March 26, 2001

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HP Plugs In To Community

By Diane Rezendes Khirallah   (drezende@cmp.com)

rom the Palo Alto, Calif., headquarters of Hewlett-Packard, it's just a couple exits north on the 101 Bayshore freeway to East Palo Alto. Once infamous as the murder capital of the country, EPA, as it's known, remains in many ways in the shadow of Silicon Valley. It's the type of community that every major metropolitan area has: Some longtime Silicon Valley residents have never ventured there unless by accident, and then only with car doors locked and their cell phone ready to speed-dial 911. But the city is also marked by hope and a desire to take part in the technology revolution that's brought such influence and affluence to the area.

It's here that the $48.8 billion hardware vendor has chosen to support the creation of its "Digital Village," pouring $5 million during the next three years into Plugged-in, a community technology center that serves school-age children and community residents.

Fifteen-year-old David Williams and 13-year-old Larry Moore are well on their way to technology success through part-time jobs they have with Plugged-in. They're part of a teen-run graphics business, an entrepreneurial group whose credits include Web pages for Pacific Bell, the Stanford Research Institute, and former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Steve Young. At any given time, six students are working in production while another six are in training. Like Williams and Moore, most are relatively new to technology.

As recently as last summer, neither teen had a computer at home; Moore had no computer knowledge, while Williams had learned "a little word processing" on a computer at school.

Both are now proficient in Adobe Photoshop, thanks to instruction from Bobby Baird, their manager and a

full-time Plugged-in staffer with a degree in mechanical engineering from Stanford University. Knowing little about technology may actually have helped the teens learn faster, Baird says, because they had no preconceived notions. When Moore and Williams came in, "they had no idea that programs like Photoshop are the industry standard and are supposed to be hard to learn."

Moore and Williams decided to create a logo for the Digital Village, and with some help from the art team at HP, they went from thumbnail sketches through pitch meetings to the final rendering of the logo.

Both teens found the HP design team open to their ideas. Like most 13-year-olds, Moore moves between intense focus and being uninterested in his work. In describing the sketches he and Williams came up with, he says proudly, "They really liked the idea of people and feet moving. It's the idea of balancing and supporting each other, people in the community."

Until recently, HP's approach to corporate philanthropy followed typical business practice: A school or nonprofit asks for funds for a specific purpose, and if the company approves it, the funds are sent. Or the company creates a program and makes it available to qualifying schools and organizations, subject to renewal each year.

But these scenarios can be problematic. As initial funding nears its end, businesses evaluate their involvement, and schools get nervous about whether the funding

will continue. This often creates a disturbing situation for educators, who value consistency and continuity for children, especially poor children who may have precious little stability at home. The inherent problem is that most programs in education take much longer than their original designated time frame to yield results.

In its affiliation with Plugged-in, HP is making a major break with its past to embrace what Bess Stephens, the company's director of philanthropy and education and head of the HP Foundation, calls a partnership model. Efforts such as those by HP and Salesforce.com/foundation (see story, p. 38) represent the vanguard of a new model of corporate philanthropy--one that values participation at multiple levels and expects returns at multiple levels.

Stephens says corporate philanthropy works best when the nonprofit group and the company collaborate from the outset as equals. "You have to talk to the people who are eager to become part of the economic mainstream," she advises would-be corporate philanthropists. "They know what's lacking; they have the best information on how their issues and problems can be best addressed."

The partnership model also calls for a liaison who understands both corporate and community culture. Janiece Evans-Page, a 15-year HP marketing veteran, took on a new role as E-inclusion executive in November. Working with community members, she'll put together a plan that includes a community portal and a formal corporate volunteer effort. "We're making a concerted effort with the program to match HP employees and their skills with the receiving organizations," Evans-Page says. The program is expected to roll out in the next couple of months.

Like marketing, metrics for success include customer satisfaction and delivering on commitments. But the bottom line is measured a bit differently: Instead of profit-and-loss statements, the return on investment is assessed by an increase in economic output in the community and an improvement in achievement rates in schools.

Ultimately for HP, community involvement is both pragmatic and philosophical. On the pragmatic level, "today's kids are tomorrow's HP customers--and employees," Stephens says. On the philosophical level, her answer is just as quick: "One of our core values is to be a valuable asset to the communities in which we operate."

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