Conference 7.286::digital

    To say nothing of the fact that switchboard is not up to date. For
    example, I moved into my current house a year ago, and it still has my
    old entry and no new one yet...

This is a wonderful strategy.  Everyone has access at all times to a system
connected to the Internet and with a browser installed, right?

Paul

    ..and it doesn't help people outside the States, or needing contact
    info outside the States.

    
    for a different employer where I worked, when they introduced this
    (daft) measure, when I *very occasionally* needed to call assistance,
    I would:
    
    1) Phone my mother/father, have a chat about things, then ask her to call
       directory enquiries (England, proper name for the thing) for the
       number I didn't know.
    
    2) Mum/Dad would phone directory assistance, and charge call to my company
       provided phone card.
    
    3) A few minutes later, I'd call him/her again, and get the number.
    
    calls 1,2,3 all now charged to daft company, rather than 1 call to
    assistance in the first place.
    
    At least we can still use the phone for other calls though. Anyone who
    suggests that we use Internet phone to call international, and save the
    company even more money will get the Sad Anorak 96 award.
    
    A management case study in the UK in the mid-80s looked at how a
    bean-counter figured he could save his (oil company) employer a whole
    stack of money by denying employees their lunchtime ice-cream (they
    could have 'normal' pudding, *plus* the ice cream you see). So from
    then on either - or. Ice cream volume dropped (bean-counter justified !).
    
    Then, at the same time, staff went crazy when they figured out what was
    happening, *plus* their Ice cream vendor doubled the unit price (to the
    employer), as volumes reduced. Staff demanded their Ice-cream !
    
    Management gave in. Now, they were the same as before, but paying twice
    as much for the Ice-cream. Meanwhile, in the petroleum market they were
    getting killed by their competition, who focussed on their real job. 
    
    This is a true story - I used to work there - its where I made my
    directory calls via my mum !
    
    Meanwhile, in Digital in 1996, it can take me 2 days to get agreement
    for a 2% reduction in price of systems, when in a competitive
    situation. 
    
    I'd like to take the (potential) customer to a nice restaurant too,
    but I don't know their phone number...... 
    
    
    Anyone with access to yesterdays London Financial Times, check the
    article on 'How HP controls costs'. Context was business expenses, but
    the difference in attitude is incredible. Of course HP does not plan to
    'save' its way to growth.
    
    AW 

http://www.lookupusa.com/ada/ada.html

seems to be more up to date than "switchboard".

    
    I just got this response after I pasted the URL in -1 into my
    browser......................
    
    Not Found
    
    The requested object does not exist on this server. The link you
    followed is either outdated, inaccurate, or the server has
    been instructed not to let you have it.
    
    Bruce 
    
    

>>    1) Phone my mother/father, have a chat about things, then ask her to call
>>       directory enquiries (England, proper name for the thing) for the
>>       number I didn't know.

My guess is that its this type of call that is running up the company's phone
bill - not 411 calls.  (yes I know .4 said "for a different employer").

bjm

>> http://www.lookupusa.com/ada/ada.html

  SHOULD BE: http://www.lookupusa.com/lookupusa/ada/ada.htm
                                     ^^^^^^^^^^            ^

    
    	I was able to get into SWITCHBOARD and looked up "Digital Equipment
    Corporation" in MA.  It returned 4 entries, Springfield, Shrewsbury,
    Boston and Lexington.  No mention of corporate headquarters in Maynard.
    
    

The following was a lookup on myself via
http://www.switchboard.com/.  Please note
that the phone number listed is not my 
phone number.  That number is the 2nd
phone I had installed in my house for data
purposes.  That phone number has not been in
service under my name for over two years.

I now have very little faith in a system
with data two years obsolete.  On top of 
that, our area is changing from area code
513 to 932 on 18-Sep-96.  Will switchboard
be up to date on area code changes.  There
are a lot of those going on now also.
 
         Find a Person

         Browse the list below to find the person you are looking for.

	Found: 1 name 


	Coghill, Steven...801 Kelford Pl...Trotwood, OH 45426-2228
	Phone: (513)854-6507  


I cover a 4-state area.  Often in some remote
areas.  I use 411 many times per year.

The senerio usually is:
	1) Have card of a customer at a large
	   corporation or DoD base.
	2) Get wind of a new lead at some other
           part of that corp or base, or
	   someone tells us of an opportunity
	   somewhere.
	3) Call 411 to get the general number
	   for that corp or base.
	4) Call general number to get number
	   of new contact.

Great.  Switchboard cannot find:

	naval surface warfare center
	crane, in

	naval surface warfare center, crane division
	crane, in

	crane naval surface warfare center
	crane, in

	nswc
	crane, in

	wright-patterson air force base
	dayton, oh

	wright-patterson afb
	dayton, oh

	wpafb
	dayton, oh

	w p a f b
	dayton, oh

However, it does find 17 entries for wright-patterson, all
which are non-DoD numbers.

Thank you .7 for the URL correction.

Lookup USA when searched for "Digital Equipment Corp" in Maynard returns 4
entries, the three DEC locations and the Credit Union.

When I look up myself, with less than a year old address (same phone number), it
returns the the proper address and phone number.  Switchboard still has the old
address.

I wrote to the contact person ("Voice Services Manager") listed in my copy
of the message:

	Like everyone else in Digital, I imagine, I have the memo saying
	that there will no access to external telephone directory services,
	suggesting that instead people rely on www.switchboard.com.

	If Digital wants to be smart about access to directory assistance,
	it will spend the small amount of money needed to subscribe to all
	the world's existing CDROMs of directory information and put them
	on line for worldwide access by the entire company through the
	World Wide Web, rather than relying on totally informal,
	unofficial, and incomplete external services.

	At my usual very reasonable fees I'll be glad to design such a
	setup.

	___Pete

He returned me a polite note which I read as making the best of a mess, and
saying that the measure would "save a bit".

___Pete

    Don't you guys have internal switchboard operators/receptionists who
    can look up and if needed dial a number for you?
    
    Charles

    Sure. I just give the phone a crank and say something like
    
    "Madge? Is Henry free? Or is he down at the store playing checkers
     again?"

    If you accept their numbers, they talk about saving 1/2 million
    dollars on directory assistance out of a phone expense of 128 million
    bucks.  That's 1/256, or less than one half of one per cent.
    
    It's hard to quantify the added cost this disruption might cause,
    though the preceding notes give some clue what the nature of those
    tradeoffs might be.  It seems like a lot of hassle for one-half of one
    per cent savings, doesn't it?
    
    -Mark

    I just tried myself on lookupusa.com. Now it shows my new address but
    gives only the modem number and not the voice number. (Hey anyone, here
    speak Modemise :-) Nice interface to a map however.

This is just another example of one group being able to say "See I saved $X 
from our bottom line.' while passing the cost on to others.  There is no 
concern as to what effect this will have on others.  But being WFH I have 
no restriction on using directory assistance :*)

Jilly

    I wonder how many VP's it took to decide to do away with directory
    assistance?
    
    Digital is putting the squeeze on everything to make more dollars at
    other's expenses.
    
    Pretty sad.

    Well half a mio is half a mio. Still waiting here for 7k for the demo
    machine. But why don't they let that guy Pete Kaiser earn his salary for
    the year ? .12 sounds great to me, it would be simple, very
    efficient, and if we could get some Alta Vista Search into it we could
    have a solution we could sell. Phoning the phone company is slow and
    boring...
    
    Now the real management trick is, converting good ideas from the
    trenches into reality. Call it lean production, the Toyota model or
    whatever, it is the WAY to save.
    
    Kevin  

>    Don't you guys have internal switchboard operators/receptionists who
>    can look up and if needed dial a number for you?

Sure.  From 10AM to 2PM.  And, I didn't know that our phone
systems would be programmed to allow the receptionist to 
call 411.  I didn't remember seeing that in the memo.

    
    Well here in Ireland our access to directory enquiries is gone too
    without any electronic/on-line replacement yet. This 500,000
    saving worldwide will actually cost the corporation money in all
    the time wasted trying to get phone numbers for customers etc.
    
    It seems that 500k saving worldwide is not that much and many
    other methods other this one could save 500k and I do not mean
    TFSO'ing either.
    
    
    Eamonn "does anyone know the number for #$^#^@#%@! ?" Fitzmaurice
    
    
    I'm all for lowering costs but not at the expense of losing business.
     

Just raises up the question in my mind once more:

Can a management that has been good at "managing"
expenses and reducing cost succeed at growing a 
business?  

It takes two very different head sets.  The first group 
is good at sitting back and counting pennies, "removing 
cost". The second group is good at vision and taking 
calculated risks - and dare I say - even spending 
money to achieve goals; primary of which must be growth.

In an environment when spending money is anathema, it
would seem difficult for an aggressive leader willing
to take risks to succeed with the constant boat anchor 
of spending constraints around their necks.

