Conference 7.286::digital

    Some counter-thoughts to .0 ...
    
    Digital is going thru a "paradigm shift" from a VAX/VMS central CPU,
    we build everything, we know everything mind set to a client-server, 
    focus on key businesses, partner with 3rd parties mind set. 
    It doesn't happen all at once. It didn't all at once at HP and it 
    won't happen (all at once) here either.
    
    We have mis-matched skill sets, heavy capital investment in older
    technology and change occuring at different rates within different
    parts of the company. 
    
    Some areas will be quicker on their feet than others; "corporate
    direction" won't make that happen; individual action to get up to speed
    is a pleasant way to help (and the side benefit is to exit the malaise
    that seems to have disabled some).
    
    Personal-opinion-from-the left-coast!

    re: .1 This is the Darwinian view of Digital.  Namely that over time, a
    natural process will insure that the strongest (best, most profitable,
    etc.) will survive.
    
    There are plenty of opinions that this isn't taking place, but if it is
    true, where will market drift or Digital-political winds take us to?
    
    Do you or I want to go there? Are you really convinced that Digital is
    a HP wanna-be?  HP is in a lot fewer businesses than Digital is.  I
    have a counterpart at HP, but many Digital employees don't.

    	The basic problem is that DEC waited too long for the change 
    to start.   We should of started this in the early 80's and we did not.
    Good or bad reasons, I'm not going to judge.   We just decided we were
    not going to change.
    
    	In the last several months (BP took over in Qtr. 2 FY'93 or ONLY
    8 months ago !!!!!) we have undergone the change, that otherwise
    will take a company our size several years to accomplish.   Now if
    that is not confusing, isolated, implosive, anomie, and whatever other
    words you want to use, then show me what is.
    
    	The rate of change we have done is just incredible.  For 30+ years
    DEC was managed by a group who saw the company grow from a start-up to
    a Fortune 500 company.   In the last several months, our new top
    management (namely BP) have changed all that and brought in new faces,
    ('left and right').
    
    	I don't think no one with so much change can say, we are in
    control and we know where we are going.   This will take a while.
    Moreover in the process and with the velocity, we have endagered
    many of the hard learned company culture, that left many people
    scared, without a future, in the middle of no-were.
    
    	The next few quarters will be more important to DEC as a company
    (feasible, I meant).   It is extremly important the message, whatever
    it is is successfully delivered to all of us.   There is a saying
    that is pertinent here: after the huricane, peace comes.
    

    re. .-1
    
    Ah, more fun ;-)!
    
    HP is a good example of a company which came up from sort-of nowhere
    by shifting their focus and sticking to it
    ..not a bad model for us..IBM surely is a bad
    model and Sun isn't perceived (by some) as the right model to last..
    
    Microsoft is a money machine (all software); we sell iron; we aren't
    a software company..so we can't out-Gates Gates (I live in Gates-land
    and get Microsoft info daily which may be different than that from the media
    spin doctors which put stuff over the nationwide news wires)..
    
    Companies like UNISYS downsized and tried to cover all bases..they
    aren't perceived as  winners..so to me, the HP model is "good enough"
    to look at..at least at a macro level...
    
    The message I see about where are are going is AXP, AXP, AXP then
    services and SI, so really we are sort of an HP model..that implies a
    smaller company (bodies) and more focus..if you reduce bodycount
    enough, the focus happens (sad but true)..
    
    
    Your-mileage-may-vary...
    

    The "model" for Digital might be UNISYS (once the number 2 computer
    company) has $8.4B in sales, $361 million in profits, and about 54,000
    employees, having taken a whopping 20% cut in employee headcount in
    calendar 1991 and then another 10% in calendar 1992.
    
    Does anyone expect more profits from UNISYS? Yes.
    Does anyone expect the next wave of information technology to come from
    UNISYS? Hardly.
    
    Or maybe the model is Compaq with only 9,500 employees and profitable.

    Well,  if the new DEC is Unisys, it's time to leave.
    

