Conference 7.286::digital

    What memo are you talking about?  The Dave Grainger "Direction for
    the 1990's" memo, the recent Industry Sales announcement, or something
    else?
    
    Being a SSUM, this would affect me directly.  I've not seen anything
    yet from my boss.
    
    Al
    

  shufflin' the DEC again............

    This topic is the stuff of rumors.  How about some facts, like the
    memo.  This is no small potato.  

    Perhaps the poster of .0 could contact the originator and ask if it may
    be published here.
    
    - ���

    We're dealing now with the Digital decision/delay/announcement process.
    
    People who are well-connected in the Digital political sense are busy:
    
    (1) They are making sure that they are "covered", ie get assignments
    they like before the everyone is aware and when there might be more
    competition for certain assignments.
    
    (2) They are letting common people know that they know, and derive
    perverse pleasure in teasing those of us who aren't as well-connected.
    
    (3) They are producing some vague sort of reassurance that nothing's
    changed while at the same time staying up to the wee hours in the
    morning in their ALL-IN-1 accounts struggling to keep power (if in
    Software Services) or struggling for it (if in Sales).
                                        

    the memo please!!!
    yours, worried,
    
    Bruno (sales support)

    What always amazes me about this company is that the people most
    affected by a change are usually the last to know! Why do we have
    such a difficult time dealling professionally with change and why
    is it that people have to turn to notes files to find out what
    management should be telling them first??!!
    
    For those of you in the dark...(no I won't post the memo)...
    Sales Support resources will be "owned" by the district manager
    and career planning will be the responsibility of SWS. So yes you
    folks will be reporting to sales. For that matter in a sense so
    will everyone else in the Districts. As we have been slowly seeing
    the District Sales Manager has been gaining more and more authity
    each fiscal year. This is much more in line with the competition
    where the DM's are the boss. 
    
    The difficultly here is the culture. We are accustomed to teams
    not "presidents", wth a few notable exceptions. I believe however
    that in order to compete you will overtime see a single person at
    a district level with alot of authority, more so than his peers(and
    that person will probably have a sales job code).
    
    

    re .8: 
    it seems to be the same construction as we (GY) have since middle of
    FY '88: 
    a SWS person (doing advisory / presales job) reports to his/her SWS
    unit manager. The SWS unit manager reports to his disctrict SWS
    manager and to the district sales manager. So you don't have a direct 
    reporting line from a SWS specialist to a sales person.
    So what's the problem?
    
    Erika. 

    I just got this vaxmail from the NorthEast Area Workstation Leader.
    
    It clears up some concerns and raises some new ones.
    
    Ed (Who hopes the moderator will spare this JENNINGS!)
    
                             *** Note ***
The following message is intended for SWS Sales Support people.
However, in order to ensure a wide distribution I am sending it to
several of my distribution lists which include people in other
functions as well. Maybe you'll find it interesting too!



I just spoke to Carol Bayley about the "Sales Support now reports to
Sales" message issued by Dave Grainger and Bill Ferry yesterday. 
There is a lot of confusion around what this all means! I hope the 
following information clears much of it up.

Primarily, it is "business as usual". Do not expect any major changes.
A Sales Support persons manager remains the same. The cost center 
remains the same. The job content remains the same. There can be 
units which consist of both Sales Support and Delivery people. Sales
Support people are eligible for Excellence Awards, not DECathalon.
etc...

So, what is new and/or changed? 

Budgeting and resource planning is being done "bottoms up" this year.
Since Sales has the responsibility for the budget, they now have more
say in defining and how their Sales Support resources are used to make
that budget. 

o It is the responsibility of Sales to define the resources that are
needed to meet the budget. It is the responsibility of SWS to hire or 
"source" the resources.

o Where arbitration is required to meet conflicting requirements (ie,
when a person cannot be at two places at once), Sales not SWS will make 
the decision. 

o It is SWS responsibility to ensure that appropriate training is
available for Sales Support people. It is the responsibility of Sales
to ensure that enough time is allocated to keep the Sales Support
person technically trained so that they maintain the skills necessary
to win business. 

o Sales provides input to performance evaluations, SWS does the 
performance evaluation. 

I have tried to address some of the issues raised in the 
Grainger/Ferry memo. Many of the above items are not really "new" or 
"changed". So, it is basically "business as usual" with some fine
tuning to help ensure that we make the best use of our critical
technical resources.

Regards and "DON'T PANIC" :-)

Lee
    
    
    

    
    What bothers me about all of this is the way that it is communicated.
    Fortunately our management tranmitted the memo to our organization, so
    we didn't have to find out about this through VAXnotes.
    