Ken

    re .22 
    
    I do not agree. Management CAN have a two pronged attack. Cutback
    costs but ensure that it does not impact revenue in  the "core"
    areas and where ever necessary grow the business.
    
    However, the bean counters now rule the roost so fiscal rectitude
    looks necessary at present or else we shall not have a business
    to grow anyway.
    
    While the above paragraph does not represent my thoughts BUT it does 
    seem to be the current management philosophy.                
    
    Am I incorrect , I wonder ?
    
    Regards,
    
    Eamonn

    I have used directory Assistance Nationwide about once or twice a year,
    usually because oour wonderful databases didn't get updated when a
    customer moved or changed phone numbers.  This has reduced response
    time, something we get measured on here and our customers measure if
    you can see the bitching about call backs.  
    
    Oh well, I do have a card for those few times.
    
    meg

    Wouldn't it make more sense if managers would just manage this problem. 
    Do we have phone logs that show WHO is making excessive calls to
    directory assistance?  Why not just ask the people who use it
    excessivly to cut back.  Not at a corporate wide level, but an
    individual level, by their direct manager.
    
    As with most things, it's probably the top 20% of the users who account
    for 80% of the use.
    
    -Steve
    
    

Re:  LookupUSA being better than Switchboard

Well, our phone number hasn't been updated either place, even though we 
moved from California to New York a year ago.  Sorry, I don't have anything 
cynical or even witty to add to the discussion, though.

Roy Goodman
[email protected]
[email protected]

PGP public key fingerprint:
  64 5A A5 A9 DA 7E BB 05  1F F1 03 87 B1 49 39 D3 

    RE: .16
    	Do you happen to be with "Hollis Telephone" .  I used to have a
    unlisted modem number, and when HT took over, they listed it, first,
    before my phone number that rings all over the house (grrrr.)
    
    Anyhow, lookupusa had the modem number, so I corrected it (or requested
    correction).  They obviously got the numbers within the last year and
    from a phone book in my case.
    
    The other fascinating (scary?) thing about lookupuse, it
    to ask for a map when it finds the requested address.  It's withing
    50-100' of my house in my case, and off by one driveway withing an
    apartment complex for a friend.
    
    Great if you have the web and you are at a party and too lit to
    remember how to get home.  Look up the party, look up your house, soom
    the map out far wnouth to see both ends, and print it.
    
    Bill
    

    re: lookupusa
    
    i don't know where they get their information, but it is not from the
    same sourse as switchboard (which i believe is from some 'phone book'
    database.  i have found myself on both:  lookupusa has the wrong name
    listed...i am listed officially in the phone book and directory
    assistance as 'r jandrow', and lookupusa has me listed as 'raquel marie
    jandrow'.  i have no idea where they got that information.  and when i
    found myself on switchboard, they had both my last and current
    addresses.  so, i just registered, logged in, and deleted the old and
    updated the new.  so now, switchboard is correct.
    
    anyway, i think this move (eliminating directory assistance) is a bad
    idea.  what about people who don't have internet access (and there are
    some out there)?  what about the people who have a hard time connecting
    to netscape?  i'd say about 1/2 of my attempts to connect to something
    fail.  and switchboard is not up to date.  perhaps digital could supply
    us again with phonebooks, and not just for the area of our building. 
    that would help.  i'd much rather use a current phone book than 411
    anyway...
    
    just rambling
    
    -raquel

    >> Wouldn't it make more sense if managers would just manage this
    >> problem. Do we have phone logs that show WHO is making excessive 
    >> calls to directory assistance?  Why not just ask the people who use it
    >> excessivly to cut back.  Not at a corporate wide level, but an
    >> individual level, by their direct manager.
     
    It no longer fits our "style".  It requires that upper management
    trust line managers and employees.  Who ever concocted this scheme 
    would not get a chance to present to the big people.  It's so much
    quicker to legislate an answer.  It will backfire, but it looks like
    were "taking action". 
    
     
    
    

    I didn't get the memo -- was it supposed to arrive via Reader's Choice
    or what? 
    

    save on time, to have in need                   (german proverb)
    
    save in need, you'll be finished on time        (Digital saying)
    

I haven't called directory assistance in many months.  I just hope the
corporation's overloaded internal web infrastructure is upgraded; it certainly
sucks now.


Re .10:

http://www.infospace.com/people.html finds your 513-854-9501.

But if you want to look up both of your home phone numbers quickly,
http://www.555-1212.com/whte_us.htm will let you query Switchboard, Four11 and
InfoSpace by only filling out 1 form.


Yahoo! has many pointers to directory assistance sites at
http://www.yahoo.com/Reference/Phone_Numbers/ .
				/AHM

    Yep, Lookupusa seems pretty current and apparently EVERY digital person
    reading this notesfile, like me, immediately went there too "look up"
    someone.  I love it when you get this message......
    
    
    Oops! We have so many users right now, that the system has taken a
    "time out." 
    
    Please try your search again.
    
    Click on [Go Back] to start again. 
    
    Toodles.....JPs
    

    Re:  LookupUSA being better than Switchboard
    
    Gee, I've been trying this for the last 2 hours (on and off) and all I
    get is "Oops! LookupUSA sevrver is down"
    
    I'm glad I remember my phone number!

>http://www.infospace.com/people.html finds your 513-854-9501.
>
>But if you want to look up both of your home phone numbers quickly,
>http://www.555-1212.com/whte_us.htm will let you query Switchboard, Four11 and
>InfoSpace by only filling out 1 form.
>
>
>Yahoo! has many pointers to directory assistance sites at
>http://www.yahoo.com/Reference/Phone_Numbers/ .

This is fine and dandy.  However, when I call 411 or nnn-555-1212,
give a name, and an address I get a number that the phone company
associates with that person (unless it is unlisted or non-existent).
If I use the Web I get multiple, conflicting, non-authoritative 
answers.  Which do I use?  Do I just start down the list?

One of the previous noters had it right.  Get copies of the
phone companies' phone books on CD-ROM and put up an internal
WEB page to read them.  Only problem here is current data.
Maybe there's a subscription service for this.

    
    I just thought up another super money saver !!.
    
    When I wish to call my customer, I first record my side of the
    conversation (at normal speed) on my dictaphone. Then I call him up,
    and play my dictaphone at twice the speed down the receiver to him.
    He records the speeded up monologue on his dictaphone. Then we hang up,
    and he plays it back at normal speed, to listen to what I said.
    
    Then he does the same, and calls me back. I reckon this way I will save
    the company 75% of the cost of the call ! (as the customers 'reply' to
    my side of the conversation is always at his cost !). And with
    autodialling, we can call each other back real fast (about 150 times per
    conversation). But the cassette tape will wear out very quickly I
    guess. I hope I can expense them...
    
    What do you think ?!!!
    
    Hello, there is a man outside my office with a white coat on. He is
    mumbling something about a padded truck outside the office.....
                          

    Well, I just tried LookupUSA and found out I don't exist, even though
    I've have the same telephone number in the same town for over 20
    years....

	I'm not listed (though someone of the same name and a different phone
number and very near by is) and I've lived in the same house with the same
phone number since 1990.

					--Doug

Re .35:

>This is fine and dandy.  However, when I call 411 or nnn-555-1212,
>give a name, and an address I get a number that the phone company
>associates with that person (unless it is unlisted or non-existent).
>If I use the Web I get multiple, conflicting, non-authoritative 
>answers.  ...

I have two home phone numbers, and The Phone Company has made a purely random
choice about which one to give out within the past month.


>Which do I use?  Do I just start down the list?

I print my entire phone list on a single sheet /PARAM:NUMBER_UP=16 every Friday
afternoon and carry it in my pocket.  I don't seem to have these dilemmas which
cause everyone else to suffer so...


>One of the previous noters had it right.  Get copies of the
>phone companies' phone books on CD-ROM and put up an internal
>WEB page to read them.  Only problem here is current data.

I rather doubt that any phone number CD-ROM is licensed off the shelf for
multi-user access.  A corporate license for 50K seats would not be $99.95, and
besides, what organization has the leadership to foot the bill when they can
just tell the peons to use the web...
				/AHM

No need for a directory. All customers have the same number:

	1-800-COLLECT

>Per

    Certainly souds like some bean counter had a dazzling demo of
    www.switchboard.com and didn't run it through the "stress test" prior
    to declaring victory on that half-mill.
    
    There are much better alternatives to the "best efforts" Web services
    that we should be building into a proper business solutions ;
    
    France for example has an excellent and *FREE* videotex service totally
    maintained uop to date by France Telecom.  Also available via (very
    slow) web connection.  
    
    UK (BT Mercury et al) has very good CD-ROM subscriptions with frequent
    updates.  In fact Digital switched off live Directory Assistance in the
    UK some 3 or 4 years ago.  After some initial teething problems with
    the in-house CD-ROM service, it settled down OK and apparently cost
    justifies itself.  It is still voice-only and business hours only - my
    requests to have the CDs shared fell on deaf ears 3 years ago.
    
