Conference 7.286::digital

    re: .0
    
    Am I just having a bad day, or does the content of the message
    belie the opening and closing comments about optimism breaking 
    out all over?
    
    Glenn

>>Marian made comments...
>>-  Bob can see through all the turmoil and envisions a miraculous 
>>   turnaround
This reminds me of the comic in which a complicated flow chart ends
with a box labelled 'and then a miracle happens'. 

>>-  Bob points to ALPHA as the product to diffrentiate us from the rest
Is this PCspeak for 'we're a S/W company'? ;^)

>>-  Right now, our investments are 2/3 HW and 1/3 SW, we want to get to 
>>   a space in the very near future where our investments are 2/3 SW and 
>>   1/3 HW
This is why we're laying off S/W eng left and right, alienating the remainder
and cancelling S/W projects. This is also why 'Bob points to ALPHA as the
product to diffrentiate us from the rest'.

>>-  Demand for ALPHA is less than anticipated
Great news! I guess we'll have to keep peddling the TFSO product a while
longer to bring in revenue. Although the customer base seems to be shrinking.

>>-  Palmer feels we need to get discipline into this company, decisions 
>>   based on facts, hold people accountable
Meaning...it should start at the bottom and work its way just upper level
grunts. This implies the 'royal we'...you not me.
    
Bill Steul Comments
>>-  We are relatively competitive
Relative to who, what?

>>-  We will continue to downsize, especially in the Field
The 'royal we' again.

    Outlook:
    
>>-  Finance needs to continue to be responsive to the company and to be 
>>   a catalyst for change, we need to keep the discipline the Internal 
>>   controls and to hold people accountable.  Bill thinks we are pretty 
>>   good at that.
Is this PCspeak for 'we're a company run by bean counters'?

>>-  Palmer has said that Finance has held the corporation together
   >:^0

Question and Answer:
>>-  We need to think about our culture, we like to make things 
>>   complicated, which costs money
Who is the 'we' in this startment...management or the grunts?

>>-  We can't borrow money again for restructuring, the interest will be 
>>   too high, we can only borrow, if we have to, for capital investment
Well I can't see this as a big problem. I think if managment puts their
collective mind together they can come up with some PCspeak to make
layoffs look like capital investment.

>>-  How can we make people accountable, if they have moved on?   This 
>>   makes Bill nervous, but he feels we will have to depend on the 
>>   individual areas to fulfill their committments.  
This one isn't completely clear...would someone pls explain it?

>>    -  We will continue to downsize, especially in the Field
  
>>    -  We had 4500 Finance employees last year, we should see a 30% 
         reduction, goal was 3000, today just under 4000, 1800 fiscal, 


I seems to me that there are more Finance employees than salespeople.  And
if we're continuing to downsize the field, the beancounters will have nothing
to count.

    re .2, question at end:
    
    Person A tries to do task T, seems to finish, moves on to different
    part of DEC or even leaves.  A year later it's clear that A did not
    actually do T.  How is A held accountable?
    
    More generally, with high turn-over, who is to held accountable when
    something fails?  The ones who were there at the start?  Those around
    at the end?  Everyone ever on the project?
    
    		-John Bishop

    As Tonto clearly articulated his position to that of the Lone Ranger
    who said to him, "we are in trouble" when they both found themselves in a 
    bad environmental situation - Tonto replied "we Kemosabe?". When we
    hear "we" from the uppers (such we need to do this or we need to do
    that), us Lone Rangers should be shaking in our boots. 

    
    Does anyone see where the optimism is coming from?
    
    
    
    Mike
    
    
    

    
    looked like a wash to me.....every positive statment countered
    with a negative statement (some more disguised than others).

    We are in trouble.  I always maintained that when finance runs the
    company, i.e. all decisions are based on what finance feeds management,
    then WE are in trouble.  I think .1 or two said it.  They (finance)
    want to grow its base, but cut off the head (the field) because they
    (finance) are doing a great job. huh?!
    
    In another sentence finance is being cut to 3000-3300 but Bill wants
    to grow?!?  If finance is doing so well, why is Alpha behind the
    numbers???
    
    We are trying to make (show) a profit through cost control and not 
    growth.  Bill is wondering "when will the margins turn up?".  Gee 
    I guess we need to ask fiance that question, they are in control!
    
    later
    mp  

Here's another pumped up high_cost_low_margin_unaccountable_piece_of_dreck_field_
employee.

Gee Bill,  aren't all those finance people gonna be pretty busy taking all those
alpha orders once all the overhead in the field is eliminated.  Ahh yes!  that
must be why you need to get stronger!

Typical old boy network at work.  Looks like Bob Palmer is starting to get 
sucked into it.  

There's nothing wrong in my house... It's those other people!

The royal we mentioned a few back.

    AHA!!! I just figured out what this means:
    
    "We are now 2/3 hardware and 1/3 software, we should be moving to
    1/3 hardware and 2/3 software."
    
