A corporation's job is to make money. ... Left to its own devices, the boardroom only cares about the money. But it's not operating in a vacuum. There has to be demand for product, demand for quality, demand for safe and socially conscious manufacturing. It's a symbiotic relationship between "the consumer", society and government, and the company.
When the purpose of a company is to make money, then eventually the company does not make profits and its products are some of the world's worst. The examples are so numerous that only people who believe propaganda, who rationalize using sound byte, would believe that profit myth.
When HP was most profitable, profit was not its objective. Even HP's corporate statement made that fact obvious and blunt. Bill and Dave stories are legendary and define a company driven by its product - serving it customers. GM has no profits because GM will do anything to make profits - including short its pension funds, stifle the 70 HP per liter engine, refuse to even use overhead cam engines 30+ years after the technology was standard, stifle the McPherson struct for 34 years, and pocket $million from the government intended to develop a hybrid.
Current situation from HP goes right back to what I reported here after the Compaq HP merger meeting. (BTW, I always wondered the relationship between Fiorina and Ann Baskins). Pam Dunn is a continuing symtpom of Fiorina, a classic example of what happens when a person has no idea how work gets done and believes the MBA school lie about profits being the purpose.
I have worked in locations where I often thought about tracking down members of the local fire department and tell them to be educated about that chemical. In other locations where people mostly came from where the work gets done (ie California), same safety problems did not exist. Therefore those CA companies were also more profitable.
When the purpose of a company is its profits, well, that was the mentality of that BP executive whose cost control mentality eventually causes massive corrosion of the Alaska pipeline. He was classic of one who lied; thought profits rather than the product were more important.
When profits are more important than product, we also have actions very much common to communism. If your roof is leaking, for a communist organization, then it is not until the government official tells you otherwise. If your roof is leaking in a company so concerned with profits, then it is not until the corporate officers say otherwise. If your roof is leaking in a company concerned about the products, then you have discretion to make the decision and authorize its repair. Nothing new in that story.