“You need to replace the CEO with someone who has a vision for growth for our company not someone who only cuts costs.” http://www.businessinsider.com/a-closer-look-at-oracle-co-ceo-mark-hurd-2014-9 . That statement was from an HP employee in 2014. I'm betting that this is increasingly the sentiment of Oracle employees in 2017.
MH's strategy is cost cutting. He had a track record at HP of shrinking the bottomline in order to increase the profit numbers and his stock option bonuses while not doing anything for topline growth. He drove HP into the ground with this approach. Now he is using the same playbook at Oracle. Topline growth has been stuck for a while now and there really isn't any focus on how to change that. MH has been cutting expenses, eliminating reimbursement payments in some categories, shutting down "perks" and finding ways to dial back on employee compensation. Now MH's focus is on making Oracle Digital -- telesales staffed by college grads (translation: lower cost labor) -- the "heart" of the sales force. Given that he eventually asked for compensation cuts of 20% at HP (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financialcrisis/6983526/Pay-cut-leaves-HP-boss-Mark-Hurd-with-just-30m.html), none of this should really be a surprise.
Managing money well is one thing. Look at Warren Buffett and the financial discipline he requires out of the companies he owns. They run a tight ship and show consistent profit, but (1) they don't overrun their employees and (2) they use it as a way to grow the business against competitors who aren't as disciplined. In many cases, running lean allows the company to pass some of the savings along to customers and, in doing so, undercut the competition and grab market share. That is a business strategy.
What MH does -- figuring out ways to pull in the most money for himself at the expense of others -- is a personal strategy. He is able to take cost cutting too far because he manipulates the stockholders into believing that it will be beneficial for them too. It does work for a while, but, in the meantime, the employees are growing discontent while innovation, product quality and service suffers. Eventually, the fact that cuts went too far become evident and the business begins to suffer. If Oracle hasn't yet reached that point, it is quickly on the way to getting there.
Until the stock price takes a hit (i.e. profits don't meet expectations, investors see that Oracle is just Cloud-washing everything or the financial games Oracle is playing with their books comes out), things are unlikely to change. After all, the biggest stockholder thinks that MH's approach is exactly the right thing to do as was expressed back in 2014 -- '"The H.P. board just made the worst personnel decision since the idiots on the Apple board fired Steve Jobs many years ago,” Ellison wrote' (from original Business Insider reference). LE is a huge MH fan and LE is fully onboard with that "strategy" as long as his own personal fortune isn't impacted.