Conference 7.286::digital

    
    My recent experiences:
    
    Customer class where the advertised course content was wrong.
    
    The customers complained that this paled in comparison to the Microsoft
    University offerings.
    
    Course appeared to be being written as we went from day to day, clearly
    unprepared.
    
    Got bumped the Friday afternoon before a class, despite a policy of NOT
    late bumping internal folks.

    Hello Larry,
    
    What Windows NT course was your brother interested in?. 
    
    I am currently working in US Registration (Learning Services)
    
    It's tough to hear storys like that.
    
    Paul Story DTN: 264-7000 X940
    

    
    
    
    since half of the instructors were TFSOd yesterday, it shouldn't make
    much of a difference if he got into the class or not. 
    Some folks I know were a half a day into a pathworks class yesterday
    when their instructor got TFSOd. 5 of the 7 instructors were dumped. 
    Of course, luckily, the admin folks weren't affected.,...
    
    Okok...so no big deal that we have 2 of 7 folks left who can teach 
    technical classes, I just hope and pray and they don't have to cancel
    the French and English and German and Spanish language classes....
    we'll be able to NOT FIX PROBLEMS in several different languages at
    least.....
    :-(

    
    Since I have no formal education in buisness, maybe someone can help
    me on this; you lose 71% of your workers, yet you still need 100% of
    your admin folks ? Are the *extra* admin  folks taking on new duties ?
    
    If I interpret this correctly, it seems to be the kind of political 
    behavoir that will, in the end, be detremental to Digital.
    
    peter
    
    

    
    
    
    ah, not to worry...in the interest of saving money, they flew in an
    outside (of Digital) consultant to finish teaching the pathworks
    class (after TFSOing the instructor at 9am the first day).
    
    Why was the admin staff not affected? 
    Well, geez, uh..who else would we have to line us up with the
    ouside consultants that we can't afford?

    re: last few...
    
    I work for DLS (the old Customer Training).  On December 7th of 1992,
    48% of our instructor staff was TFSO'd.  In July of '93, 40% of those
    remaining were cut. Late last year, another 10% "participated" in the TFSO
    program....
    
    All this time MCS was largely left untouched...delivering less and less
    training.
    
    Not to sound hostile... because I wish NONE were lost... but, this just
    HAD TO HAPPEN... THERE ISN'T ENOUGH TRAINING BUSINESS LEFT. 
    
    Digital just cut a  $243 MILLION training budget back to $200
    million... and they seriously considered the ramifications of cutting
    to around 150 million... it could have been worse!
    
    I'm sorry your instructors were cut... I imagine that many of my
    friends at PKO3 (where I work) will be leaving, too...  
    
    tony

    Just a side note about our noticable training problems.
    
    A co-worker is taking a Digital class out East that is being
    taught by a 3rd party instructor. This instructor has been
    bad mouthing Digital and our products. Over 2 years ago
    I sent a note to the Delta program complaining about the same
    problem with another 3rd party instructor. I suggested that we
    keep our own instructors employed rather then outsourcing. 
    So much for that employee contributed idea... Instead let's
    hire outsiders to tell us how bad our products are. And lets
    pay them to do it. And if we are real lucky there will be customers
    in these classes that will hear these discouraging messages too.
    
    			-Jim-

    
    
    
    I can certainly see where there is no training business left.
    We're not allowed to ravel. There aren't enough of us to let us off the
    phones long enought to go to training. The training available ISN'T
    what we've been SCREAMING for for two years. (TRY to get UCX or
    ultrix/X25 or Ultrix MCC/MSU or OSF/OSI training).
    You can still get VMS utilities and commands though....now THAT'll come
    in handy....have they stopped teaching TOPS 10 yet?????????????
    
    Our customers are IRATE at the LOUSY support they get in some products.
    We're flying blind out here and can't get training and then find out
    that BIG cuts are happening in the TRAINING DEPT CAUSE WE CAN'T AFFORD
    TRAINING ANYMORE?????????????????????
    
