|
 |
|
|
|
|
"Let Sun Shine In. And Out."
Jonathan Schwartz, President and Chief Operating Officer
Sun Microsystems, Inc.
The word transparency can be tricky. Like the word love, it means
different things to different people. And, like the word love, it's
often used when it shouldn't be.
To many companies in this post-Enron, post-Sarbanes-Oxley world,
transparency means posting GAAP compliant financial statements to the
SEC, and hosting a quarterly conference call. But to the average
individual investor and even to many sophisticated, institutional
investors, financial statements are as transparent as a glass bottom on
a Mississippi River boat. Stare all you want, you're still just looking
at mud.
The point here is that someone trying to discern the true condition of a
company won't get it by reading an annual report or a quarterly
financial statement. You can read reams of data and management
discussion and get little more than a murky image of how a company is
doing and where it's going.
That's why, in our view, real corporate transparency means going beyond
financial statements. It even means going beyond the walls of the
company and into the minds of the men and women who are Sun. It means
learning what they're doing, saying and thinking about the firm, its
products, it community and its future. To enable access to some of our
most personal thoughts, Sun encourages employees to participate in
publicly-accessible blogs. I myself have one
(http://blog.sun.com/jonathan). Blogs bring investors, developers,
partners, customers and others who are interested in the soul of this
corporation, onto the desktops and into laptops of the folks who make
Sun run. No holds barred. Sun blogs let us engage in public discussions
about everything from products-in-process and corporate strategy to the
prospects-for-world-peace.
And when it comes to financial disclosure, our financial statements go
way beyond the basic requirements. We constantly evaluate metrics that
we believe will help shareholders understand the company's long-term
strategy, competitive positioning and progress. For example, we pack our
earnings calls with data that investors are likely to find useful,
providing details on things like total server units, server growth rates
and the number of subscribers to the Sun Java Enterprise System.
Then there are those monthly conversations, broadcast on WSUN radio, in
which CEO Scott McNealy takes three tough questions from an employee and
has an on-air dialogue broadcast over a Sun-wide audio stream. There are
the town halls and small group meetings that McNealy holds around the
world with employees each year. And there are the emailed comments and
questions from Sun employees that Scott answers personally.
All this ensures access to the highest levels of Sun management and
stimulates a bi-directional flow of straight talk about the company.
It's all part of the glass house we're building to let Sun shine out.
And in. We recognize that innovation happens everywhere. We value
employees ability to constantly look out over the horizon, observe
trends, changes and ideas and communicate them here, to weigh their
potential benefits for Sun.
Our bottom line is stronger, in large part, because we place a premium
on the free flow of information. We like to think that former Supreme
Court Justice Brandeis had us in mind when he said that "Sunshine is the
best disinfectant."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
