Rules of the garage
# Rules of the garage

The rules of the garage are a set of eleven rules that attempt to encapsulate the work ethos that Bill Hewlett and David Packard set when they founded Hewlett-Packard. Since Hewlett-Packard was one of the earliest success stories of the information technology sector, it also used to more broadly describe the work ethos of Silicon Valley.

## Etymology

The Rules were first articulated in 1999 by then HP CEO Carly Fiorina - during her tenure as then HP CEO - and they were later used in a Hewlett-Packard ad campaign. The name was a reference to David Packard's garage in Palo Alto, in which Packard and Bill Hewlett first founded the company after graduating from nearby Stanford University in 1935.

## The Eleven "Rules of the Garage"

The eleven rules are:

* Believe you can change the world.
* Work quickly, keep the tools unlocked, work whenever.
* Know when to work alone and when to work together.
* Share — tools, ideas. Trust your colleagues.
* No Politics. No bureaucracy. (These are ridiculous in a garage.)
* The customer defines a job well done.
* Radical ideas are not bad ideas.
* Invent different ways of working.
* Make a contribution every day. If it doesn’t contribute, it doesn’t leave the garage.
* Believe that together we can do anything.
* Invent.

See also Wikipedia discussion of HP culture

