It’s hard to write a book about the life of Andy Grove if you never know when you’re going to be done. Richard Tedlow, a Harvard
business historian and author of “Andy Grove: The Story of An
American,” has discovered that Grove isn’t done changing the
world, even in his semi-retirement.
The 70-year-old former chief executive of Intel still has a
cubicle at the company that he turned into the world’s largest chip
maker. When Tedlow’s 466-page book came out in October, Grove was
already well on his way to a new chapter with his latest mission:
preventing disaster in the U.S. health-care industry as the weight
of 46 million uninsured people imposes crushing costs on hospital
emergency rooms.
“He’s on fire,” says Tedlow. “Health care is a complex mess.
He has the ability to simplify something without making it
over-simplified.”
That was evident when I heard Grove give a speech recently at
Stanford University on how to overhaul the nation’s health care
system. He wants to off-load costs and protect the uninsured by
enabling them to keep their health records online and visit local
clinics at drug stores instead of emergency rooms for routine
treatment.
He also backs Intel’s plan to use sensor technologies to enable
caregivers to monitor the infirm in their own homes remotely. His
basic principle is to “shift left,” or move toward better
preventive care for the uninsured.
The records would be nothing fancy: just a “shoe box of
receipts” scanned onto the Internet. Patients could take small
keys, known as universal serial bus (or USB) flash drives, to
unlock the records at whatever health-care clinic or doctor’s
office they visited. That way, caregivers could always have access
to personalized information about a patient.
“We have a huge problem,” he said. “It’s getting worse.”
When Grove gets an idea, he runs with it. One of the most famous
was “make the PC it.” That meant doing everything from marketing
computers and developing advanced technologies to designing
computers – all so Intel could sell chips.
His answers are always creative. Faced with a disaster in the
memory business in 1985, he turned to his boss Gordon Moore and
asked what would happen if the board kicked them out and brought in
new management. Moore said they would exit the memory business.
Grove said, “Why don’t we do that ourselves?”
As Tedlow chronicles in his book, Grove – whose famous motto is
“only the paranoid survive” – is always adapting. At five, he
survived scarlet fever. He dealt with a hearing problem, faced the
horror of being a Jew under Nazi occupation of Hungary during World
War II, escaped from the Communist-controlled state in 1956, and
immigrated to the United States more than 50 years ago.
In Silicon Valley, he started out as a researcher, moved into
management, helped get Intel off the ground as employee No. 4, and
became the driving visionary at the company. He deftly switched
roles from CEO to chairman, conquered prostate cancer, and now is a
senior advisor at Intel.
Tedlow’s book shows Grove’s many dimensions, from his fiery
character that inspired fear among those who dealt with him to his
sense of humor, reflected in his private memos.
Now, as a patient himself with a mild form of Parkinson’s
disease, Grove is pursuing his new career passionately and with a
no-nonsense attitude. After his speech, a panel of health care
experts discussed his ideas and he berated them for being too
academic.
As I interviewed him after the speech with another reporter, his
hand showed the slightest tremors, but his deep voice was as strong
as I’ve ever heard it. I suggested to him that he was exhibiting
his own self-interest by suggesting that technology could solve the
health-care problem. He bristled at that and said he was being
self-serving on behalf of everyone.
His response was logical, and it reminded me of everything that
Tedlow wrote in his book about Grove. He thrives on confrontation,
cuts past niceties, and takes risks. He had a lot of grit, made
mistakes, learned from them and came out ahead of everyone else.
To read a book about a man and then to meet him in person is an
awkward thing. There are the inevitable disconnects between the
legend and the real thing. It’s easy to admire someone like Grove
too much and to forget about all the people he fought with. I think
that Tedlow has captured a good deal of the things worth admiring
about Grove. But he hasn’t captured it all.
I don’t know if Grove is going to make a dent in the health-care
problem. He has the full force of Intel, which has created its own
digital health division, behind him. Intel even has a social
scientist, Eric Dishman, who has been spearheading the project to
use sensors and other technologies to monitor patients in their
homes. I’d like them to win this battle.
Tedlow calculated last year that Grove has been on 77 magazine
covers, including Time’s “Man of the Year” in 1997. At this rate,
there will probably be more magazines and more chapters to come.
And yet I don’t know if we’ll ever fully grasp this complicated
man.
(Dean Takahashi writes for the San Jose Mercury News, a member of the ap News Service.)
