Conference 7.286::digital

    
   I agree. We should have done it the way the Postal Service is. We would
   be a lot better off today had we really gone for the excess.
    

    After the July DVN for Logistics/ADMIN, I asked the level II Admin
    manager if management was going to participate in this round of TFSO. 
    He replied that probably not in the first round targeted for August but
    he was concerned about his job in the September timeframe.
    
    fwiw,
    
    Ron

    
    Notice that it is a "maybe" and in the "second round"
    
    I, for one, would like to see something more concrete.
    
    -Ed
    

re: .0
> I never thought I'd see the day when I'd recommend that Digital emulate
> the Postal Service

Slightly off the subject, but in actuality we could do (and are doing) a
lot worse than emulate them in many areas. Measuring misdelivered and lost
pieces of mail, the USPS approaches or exceeds six-sigma (3.4 errors per
million opportunities.)

-Jack

    Re: .4
    
    I don't know who's statistics you're using but... I had a christmas
    card returned after the post office equipment rubbed off part of the
    envelope, an income tax refund check that never made it, another
    letter from the IRS that never got to my box, and an express mail
    shipment that took about three weeks to arrive.  Based on your
    statistics, I should have mailed over a million things during this
    period of time.  Because I don't have a postage meter, or the money to
    mail anywhere close to that, I don't believe I did.  Next time the post
    office takes a survey to determine their quality level they ought to
    include me.  ;-)
    
    DAR
    

I think they approach six sigma if you count all the successfully delivered
junk mail.  ;-)

I find that the statistics are very dependent on the local Post Office.  The
last place I lived, the only misdelivered mail I suffered from was due to a
neighbor kid stealing it (for real).  Other than that, I had 7 years of spotless
service.  In contrast, my current post office (different town) seems to have
an exceedingly hard time getting my mail into my box, but I think that has
more to do with the local PO (and/or local carrier) than it does with the
overall service level of USPS.

In other words, they could still be making six sigma, but you're just fortunate
enough to live in one of the defect clusters.

re: .5

You're already in the statistics. But the fact of the matter is that for
every piece of your mail that got screwed up, there were millions of
other pieces that got delivered flawlessly, as .6 points out.
The sheer volume of their business has a big contribution to their
"Sigma factor", but the fact remains that the service ain't all that bad.

My point isn't to defend the USPS, to proclaim them as a "quality organization",
or to make a case for them regarding any particular position relative to
their headcount. I only wanted to point out that given the size of their
operation, and the purpose of their business, they do one hell of a lot better
than we, or virtually anyone else in our industry does.

-Jack

    Aug 7,1992 a Dec 1991 Christmas card arrived at my mailbox!
    
    don

    re: .8
    
    Just goes to prove that the "mail does go thru". ;^)
    
    Actually, having a spouse that did temp work as a mail carrier, I can
    honestly understand how mail can get "lost". It's more a matter of the
    volume as compared to quality. I presume that all of us has perfectly
    accessible mailboxes right?...no bees, no dogs, no.. I'm glad she
    decided to become a nurse!

    RE:  numerous previous
    
    I have to agree it's the local post office that can make or break the
    USPS's reputation.  My local PO can't deliver mail across town in 3
    days, but if I mail a letter to any out of state relatives, they get in
    usually in 2 days.
    
    It's like the data center saying we have 99.99% up time; they are
    counting the time most of us aren't on the system and using it.
    
    We all know anyone can make statistics support any arguement at any
    time.
    
    Ron

    To get back to the original conversation...Marvin Runyon is a well
    known person in my neck of the woods.  He was chairman for TVA which is
    Tennessee Valley Authority.  TVA is a government operation which
    supplies power to TN,KY, and parts of AL and MS.  He came from Nissan
    Motors where is was also a head hunter.  When he came to TVA, they were
    having rate increases every year.  After he was here for a short while
    he started cutting middle mgmt out where it was not needed.  We have
    not had our utility rates increased since and they say we want have one
    for at least another 2 years.
    
    Marvin Runyon believes that there should be only 3 levels of mgmt from
    the top to the front line managers.  You can believe also that he will
    stop the rate increases that the Postal Service has seen in the last
    several years and future years.  
    
    Just a little background on the new "general"
    Rick Cantrell
    

>    Marvin Runyon believes that there should be only 3 levels of mgmt from
>    the top to the front line managers. 

S'pose we could get Bob Palmer to think this way?    

In many places in DEC there are five levels of managers between the workers
and Bob Palmer.

Assuming five intermediate levels, with identical "fan-in" (i.e. the number of
direct reports) at each level, DEC has approximately 20,000 managers in all, to
manage about 100,000 workers. If there were only three levels, it would take
only about 6300 managers to manage 100,000 workers. That's over 13,000 managers
that we could eliminate without even reducing the "work" force!

Of course, some of the "workers" spend a good deal of time fetching rocks
for the managers... With 60% fewer managers, there'd be 60% fewer rocks to
fetch, and those workers could spend the time saved on rock-fetching doing
productive work.

How about it, Bob? If three levels is too radical, how about four levels?
That would still reduce the number of managers by 8500 or so.

--RS

    
    	Hey, we have 3 levels of VEEPEEs!!!
    
    	Then DMs, AGMs and UMs for 3 more!!!
    
    	Which of these levels would approve cutting the _other_ ones?  It's
    about as likely as Congress voting a pay-cut (or term limits ;^).
    
    

RE:       <<< Note 2042.12 by MAST::SCHUMANN "Welcome to the new Digital" >>>

>In many places in DEC there are five levels of managers between the workers
>and Bob Palmer.

Wow!  Only five?  I can count five layers before I reach the vapor cloud
of people so far removed from me it doesn't make any difference who they
are or how many they are.

    re: 3 levels of management
    This is precisely what Pier Carlo Falotti tried to achieve with
    the "3x3 model" in Europe. 3 levels max from grunt up to decision
    maker = Entrepreneur.
    My personal guess is that the model is O.K, but the implementation
    is not ( yet ?) a success.
    I just  don't have this comfortable feeling that my entrepreneur 
    is totally in control. On the other end is it really realistic
    to assume that while growth has turned to recession, there would
    be entrepreneural freedom available ? 
    To me a true entrepreneur should be able not only to control
    profit and loss statements from one FY to the other, but also
    to be able to decide on investments reaching further than next FY.
    Under present economic circumstances I'd rather doubt that the
    powers above entrepreneurs would allow them to play with megabucks
    and kiloslots.
    /fred
       
    

level 5 >>Palmer
level 4 >>Zereski
level 3 >>Area Manager
level 2 >>District manager
level 1 >>Sales Unit Manager

level 0 >>Me<<  where the "rubber meets the road" - sales.

We don't have products which customer buy just because it says "Digital"
on them.  I am of the considered (but perhaps incorrect) opinion that
a sales forces is needed.

The "bottom line" is the simple act of me getting a purchase order in my
hands.  I think that this goes a great distance toward keeping Digital
a viable company.  The "rubber meeting the road" is a good analogy -
when your tires blow out .. it's crash and burn time.

If Level 5 doesn't hear the hissing, indicating a leaking tire .. there'll
be trouble in River City.

Not too long ago I wrote Zereski directly ... told him that I was the
longest term sales person in Digital and wanted to do what I could do
to help this "Design Team" that he was putting together.

He took the time to reply .. copied some other people .. said I would
be contacted when they got to the information gathering state.  I actually
think that he will.  My faith is beginning to be restored.

Jerry