    When I worked for RCA (which was by no means the world's most people
    oriented company), MAJOR announcements were coordinated. Memos were
    sent to a certain level of management (equivalent to our Area mgr),
    a meeting was called for everywhere in the company at the SAME TIME,
    and the announcement was made with Q&A. And managers had the time to
    get some answers to the questions.
    
    This business of finding out about major changes in VAXnotes, Digital
    Review, mail sent from your freind, etc. is nonsense and ought to be
    stopped. Believe me, DEC today is like RCA after the GE buyout -
    rumors, rumors, rumors. And trust, me it will take its toll if not
    fixed.
    
    /ljj
    

    As long as it is stopped by getting communications right, that's fine.
    I dislike the possible implication of stopping other means of
    communication!
    
    - ���

Well, back to the orignial question...has anyone seen any tangible
results of the this announcement yet?

John

    From what we were told in a meeting with our District Management Team,
    each of the districts in the areas in the country have until 8 August
    1989 to prepare and present an implementation plan to the area
    management team.  Once the plan is approved it will be put in place.

    Wonderful, we're into double digits of replies talking about a memo
    that affects thousands of employees of which, few if any have read, but
    nevertheless it affected them.

    re: "It's changed but it's not changed"

    I hate it when intelligent people repeat such doubletalk.  Let's face
    facts: "teamwork" as a concept in the field has failed in a major,
    major way, as least how it was structured in recent years.

    To save Digital _from_ IBM, it has to _become_ IBM, and over time, one
    can see we adopting bits of its culture.  There's nothing wrong with
    it in itself, unless the original distinct values of Digital become
    lost.  (And maybe they have)

    How Software Services can salvage in the long-term, the notion of sales
    support as a career rather than being a mere "assistant to a sales rep"
    will be interesting.

    I'd also like to hear from the Sales Support Unit Managers, I'm
    guessing that they are not happy campers as a result of this
    announcement.

.15> Let's face facts: "teamwork" as a concept in the field has failed in
.15> a major, major way, as least how it was structured in recent years.

    Having spent the last 11 years in direct sales (for DEC) I can
    certainly (unfortunately) attest to this!!  This is truly unfortunate
    for I firmly believe that we at DEC have some of the most talented
    and dedicated individuals in the entire industry....but...at many
    opportunities we snatch defeat from the jaws of victory because of
    this lack of some very necessary teamwork.
    
.15> To save Digital _from_ IBM, it has to _become_ IBM, and over time, one
.15> can see we adopting bits of its culture.  There's nothing wrong with
.15> it in itself, unless the original distinct values of Digital become
.15> lost.  (And maybe they have)

    I really don't care if the ideas/philosophies/organization came
    from IBM, or HP, or Wang, or Beijing or Parris Island!!  It it's
    good for our customers and our employees...and Digital...then..
    DO IT!!  I do not think that the "original" values of DEC will be
    come lost, better, that they will be *enhanced*.

.15> How Software Services can salvage in the long-term, the notion of sales
.15> support as a career rather than being a mere "assistant to a sales rep"
.15> will be interesting.

    All I could do is evoke the "Esprit de' Corps"...I would hope that
    for the betterment of our customers and the future of DEC they would
    look at their position in Sales Support as being a viable, necessary,
    and very important part of the entire effort.
    
    I would also admonish the Sales people to remember that Sales Support
    is an equal member of a team...this "holier than thou" attitude
    that I have seen too many times HAS GOT TO GO!!
    
    Personally....glad to see it happen...

    Jerry

I think that the only effective way to bring about a true team effort in
Selling is through carefully designed metrics.  The metrics for those
involved in Selling, be they Sales, SWS, FS, Mktg, Fin, Mfg, Eng or Admin, 
have historically been _functionally_ oriented, not _process_ oriented.  

When engaged in dealing with customers and prospects, that which all these 
people _do_ is Selling.  It seems to me that to make this _business process_
work better it's necessary to design the appropriate metrics eg. those of 
account management, team effort and customer satisfaction (without cheating!).

The major problem in accomplishing this logical task is, as I see it, one
of management drive.  The business process direction, which naturally entails
functional cooperation rather than functional rivalry, must be instilled 
in Digital management.  How can this be accomplished ?  Once this vital first
step is taken, the rest will be easy.


David Goldblatt - Europe E.I.S.

    Re: .16. I will remind SALES this year evrey chance I get that I
    am an EQUAL TEAM MEMBER. I am curious if they will listen or care.
    
    Regarding the reporting structure and sales support managers. I
    discussed the memo with my manager who is the district sales support
    manager. He said that sales will probably continue as before with
    more autonomy. I personally feel the less reporting people in the
    way the better. Any organizational business book lately recommends
    LESS chain of command not more as we used to have. Quite frankly
    if SALES wants the responsibility let them have it. We own the
    TECHNICAL aspect of the sale as we always did.
    
