An interesting article on Bill Gates in today's San Jose Mercury News (http://www.mercurycenter.com/business/top/005562.htm):
Trial is leaving Gates a changed man
Washington Post
In September, Microsoft Corp. Chairman Bill Gates and his wife, Melinda, took
several dozen friends on a vacation train trip across Montana, Wyoming and
Colorado. It was, predictably, a first-class affair -- private rail car, fine food and
some of the most beautiful scenery in the country.
During dinner at a restaurant where the party stopped, a couple of strangers
who were eating there joined the group and proceeded, to most everyone's
amazement, to mercilessly tease the hosts. ''Hey, aren't you that computer guy
Steve Jobs?'' one of them demanded of Gates. In fact, they were actors,
brought in as entertainment by Gates and closely coached by him on what to
say.
As the world's richest person, Gates is accustomed to controlling many of the
events around him. But in the three months since that carefree rail trip, he has
found himself unable to blunt the assault that the federal government has
launched against his company. Day after day, in the antitrust trial in a
Washington courtroom, Justice Department lawyers have been laying out a
case for Microsoft as a danger to the U.S. software industry, with Bill Gates as
the ringleader.
As the trial has progressed, no one has felt the lash of those charges more
than Gates. In interviews, close friends and associates paint a portrait of a man
deeply stung by the accusations against him and his company, convinced that
he has done nothing wrong, and simmering with anger that the government
won't accept his explanations and back off.
In contrast to how he has typically run his business life, he is reacting more
with his heart than with his head, they say.
Worry about hostility
Indeed, some of the people closest to Gates worry that his hostility is
becoming a liability to the company. In private meetings and chance
encounters, some have begun to subtly suggest to him -- so far without effect
-- that the company, now the world's largest software maker, must act
differently than it did as a scrappy start-up.
Friends say that change must begin with Gates, whose personality and drive
have shaped Microsoft from the days more than 25 years ago when it was a
roomful of kids in ratty T-shirts. He must think of himself as an industry leader
responsible for helping the industry grow, rather than as head of a company
fighting to stay in business.
''Bill is clearly going from being an underdog to an industry leader -- and he
needs to internalize that,'' said David F. Marquardt, a member of Microsoft's
board of directors. Marquardt was one of the few people willing to speak on
the record about Gates, who also declined to be interviewed.
A Microsoft spokesman disagreed. Through the course of the trial, ''I've seen
him more rational, even more relaxed and a lot more thoughtful about how to
react and respond (than at times in the past) and still extremely convinced that
what he's done and what we're doing is right,'' said Greg Shaw, a company
spokesman who works closely with Gates.
Gates' reaction to the government's suit echoes the sentiments of another
industry leader, the late Thomas J. Watson, who headed International
Business Machines Corp. when the Justice Department sued the company in
1969. When he learned of the government's suit, ''my own private impulse was
to forget the niceties and fight like hell to protect IBM,'' Watson wrote in his
autobiography. ''It was like some primitive instinct -- as though (then-attorney
general) Ramsey Clark were threatening my child. This powerful feeling came
over me again and again through the years as our antitrust problems
unfolded.''
When the suit against Microsoft was filed in May, ''I think his (Gates') first
reaction was disbelief,'' said Heidi Roizen, a longtime software entrepreneur
who became friends with Gates 15 years ago and occasionally consults for the
company. ''Like 'How could this be?' And there's a sense of anger and
frustration that this could be done and was happening to him.''
At first Gates simply lashed out at the government, contending in an
electronic-mail reply to questions posed by the Washington Post that the
government's attack on Microsoft was tantamount to making the software
giant sell ''castrated products.'' Later in the summer, he grew glum, friends say.
Turning to Ballmer
The combination of the suit and other job-related pressures on Gates
ultimately persuaded him to turn to Steve Ballmer -- a college friend and
18-year Microsoft veteran -- for help. Ballmer was hesitant at first about taking
on the job of president of Microsoft in July. His goal was to shoulder much of
the daily responsibility for running the firm and to free Gates to spend more
time doing things he still considered ''fun,'' such as talking with Microsoft's
product teams.
Friends say that these days, Gates' legendary concentration is rattled. Though
he doesn't take part in the frequent conference calls senior executives hold to
strategize over the case, he does find his mind wandering to the dispute six or
seven times a day. ''It's a huge distraction,'' said one associate.
The need for change, said one friend, is an idea that ''has got to seep in. You
can't sit him down and tell him. It's a process, not an event.''
Others contend that whether Gates changes or not, the company must. ''We
can accomplish statesmanlike things without Bill changing,'' said one
Microsoft executive. ''Microsoft isn't a one-man band. We draw on others to
do things that Bill isn't good at.''
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