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From: earlw@pesnta.UUCP (Earl Wallace )
Newsgroups: net.rumor
Subject: Re: Whither the gurus (windy reply)
Message-ID: <2691@pesnta.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 9-Mar-85 21:25:00 EST
Article-I.D.: pesnta.2691
Posted: Sat Mar  9 21:25:00 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 10-Mar-85 08:12:21 EST
References: <1650@seismo.UUCP>
Reply-To: earlw@pesnta.UUCP (Earl Wallace)
Organization: Perkin-Elmer DSG, Santa Clara, Calif.
Lines: 127
Summary: 

I wonder if the current downfall of High Technology leadership in this 
Country is due in part to the mismanagement of valuable employees?
I have seem with my own two eyes how a single person can out perform a
dozen people.  But that single performer is a "misfit" in the corporate
world.  He has to go, get rid of the "trouble maker".  The trouble maker
just doesn't follow nit-picking orders well and thus, he is labeled for life.
Too bad for the Company and stock holders, they will lose in the end.  After
all the misfits are removed, you have a well-oiled machine that generates 
products designed to fit within the overall corporate strategy.  Unfortunately,
by the time the product hits the market, it's outdated and too expensive or
the foreign competition stomped our collective asses in the ground.

I think too much time is spent with meetings and *bullshit*, lets see what
the market needs and go for it and stop the internal bitching that goes on
inside of almost every company in the United States today.   Here is my
list of reasons why American Companies are losing to the overseas competition
(its my personal options only and not that of the company I work for and my
options may be wrong anyway...):

	- The "not invented here" syndrome.  This is your development group
	  will not use some piece of hardware, software, whateverware
	  created elsewhere because it was not created in the group.  
	  How the hell do you think the overseas competition got so far
	  ahead of us?  They used almost everything they could find, they
	  didn't spend millions of dollars doing research if what they
	  needed existed already (even if they had to steal it). 
	  I would rather not steal but think how much information you can
	  get from your employees if you would just take the time to listen
	  to them, encourage them to send in fixes, etc.  This brings up
	  another point.

	- The "field people are stupid" syndrome.
	  Blows my mind to think that "field" people and "headquarters"
	  people are so different.  Seems to me the field people are in
	  the field where the action is and the headquarters people are
	  in the ivory towers where there is no action.  Lots of meetings
	  but nothing comes of them -- blows my mind.  The guys in the
	  field, both Sales and Service, are not stupid.  But they can
	  be made to *look* stupid if you announce a product (and sometimes
	  ship it) to customers before the Sales and Service guys are
	  even told about it.  Other cute tricks include withholding 
	  internal documentation on the product because the field guy 
	  may give the information to the customer or competition.  
	  Instead, the guys in the field are given the exact information
	  given to the customers.  Talk about making the support guy look
	  dumb!  Humm.. seems that field people are dumb since they don't 
	  know anything about the product, therefore we won't listen to them 
	  in the home office.   What a setup.

	- The "Sales people are more important that the Service people"
	  syndrome.  Yes, its true!  Once the product is sold, your on
	  your own.  Better hope it never breaks.  The problem is no one
	  likes to work on something thats broken (that includes me), 
	  but it is possible to do the job of Service/Support and not be 
	  treated like something that crawled out of the sewer.  I can
	  understand that before you can support a product, you need to
	  sell it first but if the product doesn't perform or the customer
	  needs real support (no customer likes to be told "read the manual"
	  after he just spent the previous 5 hours trying to read that piece
	  of trash), I think you should be able to give it to him.  (no! no!
	  not the knife!).  To help the support people, give them the info
	  they need to keep the customers happy, without giving away the farm.
	  If the development people know of bugs that could save a customer
	  many man hours not to run into on his own, speak up and tell the
	  field guy, he'll know which customers could use it and not have to
	  blast it onto the front pages of ComputerWorld.  Lets not treat
	  your support people too bad since they have DIRECT contact with 
	  all your major customers and can cause real harm when they look
	  stupid.  There was a lot of talk about DEC support and how bad
	  it was, I don't think thats really fair to the field engineers
	  since they do the best they can (and in my option, they do 
	  it well).  Managment has to treat each employee as if that
	  person was a valuable asset to the corporation, in the case of
	  support people, it means good training, up to date information
	  from the headquarters (so we don't go out and make a jerk of
	  ourselves) and the tools to do our job.  We will, in turn, 
	  give our best to your customers, who I might add, payed for the
	  service and deserve their money's worth.
	  Of course, if your product stinks, support may not help a bit.
	
The problem of where a manager tells the guru "you can't touch that machine
because you are not authorized!" makes some sense in that you don't want just
every Tom, Dick and Harrie to screw around with your computers.  But, holy
smog, batch-jobs!  seems to me the manager could say ", your not
supposed to screw around with our computer but since you are doing a fine
job, why don't we put you on the access list and I'll talk to your boss about
letting you have more time to straighten our machine.  We can use more talent
like yours!". Now, take the guy who is supposed to be fixing the computer
problems, but can't (for whatever reason) and let him learn from the guru.
Maybe someday, you will have *two* gurus, but at least you will have one and
he will be happy (maybe).

Sorry this article is so long, I just hate having other Nations thinking we
Americans are just a bunch of lazy people (its true, but we don't have to
*look* lazy) and High Tech was just a passing fad with us.   

To put my management at ease, I should tell you that my manager (Gene Mueller)
at Perkin-Elmer is one of the best people you can work with.  His boss is
a hell of a guy and they try their best to give their support people the 
support they need to carry out the mission.  The company has made many changes
over the last couple of years, the results are always slow in coming,
but attitude of the company is so much better towards its people than before.
I am much happier now that I was a couple of years ago and I think the
customers are too.  Still room for improvement, but I think this is a company
that really wants to give the customer something for his/her money.

[Lord, I was born a rambling man... blah..blah..]
You know, if I didn't know better I would swear that the whole idea of a
Stock Market (where investors determine the fate of companies) is bad news for
American companies.  Its like having a gun pointed to your head all the
time.  Each quarter, you had better make more money than the last quarter
or you'll get your head shot off.   Doesn't really allow you the freedom to
explore new market areas since you run the risk of having a bad quarter or
two.  Whats wrong with making enough money to paay all your bills and have
a little left over in the bank for a rainy day?  Why must companies have
35%, 55%, 1000% ruturn on their investments?  With the stakes so high,
someone has to lose!  If the company folds, it doesn't get hurt -- its not
a living being (except in the eyes of the law), an employee is human.  Lets
stop trying to drive each other out of business and start working towards
an environment where all people can earn a living.  There is plenty of money
for us all (just print more if we need it :-).

-- 
Earl Wallace
UUCP:   ..!{ihnp4, ucbvax!hplabs, ucbvax!twg}!pesnta!earlw
PHONE:	(408) 727-5540 x230
USMAIL:	Perkin-Elmer Corp., Santa Clara, Calif. 95054