you LDS?" Upon answering no, she was immediately reassured, "Of course it doesn't matter; I was simply curious." But of course, by now it is clear that religion does matter -- as it matters nowhere else in the country.
Looking at the "Are you LDS?" question through the prism of The Prisoner's Dilemma
One reason the "Are you LDS?" question is important in Utah is that it sets a framework for future Cooperator Defector questions. Cooperator and Defector in this usage come from a Mathematical concept called The Prisoner's Dilemma. (outlined in its own section)
The question of, "Are you LDS?" is not so much a question of religious belief as a question of, "How should I treat you in terms of cooperating and defecting?" If you say, "No." then it will take a while longer to establish a double cooperator relation with a Mormon.
The dark side of this is that Utah is renown as the fraud capital of the US. If you answer, "Yes." then the typical Mormon lets some of his guard down. He or she expects that if you recommend an action, you will have the interests of both sides in mind when you make that recommendation.
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Later, in employee orientation, this new recruit learned how to use The Coordinator, Novell's electronic mail system at that time. The class is asked to send messages to each other. What message does our girl receive? "Do as you should. Read the Book of Mormon every day and live right." By now she is wondering what kind of company she has joined.
Soon after her hire, she attends one of the monthly MEMBERS meetings, where Ray Noorda gives hugs to new employees and briefs all employees on how well Novell is doing. She enters the cafeteria and is engulfed in a sea of blond heads. She is struck by the lack of ethnic diversity and by the youth of those assembled -- the company is run by kids! After some comments by Ray and some irreverent wisecracks by Craig Burton, the pep rally concludes with the cutting of several huge sheet cakes from Provo Bakery, all slathered thick with sugary icing. As the acres of cake are devoured, it occurs to this new employee that sweets may be the Novell intoxicant of choice.
Some flexibility -- on both sides -- was required in acclimating new employees from out of state to corporate headquarters. The Mormon influence was indeed pervasive. The Salt Lake City advertising firm, Fotheringham and Associates, was hired to design a Novell publication. After this was announced, an engineer sent a memo to Judith Clarke complaining of the choice of agency. "It has come to my attention that we have retained the services of an agency called Fathering Haven," the engineer wrote. "I think we should strongly consider asking this agency to change its name as a condition of doing business with us. I think Fathering Haven is an insult, and I'm sure our Father in Heaven would consider it insulting also."
He was serious.
Intro Chapter 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21