Conference 7.286::digital

    As Will Rodgers might have put it, things just aren't like the good old
    Digital, and probably never were.  ;^)  But, the "old" Digital I remember
    (from just over 5 years ago) was a Digital that was making money with
    products that I thought were the best bang for the buck.  I was
    absolutely thrilled to get a GPX!  It's still my buddy ... 
    
    Steve

    I joined the company in 77 so I probably qualify as an "Old Dec'ie" 
    Thinking back and going on what people told me back then, DEC began to 
    change around sometime between 1983 and 1985.  I guess the "rot" began 
    to really set in when we were required to carry picture badges and key 
    cards.  The old DEC wasn't really better, just more confused but in the 
    confusion there was flexibility.  It was possible to create a 
    job/promotion on enthusiasm and ability alone.
     
    Salary reviews were frequent and performance reviews rarely mirrored 
    actual performance (you could blind a manager with files with colored 
    tabs and great overheads).  There was also something rather endearing 
    about Spring in the Mill when young engineers held lunch time games
    sliding on the lanolin soaked floors on MLO5-5.  We also thought the 
    rabbit warren that was, and is, the Mill great fun--now it's an 
    annoyance that one doesn't have time, or the knees, for.
    
    

    Although the "old Digital" definition probably has as many 
    interpertations as "who is God", I'll give you the atmosphere as I
    remenber it. (circa: 1968) Please realize that the "old Digital"
    probably never existed except in the minds of individuals;
    but we enjoyed it.
    
    1. Everyone had different opinions but everyone was on the same team.
    
    2. Any job that needed doing was your responsibility and you were
       qualified to do it.
    
    3. No one would second guess a sincere effort.
    
    4. We specialized in everything.
    
    5. It was "fun"
    
    I think the old Digital is still alive and well in the hearts of some
    individuals. I hope the aren't all TFSO'd.
    

    Old DEC vs New DEC......
    
    What has changed is the market! DEC is trying to catch up. Old ways of
    doing business no longer apply.  This MARKET is different, way
    different than anything I've seen before. I guarantee, that it will
    change from now on till the end of..........  Well, you know what I
    mean.
    
    The phrase I can only relate to this situation is.... a combination
    of "ADAPT OR DIE, with ONLY THE STRONG SURVIVE, it's the law of the
    jungle.  We have to find new and better ways to make money.....
    
    bottom_line......  
    
    The customer needs something..... We can sell something......... 
    

    
    Old "DEC": Performance appraisals and salary reviews once a year, like
    clockwork. (In manufacturing, every six months, like clockwork). You
    might not have gotten great raises, but at least you could count on
    them, and on the feedback of a regular performance appraisal that you
    could use to better yourself for the next review. I have paperwork back
    to the year I was hired (1973) showing consistent one-year salary
    reviews and near-consistent six-month performance reviews, timed so
    accurately you could practically set your watch by them. Until 1987.
    
    New "Digital": The salary review cycle is anywhere from 9 (Ha!) to
    18 months. In addition, 5% to 20% of the population are consistently
    "exempted" from each review cycle. The Personnel Policies and
    Procedures still call for performance evaluations at least at one year
    intervals, but in practice these evaluations are tied to the salary
    review. As a result, I never can count on the timimg of my next
    review or salary "adjustment". As the year mark approaches, I worry and
    fret, and as each succeeding month passes, I wonder if I'm not doing
    my job well enough. I'm finally forced to approach my supervisor: "Umm,
    about my review..." Most of the time this worry is unnecessary, but the
    point is, I never know. The current process is degrading, confusing
    (which I have come to believe is the main objective) and
    unnecessarily complex.
    
    ----------------------
    
    Old "DEC": "We will announce no product before it's time." Software
    product announcements were not made until the product was well into
    field test, and the final ship date was just about cast in concrete.
    I believe hardware products followed the same rule. DECies prided
    themselves on never announcing vaporware -- we either had it now, or we
    didn't talk about it. Until 1989.
    
    New "Digital": "Don't let reality get in the way of a good sales
    pitch!" I know of software product releases that were officially announced,
    with quarter-specific delivery dates, before development phase 0 (product
    requirements) was closed. These products then ran into the usual
    snags that force a reevaluation of schedules (which would never have
    been visible to the outside world in the old "DEC". As a result,
    enormous, debilitating pressure was placed on engineering teams
    to get the work done as soon as possible, because after all, we had to
    meet our committments to the public. In at least one case, I am
    convinced that a product would have been reevaluated and decommitted
    because of changes in the marketplace, but instead significant
    corporate resources were squandered on completing the release of
    something that will likely never be sold, simply because of a premature
    announcement.
    