    Pete Kaiser has the right approach - will the Voice Services Manager be
    prepared to take him up on his offer.
    
    /Chris/

There is a subscription service for directory assistance and it is run by AT&T. 
Notice that there is only one directory assistance, it is universal across all
area codes, it is completely up to date, the phone installed yesterday is listed
on directory assistance today, and it is universally accepted by the hundreds of
phone companies in the US as the THE depository for directory information and
the local companies supply the information to this service only.  If the
information is wrong, complain to your phone company.  Policies change from
phone company to phone company.  The reason that there is a charge now is that
AT&T cannot, and should not, absorb the costs of providing the service when they
are not supplying the phone service.  Of course if all the local companies
agreed to foot the bill then that is a different story but try to get the
hundreds of companies to agree to that.  Now ask DIGITAL how to find the numbers
of new/changed/moved customers without going through Directory Assistance.  If
they were on the WEB that would be great, and they probably would be if they
could figure out how to charge.  The other thing that DIGITAL forgets is that
most people only go to Directory Assistance only when there is a problem usually
associated with new or changed numbers.

    Has anyone told Switchboard, Four11 or 555-1212 that we have adopted
    their 'free' service instead of paying $$?
    
    It might be interesting to see if they opt to block access from our
    outbound internet addresses.....
    
    My impression was that they service providers were doing this as a
    precursor to 'key authentication' work that would/could have a charge.
    
    Howard

They appear to be financed by advertising actually...

    Maybe I can go out to the cell phone and dial the 411 from there.  I
    think it still works pretty good from the car.
    
    .40 is classic as alternative we could always go 1-800-CALL ATT if the
    1-800-COLLECT is busy.
    
    Mav who wishes the Grayhawk was here to read this one!

re .42

Not all local telcos are cooperating with AT&T in this venture.

In fact, the whole DA business seems to be falling apart.

For example, I was in Canada last week, and discovered that someone I
knew had a new phone number.

So I call (his area code) 555-1212.

Whatever contractor Bell Canada has hired for LD directory assistance
is running with a database that is no more up-to-date than switchboard
and lookupusa.  It took three calls to get a supervisor to agree to
actually call the local phone company in (his area code) to get the
current number.  At least they were able to do this.

BTW, for businesses, there's the NYNEX Interactive Yellow Pages at
www.bigyellow.com

/john

> Pete Kaiser has the right approach - will the Voice Services Manager be
> prepared to take him up on his offer.

I asked.  He won't.

___Pete

I found four11 to me the most up-to-date for the things I've looked up.  It 
also lets you lookup email addressed:

	http://four11.com/

>                      <<< Note 4819.11 by LEDDEV::BAKER >>>
>                                 -< LookupUSA >-
>
>Thank you .7 for the URL correction.
>
>Lookup USA when searched for "Digital Equipment Corp" in Maynard returns 4
>entries, the three DEC locations and the Credit Union.

That last entry is NOT the credit union, it's a listing for Digital's
financing arm, which must be listed as a separate business (subsidiary?).
Is it a leftover (or is it still active?) from when we financed and/or leased
system sales?

- tom]

    This whole conversation is ridiculous; what are we? A small business or
    a multi-billion dollar multi-national Corporation? Jeez...
    
    Laurie.

    re: .50
    
    Yes Laurie, we appear to be a " multi-billion dollar multi-national
    Corporation" which is well on its way to becoming a "small business". 
    
    (8-})
    
    Jim C.
    

    Small businesses - at least the ones that are growing, expanding, and
    becoming bigger businesses - don't throw roadblocks in front of their
    employees as this company seems to be so intent on doing.
    
    -Steve
    

    The difference is that the businesses are moving in the
    opposite directions.
    
    Jim C.
    

    Well, I can tell you it will most likely be the Admin folks
    who get screwed the most on this one.  We *need* accurate phone
    numbers to process our work.  The phone number field is usually
    a Required Field.  What should we start putting in there??
    A bunch of 111's??  You would not believe how much work comes
    in without phone numbers or with only partial phone numbers 
    and so on....we use directory assistance because we need to.
    
    Of course, it is this same bunch of folks who *do not* have
    PCs.  "We don't need those to do our work" is the kind of crap
    we hear around here.  The best thing that has happened for us
    is the company's decision to go to MS Exchange by December.  Now
    they are scrambling to get everyone some kind of PC.  If it hadn't
    been for that, we'd never get them.  
    
    RS

What's really insane (or inane) about this is that the stated goal could be
addressed in a far less damaging fashion, yet the bean-counters who dream
up these things can't be bothered to consider it.  Most facilities have a
system that tracks outgoing calls (and often incoming calls), and it is
straightforward to identify the offices from which excessive calls to
directory assistance are being made.  Management can then investigate and
determine if the calls are legitimate or not.

No, instead we all get cut off.  What's next - bring your own toilet paper?
(Or use http://www.scottissue.com/?)

				Steve

    > Small businesses - at least the ones that are growing, expanding, and
    > becoming bigger businesses - don't throw roadblocks in front of their
    > employees as this company seems to be so intent on doing.
    
    Actually, small businesses throw roadblocks in front of their
    *competitors*.  Which is what this company's units seem to be becoming.
    When you think about it.
    
    -Mark

>No, instead we all get cut off.  What's next - bring your own toilet paper?
>(Or use http://www.scottissue.com/?)
    
    Too expensive.
    
    Try http://www.searscatalog.com/

And who is going to pay for the increased network traffic for all of this?

			Steve

    EDS?

    
    	What costs are involved in network connections?  Is it some
    	sort of a phone line with long distance costs?
    
    	And if so, is there a real savings here?
    

    Don't know if it's still the case, but when I worked in DECdirect a few
    years ago, Directory Assistance was used to help verify new customers
    and screen out fraudulent orders.  This decree certainly puts an
    interesting twist on that Admin. work...

    It's all becoming clear now.
    
    Today, Digital warned Wall Street that they expect orders to be falling
    off (I didn't catch the entire interview, so I don't know the details).
    
    Well, maybe this is actually a method to increase the total number of
    orders figure.

    I'd rank this move with freezing the purchase of office supplies at the
    end of each fiscal year.
    
    Wonder when they'll figure out how much can be saved by disconnecting
    the electricity???
    
    Randy
    

    
    So, somebody find the error in this evaluation:
    
    
    DEC saves $500k in direct telcom costs by cutting access to telephone
    directory services. Let's conservatively assume that at $5 per hit, this
    equated to 100K directory service hits last year.
    
    I've tried a few of the web directory services; they averaged six
    minutes 17 seconds to find my phone number. I also tried the
    traditional telephone directory assistance, which averaged 47
    seconds. Let's conseratively call the difference between the two
    methods 5 minutes.
    
    The cost of a person's time, using the standard budgeting amount of
    $100k per person and assuming a 50-week year, is $0.83/minute.
    
    So, the hidden cost in added labor for 100k directory assistance hits
    per year, at an increase in overhead of 5 minutes per hit, is $415k; this
    reduces the overall savings from $500k to $85k. (This ignores other costs,
    such as added network loads, getting the necessary equipment to the people
    who need it, and the retries resulting from databases that are not quite
    up to date.)
    
    If one halves the cost per traditional directory services hit to $2.50
    (which I would guess is much close to reality), the alleged $500k
    savings turns into a $330k loss.
    

> If one halves the cost per traditional directory services hit to $2.50
> (which I would guess is much close to reality), the alleged $500k
> savings turns into a $330k loss.

  At home, I pay the phone bill. I believe the last time I looked,
  NYNEX and/or ATT was getting either $0.70 or $0.85 per call in
  excess of the minimums.

  This is really another example of the desperation and lack of
  ideas and vision on the part of our "leadership".

  "When in danger, when in doubt, run in circles, scream and shout!"

                                   Atlant

Unless the cost of directory assistance is considerably greater for commercial
customers than for residential customers, it's well under $1 for U.S. listings.
I think your 6+ minute response time from WWW directory services is also out
of whack.  You must have extremely slow connections.

    I just asked our secretary how much 411 calls cost and she
    said it was $.65 per request for businesses.
    
    That equates to 769,230 calls.
    
    If we assume a headcount of 50,000, that equates to
    15 calls per person per year, or about $10 per person.
    
    Somehow I seem compelled to make some kind of comparison
    between $10 and the cost of DEC Turkeys, but an appropriate
    comparison eludes me. :)
    
    
    

While I was in my interrim period away from DEC, my TFSO package included time
at DBM (the outplacement agency that DEC hired to help us (re)learn how to find
a job) and I went to lots of little seminars/classes on how to do various things
like write r�sum�s, do interviews, and start your own company.  Even though I
didn't really intend to create a new company, I went to a few of those seminars
too, just to see what it was all about, and to pass the time between interviews.

