To: Everybody
From: John Walker
Date: 5 February 1986
Mike Ford has submitted his resignation as Vice President of Marketing and Sales, effective today.
I have accepted his resignation.
Effective immediately, Richard Handyside will assume the role of acting Director of Marketing and Sales. Richard continues to hold the position of Vice President of European Operations, and will be spending one week per month in the London office to continue his work there. Richard is a founder of Autodesk, Inc. and has been responsible for building our sales and marketing efforts in the United Kingdom since the company's inception. Please extend him the help he will need in filling the job he'll be assuming.
We will immediately begin the process of finding a permanent replacement for Mike Ford.
The events of the last two weeks, and indeed the last several months have placed many of us under extreme stress. We have all found ourselves wondering what was happening as rumours circulated and we considered what they might mean for the future of our company. We have come this far by trying to build a company which was open, fair, and honest. That is how we must continue.
There will be an all-company meeting tomorrow in the administration area (where we usually have the monthly meeting). Because of the extraordinary seriousness of what has happened, the meeting will be longer than usual, and will start promptly at 5:15 P.M. I urge all of you who are concerned with the future of our company, unsure as to what has been happening, upset with the way things have been handled, or just confused to attend. I will try to explain what has happened and what happens next. I will answer all of your questions. I will stay until there are no more questions. All of the rest of the management of the company will be available to respond to your concerns.
In addition, I would like to reiterate that this company has always had, and will continue to have an open-door policy. If there is any matter you want to discuss with any of the management of the company, please bring it to us directly. If there's anything you'd prefer to discuss on a one-to-one basis, that offer stands and will stand.
If we continue to build our company on the principles which got us here: honesty, hard work, rewarding the people who do the work, and striving to minimise the politics, we can look back on this period as a time of testing for the company as it continued to grow. We have had what it took to build one of the singular successes of the 1980's in only three years. We have what it takes to continue. Let us begin today.
Editor: John Walker