Ibm:: People

International Business Machines (IBM): Strategies & People Issues

Debi S. Saini1 In 1914, Thomas J. Watson Sr. (regarded as the father of modern IBM) joined Computing, Tabulating and Recording Company (CTR) as general manager that had been founded in 1911. Watson developed IBM’s distinctive management style and corporate culture, and turned the company into a highlyeffective selling organization, based largely around punched card tabulating machines. In 1952, Thomas J. Watson Jr. became president of the company, ending almost 40 years of leadership by his father; in 1961, he was elected chairman of the board. Over the years, IBM emerged not just a computing company but as one of America's great institutions, one of its most powerful. Could one think of a world without IBM? It appeared unbelievable like a world without television, or automobiles, or football. Wall Street didn't call IBM stock “blue-chip” for nothing. IBM: An Overview of the 100 Year Journey For decades, IBM was the most successful corporation ever. Its THINK slogan had an interesting history; it emerged while Thomas Watson Sr.1 was exhorting people to debate enough so as to reach sustainable results; later on it came to acquire new2 meaning. IBM was an institution that had changed the face of corporate America, the way Americans worked and thought. The company was known as “Big Blue,”3 after the color of its heavy-duty mainframe computers. After CTR adopted the name IBM in 1924, THINK became an ever present reminder of the ideas that held the company together. THINK4 may have been the seed, but it was just one aspect of IBM’s culture. Over the years, the company developed a formal set of Basic Beliefs, which were designed to guide employee behavior: respect for the individual; the best customer service in the world; and excellence. IBM had learned over the years that culture isn’t just one tool of management; it is the essence of management. It meant that employees made the right decisions not...