One of the things that came through loud and clear from the create-a-company
experts was that there are all sorts of expenses you _have_ to plan for as a
_cost_of_doing_business_.  You can obviously shop around for a good price, but
you _cannot_do_without_ certain things, like electricity for your lights, phone
service (including an 800 number if you deal with any non-local customers) and
advertizing to tell the world that you exist.  Ya just gotta have 'em, and ya
gotta pay for 'em.

It sounds like we should take some (a lot?) of our bean counters/VPs/middle
managers and send them to DBM!  I'll leave it as an exercise for Bob P. whether
that should be via a TFSO package or just a week of training.

	:Karl.

>    I just asked our secretary how much 411 calls cost and she
>    said it was $.65 per request for businesses.

Your secretary is mistaken.

There are fifty different rates for in-state directory assistance.  34 cents
in Massachusetts.

LD carriers such as MCI tend to charge around 80 cents.  Our primary carrier,
MCI, may charge something different for us.

The only thing your secretary is likely to know is what appears on the
cost center charge-back reports, which is an artificial rate.  Typically
the cost center reports show a rate computed by taking the total cost of
providing the service over the last period divided by the number of uses
plus a tax to support the telecom organization.

/john

    TO -.66
    
    Yesterday after I saw the announcement on the demise of 411
    availability, I tried to access both "switchboard" and "lookupusa". 
    After a 15 minute wait to connect to "switchboard", (I carefully kept 
    track so that I could have an idea of how long it was going to take to 
    find a number), I gave up because it was still trying to connect, and 
    started over with "lookupusa".  After another 7 minute wait I finally got 
    to the search option!  Another 2 minutes for the search to display the 
    info found.....  24 minutes is ridiculous -- so is 9 if I only count
    the time it took to be successful.....  especially considering that I
    only use directory assistance maybe once or twice a year if that much,
    and only after I've exhausted all other sources.  
    
    Maybe the solution is to put us ALL on home or mobile office, then have
    us pick up the cost of these types of calls ourselves...... it would
    make as much sense!  And look at all the savings the company would see
    with that approach -- no facilities costs in the field, no utilities,
    etc........  In my 13+ years with the company, this has to be the
    wierdest decision I've seen come out of HQ.

>-< Switchboard allternative >-
>
>http://www.lookupusa.com/ada/ada.html
>
>seems to be more up to date than "switchboard".
>


Couldn't prove that by me.  At least Switchboard lists my daughter's phone 
number in West Springfield, even if it is the old one.  lookupusa can't 
even find her new number, let alone the old one.

Same for my other daughter in North Carolina

    
    	RE: .70
    
    	Those connect times sound VERY absurd to me, for whatever
    	reason.
    
    	I connected to .lookupusa. this morning in less than 30 sec-
    	onds and each subsequent screen took 15 seconds at the most,
    	even the search screen and map screens.
    

Re .68:

> One of the things that came through loud and clear from the create-a-company
> experts was that there are all sorts of expenses you _have_ to plan for as a
> _cost_of_doing_business_.

> advertizing to tell the world that you exist.  Ya just gotta have 'em, and ya
> gotta pay for 'em.

Obviously not create-a-Digital-company experts, then.

PJDM

    
    >>Those connect times sound VERY absurd to me, for whatever reason.
    
    it's not all that absurd.  i have a difficult time connecting to just
    about anything via netscape.  i may get the first screen up within a
    few minutes, but the rest of the link can take forever.  it's very
    annoying.  lord forbid someone needs to find someone (via the internet)
    for a corporate emergency...maybe that what it'll take to get 411
    capabilities back.
    
    
    -raquel
    

    It is with great trepidation that I enter this note; don't blame me, I
    only work here.
    
    This is cost-cutting taken to the beginnings of the extreme.  This is
    how such decisions get taken:
    
    The BUs have told CCS (the folks who bring you DTN and EASYnet, among
    other things) that they can no longer afford to pay as much for all of
    these services, so CCS developed a "laundry list" of possible ways to
    cut down on cost along with impact statements about the effects of
    doing these cutbacks in service.  Virtually all of the arguments set
    forth so far here were made in defense of eliminating directory
    assistance access, as well as all of the other cost cutting activities
    that could be thought of, many of them draconian in the extreme.
    
    The list was then submitted to a cost containment committee that had
    the CIOs from each BU (and some others) sitting on it.  They went down
    the list, considering the impacts of each course of action, and rightly
    or wrongly, they decided that this action (among others that I'm not
    privy to) was the least painful way to take $500K out of the telecoms
    run rate.  It should be noted that the original "target" numbers for
    reduction would have resulted in Digital going out of business; the
    requested reductions would have essentially shut down all of the
    networks!  More came off the list of candidate actions than stayed on,
    but there is still a substantial amount required by the BUs to come off
    the budget.
    
    So, this was the best of a bad lot.  If the company is unwilling to
    fund some activities, then it is pretty much up to the end user to take
    the case back up the line to their respective businesses to make the
    case for the continued funding of the activity.  
    
    We have gotten to the point in cost cutting exercises that the only way
    to reduce expense is to remove services entirely.  CCS does not make
    the call, the "business" does; CCS can only state what something costs
    and what the impact to the company would be if it is discontinued, but
    the "business" makes the call.  I don't like this because it takes
    decision making out of the hands of people who know what they are doing
    and puts it into the hands of people who won't be particularly affected
    by the decisions, but this "ain't your father's DEC" any more, and more
    and more decisions are being taken for "financial" reasons.
    
    Part of getting "leaner and meaner" means that the old ways of doing
    things and old assumptions will change, sometimes not for the better. 
    I know that switchboard.com is not the fastest or easiest way to get
    directory info, but for the few times a year that I need to find a
    number I can put up with a (small) delay.  If there is a real business
    case to be made for a "production" use of directory assistance
    services, then I am certain that a satisfactory solution for these
    cases can be found.  Work with your BU management and your local
    telecoms organization on this; we all need to get creative.
    
    Just my $.02
    
    Regards,
    
    Bill

    these widely varying connect time sounds like the big name server
    problem that all but shutdown the network a few months ago. Im seeing
    widely varying times to get to almost anything inside DEC. The first
    time today I tried to reach this NOTE it hung for many minutes. NExt
    time I get fast response.
    
    feels like the internal net is still broken, and moving another service
    like 411 to it is just what we need.

    I wasn't going to reply to this, but now that I see there's a chance of
    our breaking three digits worth of replies in a 3 day period, here's
    one more protest.
    
    Once upon a time, I thought it was crazy that the corporation would
    give a cost center manager a $5m budget and then not trust the manager
    to spend $300.00 wisely (see note 4798).   Now I can see that the
    company doesn't trust us to spend $1.00 wisely.
    
    Re: absurd connect times for the world wide web - I believe it.  When
    you've got a good network administrator, cherish her.  When you've got
    Dogbert, things can get very bad.

> Re: absurd connect times for the world wide web - I believe it.  When
> you've got a good network administrator, cherish her.  When you've got
> Dogbert, things can get very bad.

And if you're on or near a site with high bandwidth to the firewalls,
cherish that.  Different bandwidths for different sites, times of day,
phases of the moon, etc.

___Pete

    Any suggestions on how we might get this presentation at DEC?
    
    MIT Media Lab's LiveWire, issue No. 56
    II. SPOTLIGHT:
    WHAT:   Media Lab Colloquium Series:
            "In Pursuit of the Chimera"
    WHO:    James Randi ("The Amazing Randi"), professional
            magician, author and lecturer.
    WHEN:   September 11, 1996
    WHERE:  Bartos Theater
    
    UMMARY:  The public is increasingly bombarded with an "antiscience"
    attitude from the media, the notion that knowing nothing is "politically
    correct", and that all opinions are equally worthy of respect and
    consideration.  Politicians who don't know quantum mechanics from auto
    mechanics regularly award large sums to crackpots.  Large corporations
    invest millions in spurious notions such as perpetual motion, and
    self-appointed gurus become best-selling authors by promoting ancient,
    disproved, medieval medical ideas.  A second Dark Ages period is upon
    us.
    

    re .75.
    
    ..er... won't the 7000 people going out door help reduce our *total*
    phone bills by a proportionate amount ?..
    
    And, since yesterday, I now speak at incredible speed whilst on the
    phone to customers. They can't understand I word I am saying, but it
    makes me proud to realise how much cash I am saving the company with my
    much shortened calls.
    
    I feel like I just got sucked into a Dilbert cartoon.
    
    
    

    
    Re .72, Re .70:
    
    Lookupusa response seems to depend on the time of day (no surprise).
    
    The following turnaround times for one lookup, starting from scratch,
    were recorded today at ZKO:
    
        Time of day   response time
        -----------   -------------
           06:30           :45
           08:00          1:59
           09:00          8:03
           10:00          9:24
           11:00          8:19
    
    ------------------------------------------
    
    .64 revisited:
    
    From the data above, the increased time per loookup of five minutes
    seems reasonable (if not charitable). Data points in other replies
    indicate that the cost per traditional telephone lookup is probably
    closer to $1 than $2.50 or $5.
    