    Something is not right here. 
    :-(
    
    

    
    
    well, all is not lost.....
    I just got mail on the "Keyboarding Class" being offered. Of course, I
    can't remember the last TIME A CUSTOMER COMPLAINED ABOUT MY TYPING
    SKILLS...............
    Oh, and there's still space available in the Six Sigman course too.....
    
    Beam me up, Scotty....
    

    >.3

    Please elaborate on the TFSO's that happened this week (Monday am)
    while instructing.  Here it is almost Wednesday and I'm planning on
    going back into the front of the classroom and teaching another day. 
    Should I lock the door?????  Out here we've always assumed if your
    scheduled to be on platform on a Monday, you've made it through one
    more week....

    If you can, names of TFSO'd people would be nice.  Out here on the West
    Coast we have heard nothing of this and probably won't "officially" at
    all.  Some of our friends may have been let go and it would be nice to
    say farewell.


    RE:  Outside consultants.  Many of those I personally meet are not of
    the utmost technical ability and their reasons for bad mouthing digital
    seem due to a complete lack of technical skills on the product(s) they
    are presenting.  It's much easier to beat Digital against the wall than
    deliver 5 hours of technical information about the ODI drivers and
    protocol stacks in an interesting and informative way!  


    RE:  Layoffs of instructors.  

    Not more than two months ago, we were directly told by country level
    DLS management that "Digital could no longer afford outside consultants
    and was in the process of  (or at least beginning to consider) hiring
    more instructors to cover many of the Alliance courses......Digital was
    going to become the number one provider of Microsoft and Novell
    training."  






    Jason.

    re: -1
    I've heard (here in the East) the same.  I've also heard the DLS is
    currently FILLING five reqs for instructors... two in ALF, two at DCO
    (or somewhere else) and one in NYO.  That's rumor, folks... but, I
    believe it.  Dick McCarthy told me last October that there would be
    three to six reqs "soon".
    
    I suspect the layoffs in CXO were from MCS.  Different org, as you
    know.  They have not been hit with recent TFSO "participation".  Here
    in the East, we have been told  not to expect much TFSO activity in
    the near-term due to the extremely deep cuts in the last three cycles.
    
    Please, however, don't feel that being on the platform on Monday is any
    assurance of security for that week (isn't is a shame that we have to
    worry about out jobs on a weekly or even a daily basis?).  The
    precedent for yanking an instructor off the platform was made long
    ago, and in more than one place (PKO being among them)
    
    tony

    rep: .6
    
>    I work for DLS (the old Customer Training).  On December 7th of 1992,
>    48% of our instructor staff was TFSO'd.  In July of '93, 40% of those
>    remaining were cut. Late last year, another 10% "participated" in the TFSO
>    program....
>    
>    All this time MCS was largely left untouched...delivering less and less
>    training.

     Tony, that's not really true.  MCS training was formed after the 
     Dec 7th '92 TFSO.  There was only one trainging group before July 93.
    
     The reason why MCS training was cut may be due to ineffective MCS
     management an/or decline of enrollment.  For example, I know of MCS
     employees that were taking DLS classes.  Having a seperate trainging
     group for MCS was largely ineffective.  I believe the two groups
     will go back into one again ( that keeps management busy).
    
     - Ted  (who is now looking for a new job)  :)  
    

    
    
    maybe the problem with MCS is that they couldn't/wouldn't/were unable
    to provide the kind of training that people were asking for.
    (UCX, MCC, MSU, X25 on a UNIX platform). We've been supporting these
    products for YEARS and have yet to get training on any of them.......
    It's not like I haven't ASKED. 
    
    I'm not blaming the instructors. They taught what they were scheduled
    to teach.....
    If you don't provide the product that your customer wants, they'll go
    elsewhere, or just do without, and you go out of business. 
    Looks like that may be what happened to MCS. Bummer, we still need the
    training  :-(