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Paul Cormier Replaces Jim Whitehurst as Red Hat CEO

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Re: Paul Cormier Replaces Jim Whitehurst as Red Hat CEO

#51

Post by rvp-x »

BaronVonSteuben wrote: post #30
zapita wrote: post #16

Good for Paul. He has wanted the CEO job forever, and was notoriously bitter about being passed over last time. Don’t expect a revolution in Red Hat’s strategy or culture. Paul was already extremely influential, especially on product and R&D which are not Jim’s strong suits. Things to know about Paul: - He is very competitive and has a zero-sum approach to competition: for him to win, someone else has to lose. - He h…

As someone who is a big fan of Red Hat, it horrifies me to see the new CEO be described like that. He sounds like one of the worst people for Red Hat. I admit I despise power seekers and people with tempers, so that's coloring my view a lot. I have always been optimistic about Red Hat's future, but this has me very worried. Red Hat has done so much good in the world, and it would suck to see them shrink or disappear.…

I wouldn't expect significant changes in RedHat just because Paul Cormier got moved up one rank. He isn't new to the company, and had a lot of influence in his previous role.

Re: Paul Cormier Replaces Jim Whitehurst as Red Hat CEO

#52

Post by zapita »

oso2k wrote: post #48
zapita wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The thing is, this is how Redhat Wins and has been winning ... I think redhat won't disappear because of this leadership style, but this is how it has been getting contracts, making money, getting sponsorships, and being attractive enough to be bought by IBM. Very true. Red Hat is a very successful company by any measure. Paul played an important role in making that happen. At the same time, Red Hat also has a majo…

DISCLAIMER: I work for Red Hat Consulting. Red Hat almost doesn't sell RHEL by itself anymore [0][1]. RHEL is lumped into OpenShift, Quay, OCS, OpenStack, RHV and more often than not sold along side Ansible, Tower, JBoss, AMQ, Fuse, DecisionManager, etc. So, the revenue streams are being bundled together which makes it harder to tease out which product is pushing the Total Revenue line. Our integration with IBM might…

> Red Hat almost doesn't sell RHEL by itself anymore [0][1]. RHEL is lumped into OpenShift, Quay, OCS, OpenStack, RHV and more often than not sold along side Ansible, Tower, JBoss, AMQ, Fuse, DecisionManager, etc.

Right, but that only strengthens my point. Red Hat is bundling add-ons with RHEL in an effort to boost add-on sales. Without the bundling, those products would be doing considerably worse in the marketplace.

> So, the revenue streams are being bundled together which makes it harder to tease out which product is pushing the Total Revenue line

Again, this supports my point. Given the historical importance of RHEL revenue standalone, there is no good reason to bundle it with other streams, other than to hide something. What is being hidden, presumably, is exactly how much Red Hat still depends on good old RHEL renewal, as opposed to genuine demand for their new products.

Re: Paul Cormier Replaces Jim Whitehurst as Red Hat CEO

#53

Post by gilrain »

zapita wrote: post #16

Good for Paul. He has wanted the CEO job forever, and was notoriously bitter about being passed over last time. Don’t expect a revolution in Red Hat’s strategy or culture. Paul was already extremely influential, especially on product and R&D which are not Jim’s strong suits. Things to know about Paul: - He is very competitive and has a zero-sum approach to competition: for him to win, someone else has to lose. - He h…

Yikes. It's 2020, and emotional abuse (which is absolutely what shouting at people you hold power over is) is not even a little acceptable. When you're an adult, you control your temper.

Re: Paul Cormier Replaces Jim Whitehurst as Red Hat CEO

#54

Post by op00to »

zapita wrote: post #26
notacoward wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, he's not going to like the phrase "Oracle-style" at all. Another thing people should know about Paul Cormier is that his hatred for Oracle knows no bounds. There's certainly no love lost between the two companies at any level, but even in that context the depth of his loathing for them seemed notable. Some might say excessive. I was there for eight years BTW.

That is true - the hatred of Oracle runs deep. But when it comes to competitive tactics, they have more in common than the Red Hat marketing brochure would have you believe.

Like what?

Re: Paul Cormier Replaces Jim Whitehurst as Red Hat CEO

#55

Post by op00to »

gilrain wrote: post #53
zapita wrote: post #16

Good for Paul. He has wanted the CEO job forever, and was notoriously bitter about being passed over last time. Don’t expect a revolution in Red Hat’s strategy or culture. Paul was already extremely influential, especially on product and R&D which are not Jim’s strong suits. Things to know about Paul: - He is very competitive and has a zero-sum approach to competition: for him to win, someone else has to lose. - He h…

Yikes. It's 2020, and emotional abuse (which is absolutely what shouting at people you hold power over is) is not even a little acceptable. When you're an adult, you control your temper.

No idea who or what youre talking about, but I’m sure youre not achieving whatever it is you set out to achieve here.

Re: Paul Cormier Replaces Jim Whitehurst as Red Hat CEO

#56

Post by op00to »

linuxftw wrote: post #14
mathattack wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

RedHat shares IBM’s model of “change the terms and product definitions every year and audit folks to death who can’t switch providers” They are going to irrelevance together.

I've worked with several large firms that had large footprints of Red Hat products and never heard about them being audited. You're confusing them with Oracle.

No, just sounds like that person can’t keep track of how many system they deploy.

Re: Paul Cormier Replaces Jim Whitehurst as Red Hat CEO

#57

Post by gilrain »

op00to wrote: post #55
gilrain wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yikes. It's 2020, and emotional abuse (which is absolutely what shouting at people you hold power over is) is not even a little acceptable. When you're an adult, you control your temper.

No idea who or what youre talking about, but I’m sure youre not achieving whatever it is you set out to achieve here.

I was responding to the description of the new CEO as losing his temper to a degree that his shouting can be heard on the entire floor. Which I don't view as appropriate.

Re: Paul Cormier Replaces Jim Whitehurst as Red Hat CEO

#59

Post by eskaytwo »

stuff4ben wrote: post #15
MelioRatio wrote: post #4

If anyone wants to find out more on what Cormier wants to focus on over the coming years, he did a small QnA: https://www.redhat.com/en/blog/get-know-red-hat-president-an... It will be interesting to see, how his management style is going to impact Red Hat over the coming years. Considering his background and acumen, I feel like there is going to be a stronger focus on tailored services and specific solutions for org…

A lot of IBM products are in the cloud and the focus from Whitehurst as IBM president is that cloud, containers/K8s/RHOSP, and edge are the big things that will be going on. It will be very interesting to see how RH plays into the broader IBM strategy. Will RH become the platform and IBM becomes tooling, services, and products on top of that platform? Or will RH move to more consultancy and enterprise IT services? Co…

Except Meraki - that’s been kept seperate in a similar way to RedHat.

Re: Paul Cormier Replaces Jim Whitehurst as Red Hat CEO

#60

Post by Jedd »

stingraycharles wrote: post #29
cachestash wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its the co-CEO strategy, or two in box. Its becoming quite popular as of late.

Why is that? I can’t imagine it going well for an extended period of time.

> I can’t imagine it going well for an extended period of time.

Why is that?

I don't think there are many modern examples, but the idea of consensus based decision making isn't new, and doesn't appear to be intrinsically flawed.

Consider the origin of the word triumvirate. While the first one ended less than optimally for all concerned, we have a slightly less violent way of dealing with organisational promotion and succession now.

Personally I love the idea of having three equal heads of state, especially if their decision and voting behaviours are obliged to be published.

But I also like the idea of proper democracy. I'm Australian, and I don't think we have an actual democracy here - just a poor facsimile. I think in the USA it's even more distant.

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