    This changes the $500,000 telcom saving to a $1,575,000 corporate loss.
    
    Another way of looking at it: at 500k lookups per year, each additional
    second per lookup costs about $7000; a 71-second increase in the lookup
    time wipes out the savings.
    
    

    
    I'm not sure this is mentioned in a previous reply, although I saw
    toilet paper, and got a chuckle out of that one, but what's next?
    
    Perhaps 911?
    
    My $0.02 cents worth.
    
    Bob

    Next thing you know we won't have voice-mail.  Everyone will be
    required to supply their own answering machine.  
    
                                                August

    re:.75
    
    .75 shows some keen insight as to how this company is being run
    (management wise) and further begs the question, just how in the hell
    did we get ourselves into this mess again?  As always one can head up
    stream in our business to find the answers.
    
    The problem is not 411, that's some band-aid to cut money out of a
    company that is beginning to bleed again.  I mean we have what $1.5B in
    the treasury give or take a 100 mill, but it's the numbers they (they
    being upper management) are quaking over.  And folks, they are quaking. 
    Our Q1 is in the tank right now and here's why. 
    
    First, the Field sales force emptyed the order backlog in Q4 so we were
    told "in order to make our numbers".   Well the SBU did make their
    numbers for the first time in 3 years for the USA.  This is good.  But
    we have no backlog going into Q1.  This is not good.  So what do we do? 
    We tell our field sales and marketing organization that in essence you
    all get to look for new jobs in July, the music starts, the chairs
    are out in N-1 configuration and everyone dives for open seats as soon
    as the music stops.  Result, we did NOTHING in July for certs and
    ships.  And this is the life blood of this company: ORDERS and
    SHIPMENTS.  Kiss off July.
    
    So now everyone has a new job to figure out, well good time to take
    that 3-week vacation eh?  So there goes August.  Kiss off month 2.
    
    Now here we are in fiscal week 10 with 3 to go.  And we are in rotten
    shape.  We haven't made our revenue numbers for the past two months, 
    and the September loads most likely are starting to increase but not
    enough to fix the first two months and the previous ones before that. 
    So, were having another "soft" quarter and THEY know it.  THEY just
    won't admit but we all know it 'cause were in the trench and can see
    it.  Even the CFO sends a little pulse down the wire saying it's not
    looking great.  Wonderful, here it comes again, torpedo #3 into our
    hull.
    
    Face it folks, the decisions management made to decimate the field
    selling engine are going to significantly affect our Q1 profitability
    and performance.  This is the root cause as to why the BU's have to go
    into rooms and agonize over how many telephone calls can be madeto
    information.  It's one of those systemic things, we're once again
    treating the symptoms but the bigger problems are looming like freight
    trains at our door.
    
    And if that wasn't exciting enough, we stuffed our channel again.  Yup,
    just like Enrico did, the SBU did it in Q4.  Remember we went to all
    our really big customers, like the distributors and resellers and told
    them we needed to ship them $x millions of dollars of Alpha's.  And we
    did.  There's one distributor sitting on over 65 Turbolasers right now
    can you imagine what the end of the month is going to look like when
    all those unsold units come back to us for credit?
    
    We just don't get it.  Correction, THEY just don't get it.  This isn't
    about the phones, or the staples, or post it notes.  It's about
    fundamentally being in tune with the business.  It's about hiring and
    keeping good hard working professionals and letting them rock and roll
    and have fun with a thriving business.  It's about trust, and honesty
    and forthrightness.  It's about setting achievable goals, laying out a
    plan to do it, giving the people the resources to make it happen and
    turning them losse with the fundamental belief they want to and will do
    the correct thing.  It's about being human.  We're not a human based
    business.  We are a scrambling, frightened numbers chasing business. 
    We know it, Wall Street knows it and worse of all our customers know
    it.  And our competition knows it and they are exploiting it every
    chance they get.  When you are drowning your competition shoves a hose
    down your throat and turns on the hydrants.
    
    Enough said.
    
    Mav

>    Next thing you know we won't have voice-mail.  Everyone will be
>    required to supply their own answering machine.  
    
Hey! Careful there!  You might give Telecom some ideas they haven't thought
of yet!

	Josh

    
    	RE: .82
    
    	In case you were serious, 911 is not a toll call.
    

No, but you do pay for 911 access - at least it shows up on my phone bill every
month.

    > what's next? ... Perhaps 911?
    
    Nah - they use caller ID and don't take our calls anymore.  The patient
    keeps resisting sound medicine and calling for a witch doctor.
    
    > My $0.02 cents worth.
    
    I hope you're depositing two pennies in your computer every time you
    write to this notesfile.  You can put the coins in that slot where the
    three-and-a-half inch thing goes, if you want.  And don't forget
    to add $9,000 or so for the corporate bureaucracy to send someone
    around to empty out your coin box once in a while.   :-)
    
    > Next thing you know we won't have voice-mail.  Everyone will be
    > required to supply their own answering machine.  
    
    Better yet - we can eliminate in-bound phone service.  That ought to
    free up a lot of time for important things, once we get them customers
    off our backs.  And we can show everybody how we're still a
    leading-edge company by basing our infrastructure on that technology of
    the future, Microsoft Mental Telepathy.
    
    And how about this costsaver: outsource lunch.  Let some other company
    worry about feeding its employees while ours discover a whole extra
    hour to spend doing corporate business.  Whatever it is we do.
    
    -Mark

    Re: .84
    
    Your exposition reminds me of the small biology consulting firm I
    worked for before coming to Digital. When I first came to work at ZKO,
    I felt I'd landed on some other planet -- the management styles were so
    different. Now, it seems I've been warped back to the old planet
    without even leaving my cubicle to go to the transporter room.
    
    Such clarity deserves some kind of award IMHO.  

    .84, .89,
    
    I waiting for the next side-splitter from the donkeys above, enthusing
    us to sell 'Large Projects' (preferably, before end of Q1 - er, three
    weeks away), as these bring in large revenue. Ignoring of course, the
    odd characteristic known as 'very long sales cycle', and a key buying
    criteria known as 'long term credibility of the vendor'. 
    
    And, if you forget the phone number of your punter, you can't call
    enquiries anymore.
    
    What planet are these eejoots on ?
    
    
    AW

    Well, I heard they were going to remove ALL telephones, save 1 per
    site. Individuals would be required to reserve telephone time in
    advance. A VTX phone booking process is under development along with a
    netscape applet (to facilitate "Instant Phone Reservation Access").
    The phone (emphasis on "THE") would be located in or near the parking
    area for the facility so as to not incur occupancy charges for its
    space requirement or the short lineups expected.
    
    Big savings.
    
    Really, really big savings!
    
    8^)
    

| <<< Note 4819.83 by CXXC::REINIG "This too shall change" >>>

| Next thing you know we won't have voice-mail.  Everyone will be
| required to supply their own answering machine.

	That's how it was before.... oh wait... DEC paid for them.

re .84 - well said.

re: .75 -
Why don't the BUs do what they are there for - create BUSINESS.
This relentless "we must cut costs, we must become more competitive"
strategy is clearly causing a management-introduced cancer that is 
rapidly eating away our very core.

Perhaps our costs are too high. Sure they should be brought into line,
but this near-sighted rapid strangling of resources seems to be
crippling our very ability to make money. We must live by doing! 
Come quarter-end yet again we will be 'positioned for growth' 
(ie. not growing). Disillusionment continues.

If we were a bookshop we could _significantly_ reduce costs by eliminating
all shelving and classification. All titles could be piled on the floor in
one big heap. We would manage to trim costs, _and_ save on floor space.
Our customer numbers would probably drop to zero, but that's not what
we're focussing on right now..

The employees are willing to work hard, the customers would love our
stuff, but the management seem to be blocking the way. 
Their over-riding priority should be to LET THE BUSINESS HAPPEN.
    
    -Kevin                

RE: .75

Did the "cost containment committee" consider holding management and 
employees ACCOUNTABLE for their own telephone expense as Steve Lionel 
suggest in .55?

I once worked for another company, where each employee receive an itemized
monthly long distance phone bill, much like your own household phone bill. 
Each employee had to check off each legitimate business call and pay for 
any personel calls.  The report was then submitted and approved by his/her 
manager.

The new policy seems to penalize everybody, because management cannot be 
trusted.


						-Paul


    

 re    .84
    
    In my 16+ years at DEC (two tours) this is ony the 3rd time I have 
    ever entered anything in this conference....but I felt compelled 
    reply with an amen to the above mentioned reply. WHY can't senior
    management grasp these basic fundamentals of our business cycles?
    
    Or perhaps they believe the law of "cause and effect" has been
    rescinded.....
    
    

|    Better yet - we can eliminate in-bound phone service.  That ought to
|    free up a lot of time for important things, once we get them customers
|    off our backs.  And we can show everybody how we're still a
|    leading-edge company by basing our infrastructure on that technology of
|    the future, Microsoft Mental Telepathy.