    Ed

    The next-to-last paragraph of the memo from Ferry and Grainger
    explicitly stated that management should communicate this information
    to their organizations.  Yet I am totally amazed at the number of
    managers who have sat on (and are still sitting on) the announcement,
    without communicating it to their people.  And then they get upset when
    people hear it through VAX Notes!  Sheesh!
    
    							Pat

    Ok, now in light of all this, how we we to interpret the following
    paragraph from the State of the Company Address (as reported in the
    July issue of MGMT MEMO)?   KO is speaking:
    
    	Our sales people can't know everything about all our products.  We
    	encourage them to learn everything they can, but they still need
    	support from specialists.  These specialists will be budgeted by, be
    	trained by, and be part of the group that develops the products.  They
    	will serve as one of the resoucres of the sales team.  The product
    	group is clearly responsible for the product message presented by sales
    	to the customer.  The rest of us are there to help.
    

    OK, I'll bite.  This is called "taking a vague statement and creating
    an action plan from it"
    
    My PERSONAL and HYPOTHETICAL and PRIVATE interpretation is:
    
    Ken Olsen has directed someone:
    
    (1) to eliminate "Software Services" as an entity with a separate
    functional identity
    
    (2) to reassign all managers and staff people in "Software Services" to
    other positions within Digital
    
    (3) (in particular) to assign sales support "Software Specialists" to
    directly report to Sales Unit Managers.
    
    Frankly, I'm skeptical he really meant (1),(2),(3) but because this is
    Digital, after all, I'm entitled to my own personal and hypothetical
    and private derivative action plan of our president's comments.
    
    I await, as all of do, the actual formal derivative action plans from
    the May 4, 1989 State of the Company message with patience and
    fortitude.  The clock is running. 

    Sales management has always had _de_facto_ responsibility for Sales
    Support staffing and deployment.  I read the Grainger/Ferry memo as
    putting the Sales DM on notice that it is now HIS responsibility and no
    one else's to ensure that there is adequate support and that it is
    deployed in the most productive manner.  No more whining about how SWS
    isn't giving Sales what they want.
    
    
    -dave

    Some high level sales guy made a presentation to our group about a
    month ago about the sales reorgs. The org chart showed sales support
    reporting to described in the previous notes (reporting to both sales
    and SWS).
    
    It could exacerbate two already large problems:
    
    1) A sales rep schedules a customer meeting and the sales support
    person is to be present to demo and answer questions. The meeting
    happens, but no sales support person shows up. At the last minute, some
    SWS manager (who is now goaled on business generated) decided some
    other opportunity was bigger. Sales managers are even more inclined to
    such erratic behavior...
    
    2) There is already a huge shortage of sales support people in some
    areas and districts because they would rather use their budgets on
    other things, e.g., more sales reps. This might result in even fewer
    specialists if sales managers have their way.
    
    I also talked to manager in one those rumored business units who said
    that sales support was going to report to district sales and be managed
    by district sales -- but they would be owned by the business units. The
    business units would fund their own sales support staff and be
    responsible for training their own sales support staff. This makes a
    lot sense, so it's probably not true.
    
    -George 

>    It could exacerbate two already large problems:
>    
>    1) A sales rep schedules a customer meeting and the sales support
>    person is to be present to demo and answer questions. The meeting
>    happens, but no sales support person shows up. At the last minute, some
>    SWS manager (who is now goaled on business generated) decided some
>    other opportunity was bigger. Sales managers are even more inclined to
>    such erratic behavior...

This is not a problem with the model.  It is a problem with the sales
and/or SWS manager.  They are certainly entitled to run the business
in the way they think is best, but they have to answer to their bosses
and customers about their decisions.    

>    2) There is already a huge shortage of sales support people in some
>    areas and districts because they would rather use their budgets on
>    other things, e.g., more sales reps. This might result in even fewer
>    specialists if sales managers have their way.
    
This is also a problem with a sales manager's decision.  I don't think
we should take away their decision-making responsibility in this regard.
If they are measured on how their decisions come out (for customer sat
and meeting the numbers) then they should have plenty of incentive to
hire sales support people.  If I'm a sales DM and I see a sales unit
that's overloaded with sales (or "underloaded" with SWS) then I'm going
to make sure the unit mgr knows my opinion. 


Sales should've had direct control over sales support hiring and deployment
a long time ago.   As a sales support person, I view the new configuration
as goodness.

K.    