    I'll try to find out if 
    
    (a) the downsizing in UNISYS is finally over
    (b) the morale has imporved now that the company has returned to
    profitability
    (c) their CEO has the confidence of customers, shareholders, and
    employees
    (d) their mission statement is engaged with or isolated from creating
    innovation in information technology.
    
    If we're not going back to being the old Digital, how many feasible
    corporate models are there?  HP, UNISYS, or even more pessimistically,
    DG and Wang.  GE, Microsoft, an Intel are totally different
    enterpises.

>GE, Microsoft, an Intel are totally different enterpises.
    
    iam confused now, why are we not like Intel?
    
    i thought we were becoming a mainly hardware company? no?

    before , about 3 years ago, i heard that we were becoming a software
    company like Microsoft, but about 6 months ago i started to hear
    that we changed and we are becoming like Intel, a hardware/chips
    company.

    now i hear we are not like Intel or Microsoft? 

    can some please tell us what are we becoming then? 

    thanks in advance.

    \bye
    \nasser

    As .0 points out, we are in "splendid isolation" from the trends that
    the industry is facing.  Our micro-managing VPs see to it that we
    cannot change.  BP's nice speech-time answer about our soon being able
    to buy cheap PC software was contradicted last week by Vin Mullarkey
    again; it's clear that Vin and the Greater Maynard Good Old Boys
    Marching Band and Chowda Society are still firmly in command, even if
    BP is picking them off one by one.
    
    This might be part of BP's grand strategy, though.  I see a clear
    bifurcation of Digital into two companies.  One is represented by the
    independent PBUs, especially semiconductor and storage.  They get money
    (you think Hudson puts up with the crap the rest of us do?) and other
    resources, and are expected to produce industry-leading technology. 
    The rest of the company (including computer systems, software and The
    Field) is being slowly choked off, with the CBUs set up to salvage the
    parts that have markets.  The rest dies off, so the company is likely
    to downsize its employee roster by a factor of two or so over the next
    three or so years.  Like HP, we'll be in far fewer businesses.  We
    might even be profitable.
    
    For the rest of us, that aging VT220 in that shared cubicle is just a
    not-to-subtle hint. 

    RE: .3 What change? Other than some new faces at top jobs, what's
    changed? Do you really believe that the "reorganization" means anything
    below the VP level? This is a serious question as I don't really see
    any changes that affect customers or low level employees. Certainly
    the uncertainty around where I work hasn't changed in 2 years.

    		Alfred

Many people at Digital are indeed isolated in both the senses raised in .0:  
isolation from a leadership role in how computers are used, and isolation from 
having at our desktops the latest hardware and software computing resources.

Some of the replies are complaints about what's happening to Digital.  I 
prefer to think and act in terms of empowering ourselves and making the right
things happen for us.  

I would like to propose the following set of questions to frame the issues
we should be pursuing:

What do we do best?  What should we be doing?  What do we need to do it well?
How can we make an effective case that our needs be satisfied?

The last question is particularly relevant, because we are more likely to
get improvements in our resources if we can quantitatively justify their
effect on our productivity.  If we want something, the best way to go about
getting it is to make it a win for everybody involved.

The bottom line is that we are capable of making the right things happen if
we go about it with intelligence, effectiveness and persistence.  Complaints
won't make things better; effective action can.

Re: .10 -

>>    This might be part of BP's grand strategy, though.  I see a clear
>>    bifurcation of Digital into two companies.  One is represented by the
>>    independent PBUs, especially semiconductor and storage.  They get money
>>    (you think Hudson puts up with the crap the rest of us do?) and other
>>    resources, and are expected to produce industry-leading technology. 

That's "DECtel."

>>    The rest of the company (including computer systems, software and The
>>    Field) is being slowly choked off, with the CBUs set up to salvage the
>>    parts that have markets.  The rest dies off, so the company is likely
>>    to downsize its employee roster by a factor of two or so over the next
>>    three or so years.  Like HP, we'll be in far fewer businesses.  We

That's "DECosaur."    