	Just move us to a 900 area code (3 minutes minimum). That will also
	make it near impossible to be disrupted by international calls.

	>Per

If anything is done on the order of taking away phones, eliminating in-bound
phone service, or itemizing all phone calls, you can bet a bunch of people will
leave to work someplace where they don't have as big a brother looking over
their shoulders.  Big savings on headcount, I'm sure.  (And I suspect the 411
thing is going to be the last straw for some folks.)

						Brian

    Re: .94
    
    Your cost center manager *DOES* get a phone bill detailing your usage
    every month (you're in ZKO, right?).  I suspect that, given the charges
    for DTN calling, the numbers are sufficiently low that most cc mgrs
    would find it a "waste of time" to look at all of the details to save a
    few $s on their budgets.  It could well cost several times as much in a
    mgr's time (his/her most precious commodity) as it would save.  Hence,
    it is far easier to restrict everyone; it gives a recognizable savings.
    
    I am not saying that this is a good or bad decision, just that there is
    no individual benefit to undertaking this -- no cc mgr has the time to
    review individual phone bills (or the inclination).  Up to now the
    company has depended on every individual to do the right thing; it just
    doesn't work when no one feels the necessity of saving at most $5-10
    per year.  So, these kinds of decisions get made by people who are
    really trying their best to meet the financial needs of the company
    without totally crippling the workers' abilities to do their jobs. 
    What would you have said if the decision had been to halve EASYnet
    bandwidth (which would have saved similar numbers)?  For the great bulk
    of us, this decision is mildly inconvenient; for those who have a
    really big business justification there are ways to get around this (if
    your business depends on using DA to conduct its business, then justify
    the use to mgmnt and something will undoubtedly be worked out).  
    
    Benchmarking exercises show that we have arguably the lowest telecoms
    unit costs in the industry, but we use a LOT more of it than other
    companies so our overall costs are higher.  This is what is being
    looked at by the bean counters, not the strategic nature of our
    investment in telecoms.  That's another story entirely -- don't get me
    started.
    
    Regards,
    
    Bill

    .98 sounds good in this context, and it's probably the level at which
    such decisions are made.  But if, after the "extraordinary" charge, we
    lost 400 million dollars last year (or whatever it was), how much of a
    turnaround do we expect by cutting a 0.5 million dollar item?
    
    Shouldn't we be concentrating on *big* wins?
    
    If it's a "waste of time" to ferret out the details, then it's a "waste
    of time" to be changing things in that area.
    
    As for the "$$ crunch", we have a cash kitty of what, 1.5 billion
    dollars?  At the current rate it would take 3000 years of directory
    assistance to deplete the cash reserves.
    
    I don't know where those *big* cuts ought to be made (outside of
    leaning down the org chart layers) but then, I'm one who believes we
    ought to invest in our people and our infrastructure to improve our
    *income* rather than simply cutting our *expenses* to get black ink.
    
    Most Wall Street news indicates that's I'm out of touch, of course. :-(
    
    -Mark

    
    	Yes, our managers do see the telephone bills.
    
    	My manager a couple years ago came to me once and told me I
    	was screwing up his telephone budget ... it was off because
    	I wasn't making enough long distance calls.  8^)  I think
    	I'd make maybe 1 LD call in the previous 3 months.
    

>> Next thing you know we won't have voice-mail.  Everyone will be
>> required to supply their own answering machine.

>  That's how it was before.... oh wait... DEC paid for them.

What's the monthly cost per phone for voice mail?  How much does a very
basic answering machine cost when bought by the thousands?   How long would
it take for the savings in ongoing monthly costs pay for the basic
machines?

In my office I use a old answering machine I would otherwise have no use
for and voice mail is disabled on my extension.  I'm saving the cost center
money each month and I have a little blinking red light telling me when I
have a message.  (and I have to press only one button to hear the message).

                                    August

    RE: .84
    
    Mav,
    Your memo was well-written, and I believe gets to the crux of the
    problem in this company.  What you are describing are basic business
    and corporate problems that should have been recognized for what they
    are years ago - problems that need to be fixed.  We should have gotten
    beyond this stage quite some time ago, but alas, we have not.
    
    I have been in Sales with Digital since 1982.  During that time I have
    seen some exceptional managers in Digital, and some not so exceptional
    managers (I also was one for five years.)  The difference between the
    current time and earlier was that we had, once, the market share and
    customer goodwill to overcome what are viewed as questionable edicts
    from upper management.  We could fall over ourselves once or twice, but
    basically bounce back by showing good revenue growth and earnings. 
    Those days are long gone, but the questionable edicts have not been
    eradicated from the system.  I'm really not sure that today's upper
    management is any worse than earlier years; by many measures they may
    be better, by others worse.  Unfortunately for them (and us), though,
    is that missteps nowadays are much more dear in terms of their
    long-term impact on Digital's survivability as a corporation.  Your
    observations about actions taken on a quarterly basis are a good
    example of the change.  We have always done this sort of activity (pull
    in all the orders we can, and fill the channels pipeline.)  It worked
    in the past because increasing revenues nullified the negative impact
    to the markets.  We just don't have the room for error any longer, and
    upper management acts like we do.
    
    I don't have any answers for these problems.  I personally know of
    managers, some who I work directly and indirectly for, who recognize
    the futility of these upper management actions and would like to do
    something about it.  But they do shoot the messengers in this company,
    and many of these individuals are in fear for their jobs if they speak
    up.  So consequently nothing changes - management is applauded by their
    underlings for their actions, and bewilderment occurs when these
    actions do not translate into a resounding turnaround for the company. 
    Are we in a death spiral?  I won't concede that yet, but we ain't that
    far off.
    
    Chuck

    re .98
    
    Certainly a 5 minute phone bill check by a manager wouldn't be all that
    hard to do... all they're looking for is to see if any of their direct
    reports sticks out like a sore thumb with excessive calls to diretory
    assistance.  I hardly consider that to be "big brother".  This isn't a
    free-for-all.  It's a business.  
    
    Could we ask our phone service provider (MCI, AT&T, or whoever) to give
    us a list of the phone numbers the most directory assistance calls came
    from.  We pay those companies a LOT of money.  Shouldn't they be able
    to do this for us?
    
    This all seems fairly trivial.  Unless of course we are so mired down
    in our own bureaucracy and internal power struggles that even the 
    trivial things are no longer achieveable on a corporate wide scale.  
    I fear that this is the case.
    
    To eliminate 411 access seems like a "manage by memo" solution to a 
    problem that is easily fixable by more "hands on" means.
    
    -Steve
    
    

    We KNOW where all the Directory Assistance calls come from!  It's not
    really a matter of a very few people calling thousands of times, but
    rather more like thousands of people calling a few times.  My personal
    opinion on all of this is that this will cost more than it saves after
    all is said and done.  However, this kind of action is also intended to
    send a loud and clear message to everyone which is more effective than
    just sending out a "don't use 411" readers' choice memo to the world.
    
    In case no one has noticed, this company is in bad condition.  $500K
    here and $500K there and it adds up after a while :^).  

> However, this kind of action is also intended to send a loud and
> clear message to everyone which is more effective than just send-
> ing out a "don't use 411" readers' choice memo to the world.

  Here's the message it sends to me:

    1. This company is in incredibly bad shape if it it can't
       afford the basic infrastructure that lets it do business;
       the boat's about to capsize, $1.5B in the bank or not.

    2. Management is devoid of real ideas on how to fix this.

    3. Employees and customers better have their contingency
       plans ready for the end 'cause it's coming soon.


  It isn't just the stupid* 411 plan that makes me say this. It's
  also the fact that *EVERYONE I KNOW* in the technical community
  is shopping their r�sum� around and many key technical contributors
  are leaving. Pretty soon, it won't matter what management does as
  there'll be no one left to manage.

  Every additional little pain-in-the-butt, penny-wise, pound-foolish
  decision accelerates the death spiral. The 411 decision is just the
  latest in a long series.
                                      Atlant


* I literally mean that. This is a *STUPID* decision.

    Answering machines are OK, except a customer would get a busy signal
    when they called and you were on the phone.  At least with voicemail,
    a customer will never get a busy signal (of course "never" is
    relative).
    
    I spend 80 to 90% of my time on the phone and get approximately 25 to
    30 voicemails from customer's calls that I can't answer because I'm on
    the phone; without voicemail, those customers, as well as the ones that
    call and decide to hang up and not leave a message, would get a busy
    signal.  NOT good for business.
    
    I don't know what the solution is here, but getting rid of 411 ain't
    it.
    
    Toodles.....JPs
    

I'd love to see voicemail eliminated entirely within Digital.  Nothing
beats getting a responsive, competent human being on the line.  The way
voicemail is used in this company is a disgrace.

___Pete

    RE: .84
    
    That is a magnificent note.
    
    RE: voice mail etc.
    