Re: Note 849.21 by SDSVAX::SWEENEY


�    OK, I'll bite.  This is called "taking a vague statement and creating
�    an action plan from it"
�    
�    My PERSONAL and HYPOTHETICAL and PRIVATE interpretation is:
�    
�    Ken Olsen has directed someone:
�    
�    (1) to eliminate "Software Services" as an entity with a separate
�    functional identity
    
    Just to keep it short, I disagree that this is a directive to eliminate
    SWS. Don't forget that SWS (at least now) has two halves: Sales
    Support and Delivery. There have always been problems with that.
    Even if Sales and Sales Support form a perfect "marriage" we will
    still need someone to *deliver* what these folks supposedly know
    everything about (and hopefully sell).
    
    Now, if someone thinks that Software *Delivery* is going away, I wonder
    how we'll ever develop software!

	BD�

    Maybe some conflicts are productive ?
    Maybe you can't deliver well without supporting sales and the other
    way around ? 
    Isn't there a risk that sales support will be given by people without
    (current) experience with the products and delivery by people without
    any influence on overall design ?

    I sort of liked the "old" days when I did sales support, projects and
    software support. There were many conflicts over resources but you
    learned a lot and was sure to get support responsibility for screwed up
    sale.

    						wlodek

    2 cents from a SSUM who was a Sales Unit Manager before:
    
    This "change" is business-as-usual for us.   In the almost-a-year that
    I've been in this position, we've operated under the assumption that
    both the Software DM and the Sales DM(s) are our solid line managers. 
    I participate directly in Sales management meetings and decisions.  We
    would not consider making any significant change (staffing, scheduling 
    etc) in Sales Support without Sales' knowledge and full support.
    
    My last three new slots (not backfill) have been converted Sales slots
    - the Sales DMs felt that they could get the most bang for the buck by
    hiring Sales Support, rather than an incremental Sales rep.
    
    I think these "changes" will be felt most strongly where the existing
    Sales - Sales Support relationship is poor.  I agree with the earlier
    reply which suggested that this move is a directive to Sales DMs to
    make it work, and quit complaining.
    
    One last thought - perhaps the most important aspect of this change
    will be that Sales DMs now have control of the Sales Support cost
    centers.  That means no more allocation of miscellaneous expenses to
    Sales Support cost centers by Software DMs trying to protect PSS
    margins.  (I know, that has never happened in your district, but
    believe me, it *has* happened.)
    
    pjd  

>    I personally think when KO says something it happens.
>    
>    Anyone disagree ??

	That is of course the theory. Doesn't always work that way.

				Alfred

    My reply with an action plan to implement what 849.28 discussed was
    reply 849.21.

    A lot of discussion at the "State of the Company" that is
    forward-looking is, in fact, being heard for the first time by many of
    the people in the audience.

    They discuss each phrase and attempt to spin their own agenda to it.
    And some of it never, ever, happens.  Old issues of MGMT MEMO or old
    videotapes of SOTC presentations will show you that to be the case.

    It's no accident that Ken uses terms like "support people" rather than
    "R job codes" or "Software Services" and "product people" as opposed to
    "Product Marketing" or other instantly recognizable, specific terms.

    The bottom line is the foot soldiers take orders from their lieutenants
    and sergeants and not from the Commander-in-Chief.
                                                                        

    Here's a clear distinction between your view and mine:
    
    I believe that vague words are deliberate signals (or "code words" if
    you prefer) to the SOTC audience, the most senior managers in the
    company.
    
    You believe that vague words are "simple terms that people can
    understand".
    
    My military analogy was not intended to be humorous.  Employees take
    operational direction from the immediate level of management above
    them.  High level managers act to coordinate the actions of all the
    employees.  The President of Digital Equipment doesn't micro-manage the
    relationship between each sales support person and sales rep.
    
    We're into the "funny months", people are carrying budgets and
    goalsheets and think they aren't worth the effort because they are
    anticipating another re-org that will give them a new budget and
    goalsheet that they'll really be measured on.  This is because the
    re-org process is dragging on and on...
    

    With regard to goalsheets - I've just attended a District sales
    meeting, as one of three software specs who regularly attend these
    things. The DM announced that goaling for this year is now part
    Certs and Part revenue, and that future trends are to replace Certs
    with Revenue goaling. At the moment, Certs are weighted at 75% and
    Revenue at 25%. Next year, the plan is for 50/50, then 75/25 in
    favour of revenue, etc.
    
    Also, mixed goaling for "relationship" accounts spool up Certs/Revenue
    weighting over a three period, with subjective perceptions and customer
    response playing a much greater roll at the beginning of the 3 year
    period, then giving way to Certs and Revenues as the relationship
    progresses.
    
    This seems to be a more realistic, and equitable manner in which
    to goal the Sales force.
    
    Scooter