Success Quote by David Packard

Under the pleasant frosting of encouragement, Packard is doing something very corporate: declining without saying no. "You appear to have a good project" is praise carefully hedged by distance. Appear to whom? By what standard? The wording keeps Packard out of the line of fire if the project fails, while still letting him sound generous. Then comes the classic send-off: "we wish you well in this endeavor" a phrase that, in boardroom dialect, often translates to "not us."

The intent is diplomatic triage. Packard, as the HP co-founder and a defining figure of postwar managerial capitalism, operated in a world where attention, money, and institutional legitimacy were scarce and constantly petitioned for. When leaders like him offered real support, they tended to do it with concrete commitments: time, introductions, funding, resources. The absence of any of that is the message.

Subtext matters because it reveals Packard's operating culture: politeness as a tool of risk management. It's the language of a system built on rational allocation and reputational control. You don't crush the dreamer at your doorstep; you let them leave with their dignity intact and your calendar untouched.

Contextually, this is West Coast techno-business ethos before it became a meme: optimistic on the surface, unsentimental underneath. Packard isn't being cruel. He's being efficient. The line works because it lets both parties keep face, while quietly establishing the boundary that actually governs the interaction: encouragement costs nothing; commitment is expensive.