    I work in technical support, and I spend 80%-90% of my time on the
    phone. We have no voice mail and no answering machines. When I get an
    incoming call and I'm on the phone I hear a beep, and in order to grab
    the other caller, I have to cut the current call (there may be a way
    round this, but no-one seems to know of it). If I don't the other
    person hears what? An engaged tone? Nope. A message telling them that I
    know there's a second call and asking them to be patient? Nope. They
    hear a ringing tone...
    
    Cheers, Laurie.

re: voice mail

We could go back to using secretaries/admin assistants for taking the 
messages.

Yesterday, I called a bank in NH looking for info on a loan. The call 
was picked up by a human being. Wow, was I impressed. None of the "If 
you have a touch tone phone, hit 1 now...". Guess where I'll be 
taking my business.

Sometimes it's little things that impress/please customers.

Joe

re: .107

 VM is an excellent thing, if used properly. If one is one the phone, and 
another call comes in, that call should go to voice mail, and be addressed
as soon as it is humanly possible. Without it, the caller would get a busy 
signal, and I know for me, a busy signal is not only an aggravating tone to
hear, but also makes me hit the redail button, or redial, and redundancy is
yet another thing that is annoying.

I agree 100% with your comment 2, and in part on 3, as there are some who use
VM properly. Might be the minority though. Perhaps we should take a survey? 8-)

re: .108

 Laurie,
 
 Is it possible for you to get a multi-line phone, with "hold" capabilities?
That should keep them from getting dropped off, and they can be on hold listen-
ing to beautiful, calming music, while you close out the 1st conversation.


re: .109 

 Secretaries? We used to have bunch of them. Someone considered we had too many,
so now those who are left usually are supporting 3, 4 or more managers at a time
and this cuts their efficiency in all areas. I se some of them sweating, as they
run around, make copies, juggle phone lines, do the presentations, and then get
put down by one of the 3, 4 or more for not being able to help their cause.

 You're right, it IS the little things that make people happy. To know someone
cares enough to answer quickly is critical. These mechanized answering services
that have one pushing buttons to try and follow a trail of numbers, in order to
get to a specific department is an annoying thing to a potential customer.

re .94 & .98 (maybe we should pay for own, would managers waste time checking?)

I see nothing wrong with paying for my own personal calls,
in fact it seems to be an apprpriate thing to do.
No matter what the solution, some time is going to be "wasted",
whether it be in time spent getting numbers or checking phone bills or whatever.

re .103 (How do SUN, Compaq, & IBM do it?)

From personal experience I can tell you that IBM gives you a bill and they
expect you to go down to the cashier and pay it.  My manager would give me the
phone bill with the instructions to mark my calls and go pay them.  The cashier
kept the bill with the marked off calls.

In one respect I liked this.  At the time I was making a number of out of state
personal calls and it was much more convenient to do it from work.  I did a lot
of them after hours or during lunch and that showed up on the bills.  I never
felt guilty about running up a bill because I was paying.  Worked for me.  I was
also not in a job that required a lot of phone work although it did require some
infrequent, long winded, long distance type stuff.

.re Answering services

I love it, most phone calls are "message delivery" type things anyway, as long
as there is a way of eventually getting to talk to someone for the "non routine"
types of things.  I do wish though that the red lights would light when you had
a message, that would make things SO much easier.

    Re: .110, multi-line phones, customers on hold . . .

    What if Laurie needs to spend 30 minutes or more with caller no. 1?
    Toggling between the main caller and all the callers in waiting would
    be, IMHO, much more stressful/annoying/off-putting than even the most
    complex and impersonal voice mail system.

    There's nothing wrong with voice mail provided (a) the menus are well
    thought out and (b) the messages are answered promptly.  Most
    professionals in business handle (b) as part of the job anyway.

    George

    Clearly there our people who need something better than a simple
    answering machine.  However, I average maybe one or two short phone
    calls a day.  For me, simplicity wins.  
    
                                        August

    RE: 98
    
>    Benchmarking exercises show that we have arguably the lowest telecoms
>    unit costs in the industry, but we use a LOT more of it than other
>    companies so our overall costs are higher.  This is what is being
>    looked at by the bean counters, not the strategic nature of our
>    investment in telecoms.  That's another story entirely -- don't get me
>    started.
    
    Don't want you to get you started but this seems to me to be where the
    problem is.  Looks to me like the extent of the analysis went:
    
    1) Benchmarking shows our telecom costs are higher than the rest of the
    industry.
    
    2) Cut telecom costs.
    
    Not much analysis of WHY our telecom costs are higher.  Perhaps they
    are higher because we use telecom instead of other possible services to
    produce an overall lower cost to Digital.  Without analyzing why the
    costs are higher you can't really propose a solution.  Perhaps its a
    GOOD thing that our costs are higher.
    
    I see this as a symptom to our overall prolems.  There isn't much
    analysis in our cost cutting.  It's just cut the cost without thinking
    about the implications or ramifications to other parts of the business.

    Still not as bad a some...
    
    One Areospace company I support has one phone line, 
    one voicemail account and 2 handsets for each smurf cube. 
    Each smurf cube has 2 people, they have to share! 
    
    Exceptions for people manning support desks and the like require VP 
    approval.    

    re .114
    
    exactly!

    
    
>>    Benchmarking exercises show that we have arguably the lowest telecoms
>>    unit costs in the industry, but we use a LOT more of it than other
>>    companies so our overall costs are higher.
    
    Geez, I thought I remember my boss telling me we *should* be doing
    things over the phone as a cheaper alternative to having meeting,
    visiting with customers, and doing all the other things that we used
    to.
    
    
    Larry
    

    
    	RE: .117
    
    	Yes, we have many more instances at a lower cost per instance,
    	for a higher overall cost.  Compare the current costs to what
    	they could be [let's suppose you added $.25 to each telephone
    	call] and it wouldn't look so good any more.
    

    	I had sent this into one of the various suggestion boxes a few
    years ago, can't remember which one but never heard back....
    
    	When used correctly, voicemail is an effective tool, but you have
    to check it often and make a point to return calls promptly.  (next day
    is not good!)  Sitting at the desk you can see the message light come
    on (as well as see the other lines ringing), but if away from the
    office you have to make a point of checking (unless you're allowed to
    have your voicemail system page you).
    
    	Digital uses 3 or 4 variants of voicemail (DECvoice, MERIDIAN,
    ASPEN, and AT&T) that work a bit differently.   Usually your customer
    doesn't want to hear how glad we are that they called,
    yadda-yadda-yadda, so in the first 4 or 5 seconds of your message identify
    yourself, tell them how to leave a message and then exit, and then
    after a [pause], go for the yadda-yadda-yadda.  This is appreciated
    when the caller is using a calling card and is saved the problem of
    hanging up and again dialing their 30-40 digits for the next call.
    (I get comments on mine all the time, you are welcome to try 328.3008,
    but no obscense messages please!)
    
    	And if you're not going to be returning the call because you're not
    there (vacation, whatever) leave an "extended absense message" but make
    it brief, since these messages cannot be bypassed.  Leaving the number
    of someone who is taking your calls a good idea if you can arrange it,
    else indicate that they are welcome to leave a message, but indicate
    when you are likely to return the call.
    
    

    
     re.all
    
    I just stop talking to people altogether. Makes my life a lot
    easier.
    
    -Mike Z.

As one whose primary responsibility is customer interaction, it would be
tremendously damaging if our VMS (voice mail system) were done away with.
At our site there are 0 (yes ZERO) secretaries to answer phones that may
be busy or unattended.

    
    

>>            <<< Note 4819.121 by INDYX::ram "Ram Rao, PBPGINFWMY" >>>
>>                        -< Please don't eradicate VMS >-

Now, there's one by-line and title I didn't expect to see together!  :-)

Re: .114
    
>   1) Benchmarking shows our telecom costs are higher than the rest of the
>   industry.
>   
>   2) Cut telecom costs.

    I'd love to know the source of comparative cost figures.  I've seen so
    many memos lately stating "Our <blah> costs are higher than <blah>.
    We're doing <blah> to get them more in line with <blah>".

    Where do the figures come from?  Do HP, IBM, DEC, etc. reps huddle at
    COMDEX and compare phone bills?  Does some "industry analyst" whip out
    a OUIJA board?  Anyone know?

    I'm curious.

    Bob

    There are companies that get several companies together to compare
    things like telecoms costs.  We have been participating in such an
    exercise for quite some time now; however, by contract, we are not
    allowed to divulge who the other companies are.  Suffice it it say that
    companies in the same businesses are compared.
    
    We do have relatively low unit costs of ownership when compared to
    these other companies, but we seem to use telecoms a LOT more on a per
    capita basis.  I could explain this as the result of a lot of business
    people leveraging their businesses' effectiveness through the use of
    telecoms.  A good example is teleconferencing: if people are not
    allowed to travel, are they expected to stop working just because they
    can't have contact with their peers in the company?  Teleconferencing
    is a good alternative to travel, but "management" doesn't seem to
    recognose this -- they want us to cut travel AND teleconferencing! 
    Closing sites and doing more work at home will have a relative upward
    pressure on unit costs for telecoms because we lose some of the
    economies of scale that working in bigger groupings can give us (it
    also turns LAN traffic into dial-up traffic for a lot of instances). 
    Closing facilities probably makes a lot of financial sense, but mgmt
    wants to have the lower real estate costs AND lower telecoms costs
    (can't be done).
    