Re: .12 -

>>Some of the replies are complaints about what's happening to Digital.  I 
>>prefer to think and act in terms of empowering ourselves and making the right
>>things happen for us.  

Shooting DELTA was a clear sign (to me) that the days of giving even lip 
service to employee empowerment are over.


ken

    I agree with .11
    
    What has changed?????  Aside from more empty cubicles, I see no
    changes.
    
    As for personal enpowerment.  True.  I got myself my own PC and some
    good software (C++) and some books.  Like .0 said, we are on the
    outside looking in.  I have been told that this area (or whatever they
    call it now) will not be doing the thing I was best at.  If I want to
    catch the technical leading edge, I am strickly on my own.  I do not
    expect Digital to reward me for this effort, I expect to be penalized.
    But it sure makes me feel better.  I am actually using my brain!  Now
    there is a change I can support.
    
    Re: Isolation...   No kidding!!!!!  There is even another level.  I
    have worked on projects for the last 9 years.  On a big project, you
    usually live at the customer site.  NO Digital equipment, no net links,
    no Digital desk, no contact with field employees....  If you think
    field people feel isolated, project people envy field people their
    connectedness.  We would joke about trying to remember what color our
    badges were.
    
    Judy
    

    
    re: 8.
    
    A friend of mine at Unisys tells me morale went way up, when the mass
    layoffs ended, and they started making money. Known him since 79,
    worked together when it was Univac. 
    
    They still have reorgs, which tend to make jobs less secure.
    
    Sometimes I think all the computer companies are run by one group. They
    all seem so alike, they all have the same problems. 

    re: .15
    
    Management across computer companies are peers and watch each other
    closely, often emulating each other's actions.  It has been speculated as a
    reason for why Compaq laid people off -- in spite of being profitable.
    As it is necessary for managers to show they didn't do anything stupid,
    it is acceptable for them to point to each other as proof.
    
    Steve

    ...in fact Great!!
    
    The worst isolation for the employee is probably being 'the pawn'.  No
    input/contribution/effect on decision making.  Decisions which seem
    ill-conceived and are ill-explained.  This makes for the wonderful
    environment where everyone is a resume-writer first and a
    contributor-to-Digital second (third, fourth...?).
    
    The worst isolation for the Company is that we are, indeed, in full
    retreat from any form of industry/technology leadership.  Given the
    opportunity to make markets, we choose to limit ourselves to few - and
    really old-style ones at that.  (There's good Freudian irony in the
    epithet "Chip Foundry".)  
    
    It's not unfixable, but no-one is listening, anyway.
    

re: .12

>Many people at Digital are indeed isolated in both the senses raised in .0:  
>isolation from a leadership role in how computers are used, and isolation from 
>having at our desktops the latest hardware and software computing resources.

I'd like to propose a 3rd category of isolation:  the promulgation of "remotely 
managed dispersed organizations" ....  For the past two years, I've been part 
of 2 or 3 (depends on how you count em) such groups, and it's somewhat isolating
to be the only member of your organization in a geographical region.  Not
saying remote management and dispersed groups are bad, but they do introduce
a new degree of isolation that many of us haven't had to face as directly before.

Steve

    hi,

    do you think note files helps in reducing our isolations?

    because for example with note files we talk with each and this way we 
    know what is going on. some DECeee can go out and find out is happening 
    outside and then they come tell us via this note file and others like
    it.

    when i worked in EDS we did not use notes.  i think notes make
    isolation less painfull than without them.

    
    \nasser

    I've been remotely managed for the past 5 years (the salesreps in this
    office have been remotely managed for the past 2 years, I'm in sales 
    support...) and we LOVE it!  We can actually get some work done w/o
    having management looking over our shoulders all the time - its one
    kind of 'isolation' that seems to be good.

Re:.21 (Dave Silvers)

...that's cuz yer unmanageable in person!! ;-) ;-)

tim