    Take a look. Its really obvious when you think about it. Just because
    we are shrking software right now would mean that then we have to
    turn around and massively shrink hardware. Then we would be 1/3
    hardware and 2/3 software. So the goal is to get hardware down really
    low to 50% of current software.
    
    Perhaps this happens when we are only a chip foundry and making no
    boxes.
    
    (: Gallows humor, extrordinaire.
    

On Alpha volumes. I'm generally upbeat about future potential. However, I
think we'd be more advanced than we are if we:

1)	Bought everyone in Alpha related marketing groups a copy of "The
	Silverlake Project" by Bauer, Collar and Tang (ISBN 0-19-506754-1).

2)	Told them to read and internalise chapters 4 and 5 only... and to
	then do exactly the analysis and prioritisation that IBM executed
	(in their case, for the AS/400).

I did my best -- both the UK and European Server Business Managers were given
a copy courtesy of my cost centre ;-)
								- Ian W.

        Re: .10

>    -  Right now, our investments are 2/3 HW and 1/3 SW, we want to get to 
>       a space in the very near future where our investments are 2/3 SW and 
>       1/3 HW

        This doesn't say how much the total investment needs to change.

        If the software investment stays the same, then hardware
        investment needs to be cut `in the very near future' by 75%
        to meet this goal.  Total investment is cut in half.

        If total investment stays the same, than hardware investment
        is cut in half and software investment is doubled.  Since the
        recent trend is to cut back software development, it would seem
        overly optimistic to expect hardware investment cuts of only 50%.

        					B.J.

Assuming that Engineering matches the total HW/SW split, and given
that Engineering needs to go from 13% of revenue to 10% of revenue, and 
also assuming, for the moment, that revenue stays flat:

Current:

HW 	= 2/3 * 13%	= 8 2/3 % of revenue
SW	= 1/3 * 13%	= 4 1/3 % of revenue

Goal:

HW	= 1/3 * 10%	= 3 1/3 % of revenue
SW	= 2/3 * 10%	= 6 2/3 % of revenue

Changes:

HW:  3 1/3 divided by 8 2/3 = 38% of current budget
SW:  6 2/3 divided by 4 1/3 = 154% of current budget

We always expect some increase in revenue, so both changes 
might be somewhat higher.

These are just back-of-envelope calculations based on two different 
numbers, from two different people (who just happened to speak at the same 
meeting).  The assumptions above are just that -- assumptions -- which may 
have no basis in reality.  Looking at these calculations may be 
enlightening, amusing to some, depressing to others.  There's only one 
conclusion that I can make with confidence:  In order to achieve the goal
of 2/3 SW and 1/3 HW, we will either have to spend more on SW than we're 
doing now, or decrease our total investments drastically, far more than the 
23% (=(13-10)/13) number given by Steul for Engineering.

   Gary

    re: .6
    
    > Does anyone see where the optimism is coming from?
    
    Check with the Executive VP for Optimism, Will Blowhard.
    
    He reports to the Corporate Senior Executive VP for Proper Thinking,
    I. Sae Yudoo.
    
    -- Russ

    re: way back
    
    Guess the beancounters will just have to count each other when they've
    downsized the rest of us.
    
    2/3 vs 1/3 reminds me of discussions several years back when the $3B 
    services biz was supposed to become 50% of the company by year X.  My
    response:  does that mean services will become $6B, or the rest of the
    company become $3B? 

    
    
    		re-.1 
    
    	Well , if Bill Steul's comments about there being 12,500 Cost
    Centers, about 9600 having managers, and wanting to get down to
    around 2000 Cost Centers doesn't shine a bright light in some peoples
     tunnels,  I don't know what could. Too many Chiefs, not enough Indians ?
    
      I don't think it takes a degree in accounting to figure that one.
    
             But hey, I wasn't hired here yesterday either, so I'll
    wager my raise last year AND the year before ; that it'll never
    happen.
    
    					Paul
    

    
    > In the Company we had 114,000 at last yearend, we expect 94,000
    > at this yearend, Palmer has said 85,000-90,000 seems about right
    
    So much for getting the majority of downsizing done this quarter.
    It appears that we have at least one major downsizing left.
    
    Peter

    
    
       HE SAID WHAT HE WANTED FROM THE FMC,BUT WHAT IS HE GOING TO DO
    WITH THE LMC SITUATION.? ANY ANSWERS.
    
                                  FOR NOW SEE YA.
    

    What's an LMC? What's a FMC? Why are you shouting? (Using all caps is
    shouting in notes.)
    
    		Alfred

    Re: .20
    Alfred,
    
    LMC = Logistics Management Center. Formerly called DLO, Distributed
    Logistics Organization. Source spare requirements for field engineers.
    
    FMC = Financial Management Center. Accounts payable, employee
    disbursements are part of FMC.
    
    hth,
    
    Kevin