    A better question might be to ask why we need to communicate so much
    within the company to get our jobs done.  Why is it necessary to be
    organized such that major meetings have to include people scattered all
    over the world?  Is this just the cost of "management by concensus"? 
    Or are Digital employees less "empowered" to do their jobs than at
    other, similar companies?  Or, alternatively, are we more empowered to
    make the "little" daily decisions that get our jobs done?  Or a
    combination?  Whatever the answers, we seem to do a lot more telecoms
    than an awful lot of companies.  Unfortunately, mgmt seems unwilling to
    look at cause and effect and prefers to just cut, and I suppose that if
    I were responsible for the financial health of the company, I'd be
    pretty desparate right now, too.

>>    A better question might be to ask why we need to communicate so much
>>    within the company to get our jobs done.

	Um... Because this is the Information Age? Because for years
	we've been ahead of the game with regard to electronic
	communication and it comes natural to most of us now?

	They can't have their cake and eat it too.. You have to spend
	money to make money.

							mike

    I'm in the middle of getting an MBA and I read something just this week
    for one of my classes that instantly made me think of this topic. It's
    from Thomas A. Stewart's "The Search for the Organization of Tomorrow".
    Here's the paragraph which brought this topic to mind:
    
         Results like that [various examples of how companies greatly
         improved performance - bdd] come from changing a company in
         profound ways, not just tinkering with the boxes on an
         organization chart. For years, Smith says, the basic questions
         about how best to arrange people and jobs stayed the same: "Do
         we centralize or decentralize - and where do we stick
         international?" The answer was never satisfactory. Companies
         were set up by product, or by customer, or by territory, and
         then switched when those arrangements stopped working. All that
         rejiggering missed the point, says Smith: "It mattered only to
         the top people in the company. Below them you found the same
         functional, vertical organization. For the 90% of the people
         who serve customers and make product, all that changed was the
         boss's name."
    
    	BD�

    We need to communicate so much because most of the communication is
    deparate attempts to find SOMEONE, ANYONE who is responsible for the
    product under discussion or who can answer questions.  I get several
    calls a week from frantic employees hopeful that I happen to know who
    is in charge of product X.  Sure, we have some corporate indexes, but
    they are more often than not out of date.  For example, VTX ATOZ no
    longer seems to be actively maintained.  Groups put up web pages but
    don't update them.  Corporate Customer Relations turned into US
    Customer Relations and then disappeared entirely.
    
    We'd all be a lot better off if there was a central corporate office
    whose job it was to keep track of who does what and how to get in touch
    with them.  Bob Palmer talked about this nifty information system
    running on Alphas, but from my conversations with people who should
    know, it's an empty shell right now with no funding to make it useful.
    
    This notesfile serves as the information switchboard for the company -
    without it, I think we'd go under fast.
    
    					Steve

    re .124
    
    >Unfortunately, mgmt seems unwilling to look at cause and effect and 
    >prefers to just cut,
    
    That is it. Or put another way, they do not have a credible and
    effective cost-control policy which enjoys the support and confidence
    of the employees. Nobody seems to care much. The very fact that this
    decision is met here with derision which does not get an answer shows
    that the decision takers do not have the guts to defend their decisions
    publicly. Cost-cutting is a science. What happens with us is butchering
    in the midst of waste. 
    
    It seems clear that we could have all the phone information we need
    using infoservers in a way which would save money, but that is being
    ignored. It is a mindset which is handicapping the company, and the CEO
    must take the responsibility for it.
    
    Kevin 

    I understand this decision has been "put on hold"
    
    stay tuned...

    re: .102
    
    Why on earth would anyone not speak up when asked about their views on
    a decision that is being pondered or proposed and not give their honest
    to God feeling about how they feel.  Are we all so paranoid to truly
    feel that we will be shot if we give our honest and forthright opinion
    about what we believe as a professional.  And if so, is that the kind
    of job and work environment you truly want to be in?  I mean come on
    folks, if we can not be honest with ourselves, than we are history. 
    
    How can we be honest with our customers?
    How can we be honest with the investment community?
    How can we be honest with the owners of the business, our shareholders?
    How can we be honest with our competitors?
    How can we be honest with the consultant community?
    How can we be honest with our vendors?
    How can we be honest with our business partners?
    How can we be honest with our families?
    
    ......How can we be honest with ourselves?
    
    I read a recent article interviewing Bob Palmer in one of his early
    meetings in the company with Jack Smith.  Well we were having a tough
    time, losing market share and taking it in the shorts on our profits
    and revenues.  Well, BP was in this meeting (paraphrasing) and the
    general consensus was that the solution to bringing in more money was
    to raise our prices.  Now everyone who has taken economics and
    marketing knows that when you are struggling for marketshare you don't
    go out and raise the price of oranges.  You get inovative, you do
    things like advertising to the world that you have the best oranges at
    the low low price and sell organges to everyone who wants an orange. 
    you even try to convince the apple lovers that an orange a day will
    keep the doctor away too.  
    
    Bob was looking forward for a good debate on this pricing discussion
    but no one would do it.  Why?  Were they afraid of being shot? 
    Hmmmm...perhaps.  But this company I think started with the greatest
    debate of all, when KO went to get the $50K he was turned down the
    first time to start the business.  So he went back and debated with his
    people and worked on the business plan and came back and SOLD it again
    and this time he got the seed money to start history.  Without this
    introspection and debate I doubt we'd exist.  I doubt we would made
    this much progress.
    
    We don't debate anymore.  We are like sheep milling around in our
    Dilbert cubes waiting for the call to market.  Well folks, debating and
    questioning rationale is not only good, it is HEALTHY.  It lets you
    twirl decisions 360 degrees and make sure that you have considered all
    the options.  If you are telling me there are managers in this company
    that are afraid to express their opinions honestly, fairly and without
    repercussions from above, then we are truly toast.  I'd like to hear a
    leader, right this instant come in after this entry and tell me to my
    electronic face that I could be shot for expressing my personal and
    professional views on something.
    
    I'm not talking about not being professional, in not structuring a
    logical and convincing arguement concerning my viewpoint.  But if I
    feel that I don't have the ability to do that anymore over the fear of
    telling the King he has no clothes on then I'm outta' here.  That is
    utterly ridiculous.  We all know it too.  
    
    So debate this 411 stuff.  Debate your engineering design or idea. 
    Hell, if it's a good one I'll go sell it and make us a couple of
    million bucks.  Debate your approach.  You will learn something in the
    process and be a better individual contributor for it in the long run.
    
    Mav

    > Why on earth would anyone not speak up when asked about their
    > views...  Are we all so paranoid to truly feel that we will be shot
    > if we give our honest and forthright opinion.
    
    FWIW, paranoia is only one of the reasons people don't respond.
    Others may include:
    
    	- cynicism: it won't do any good anyway, so why bother?
    	- depression: nobody cares how I feel...
    
    I think that for different people, different reasons may apply.  Maybe
    a combination of ingredients for some.  But nothing seems to be
    happening to improve the situation.  On those rare occasions that the
    upper crust asks for feedback in some way, there doesn't seem to be any
    concrete indication that they actually heed it.  (How many
    organizational questionnaires did *you* fill out last year.)
    
    I agree *strongly* with your key point, that open debate is good and
    healthy.  But with a lot of reasons that people avoid it, and no sign
    of meaningful encouragement from above, I don't see the fix.
    
    Does that make me a cynic, or depressed?  And I haven't even dealt with
    paranoia yet...  :-)
    
    -Mark

    > Why on earth would anyone not speak up when asked about their
    > views...  Are we all so paranoid to truly feel that we will be shot
    > if we give our honest and forthright opinion.
    
    Fear.  Absolute fear.
    Fear of looking stupid.
    Fear of being made to look stupid.
    Fear of pissing off the "wrong" person.
    Fear of not being able to get it into the right words.
    Fear of losing your job.
    Fear of losing your promotion.
    Fear of losing your raise.
    
    Open door policies often are revolving door policies.  As are
    "frank" discussions.  You don't get fired by being blunt, being
    honest, being right, or being wrong.  But you may find yourself
    looking in from the outside afterwards.
    
    It's been made known to me that I should seriously consider
    chilling out.  And that I have rumpled some feathers in a few
    birds of prey that I can't afford to offend.  For a change,
    I'm gonna take the advise.  Friday the 13th is my self-selected
    d-day to delete the DIGITAL conference from my notebook.
    
    I'll share my views on what I'm being paid to have view on, and
    this ain't it.  Time to get back to work, August vacation is over.