, Columnist
Oracle Should Have Disclosed Hurd’s Illness Sooner
Individual privacy sometimes has to take a back seat to good corporate governance.
Being upfront puts a company in control over when and how to disclose sensitive matters.
Photographer: David Paul Morris/BloombergThis article is for subscribers only.
I understand why Oracle Corp. tried to keep the illness of Mark Hurd, one of its chief executive officers, private as long as possible. It was a humane personal decision, but it was the wrong corporate one.
A day after Bloomberg News contacted the company for an article about how Oracle had been grappling internally with Hurd’s health for many months, the company moved up the planned announcement of its quarterly earnings and disclosed that Hurd is taking a leave of absence for health-related reasons.