That's for sure. In the past year, Livermore has evolved from a cautious practitioner of HP's consensus-oriented management into a lightning rod for change at Silicon Valley's granddaddy of technology companies. It was she who finally got HP into gear on the Internet. And when HP CEO Lewis E. Platt announced in March that he would step down, Livermore shocked some colleagues by confirming that she wanted the job. If judged unseemly by some, Livermore's approach almost worked.
Insiders say Livermore was the only internal candidate who made the short list.
I already have one of the best jobs in the industry,'' she says. She's somewhere in the middle. She never ran a Net business until last November. Some analysts say that Livermore managed it too cautiously. That's why her rapid rise has left some of her peers miffed.