    
    
    I'm sure there are many more concrete examples of how the old "DEC" has
    become the new "Digital".

    At the main entrace to ZK, one wall is covered with two rows of 6-foot
    high bars.  Each bar is black or white, round or square in
    cross-section.  The bars are in groups of seven, with fourteen groups
    in each row.
    
    In the old Digital, the bars spelled out in 7-bit ASCII:
    
    	digitalsoftwa
    	reengineering
    
    In the new Digital, the bars spell out:
    
    	Customers Win
    	WhenWeDeliver
    
    In the old Digital, employees told new hires about the bars and printed
    up t-shirts with copies on them.  In the new Digital, management denied
    a petition to change the bars back, and nobody talks about them
    anymore.
    
    
    				-- edp

    I have been with Digital for 10 years, so I guess that qualifies me as
    an "old DECie" too.

    The Digital I joined 10 years ago, was a company who encouraged "risk
    taking" and excepted the outcome, good or bad, as part of the process
    for doing business.

    Today, I see people humiliated publicly (within the group/team) for
    even suggesting or attempting something which even smells like a risk.
    I see today, people who have "gone the extra mile" for a customer only
    then to be scorned for making harmless mistakes in doing so.

    *****

    The Digital I joined 10 years ago, was a company where people were
    encouraged and expected to be "self starting" individuals who would
    find ways to make the job easier, better, faster, more cost effective,
    and would share those ideas with others on their TEAM, to help in
    streamlining "the business" of assisting customers.

    Today, I see people who are not only discouraged from "making the job
    easier", they are told that if "procedure" doesn't come from a certain
    group of people, then it will not be considered. People today are told
    that they will do as they are told and nothing more.

    *****

    The Digital I joined 10 years ago seemed to have the ability to weather
    the storm of change because it was so flexible, it encouraged innovative
    contribution of ALL employees, resulting (sometimes) in being able to
    avoid large problems, by fixing small ones.

    Todays company seems to discourage contribution of employees. This
    seems to be most evident in the fact that the new Digital doesn't give 
    new products out to its employees, before getting them out to the 
    customer.

    If Digital would get back into the habit of getting the employee
    involved in the evaluation of products before they go out to the
    customer, the employees just may find problems before the customer
    would.

    *****

    The "old Digital" just seemed to be a place where employees could
    contribute and know that contribution was appreciated. 

    The "new Digital" is a place where I (personally) feel I am discouraged
    from being creative. So much so that a resent PA pointed out that I was
    "to much of a risk taker" and should "learn to conform to procedure",
    even though on a few occasions, I have developed ways which may have
    made the process just a little bit better.

    The "New Digital" is NOT a place I feel comfortable working. I am a
    person who prides himself in doing the best possible job for the
    company and the customer. In the process of doing that job, I develop
    ways to streamline my work. I would like to think that that
    "streamlining" would be not only acceptable (it use to be) but
    encouraged (it use to be) in this company. After all, many a new
    product has been developed by someones improvements of an older
    product. 

    Has this company outgrown itself..???

    Bob G. (wishing some of the "old Digital" would come back)

    Prompted by .6 and admittedly more than a little inflammatory:
    
    Old Digital:
    
    	Engineers designed products with features that engineers found
    interesting and worried about esoteric stuff that engineers thought
    important but customers did not.  Customers bought the stuff because
    they had no choice.
    
    New Digital:
    
    	Engineers design products with features that engineers find
    interesting and worry about esoteric stuff that engineers think is 
    important but customers do not.  Customers don't buy the stuff because
    now they have a choice.
    
    Al
    

    
    Re .6: Can you put a date on it? The chronology might be interesting.
    
    BTW, in the old "DEC", everyone knew what 7-bit ASCII was, and most could
    translate on the fly. In the new "Digital", the majority of people above
    the individual contributor level take pride in their technological
    ignorance. (Can't date)
    
    Re .8: This is bad, but it's not a difference between the old DEC and
    new Digital -- it just always was. Actually, .6 and .8 are just
    different perspectives on the same problem: The old good things got
    lost, the old bad things became institutionalized.
    

    
    
    
    
    Only NOW we have a lot more competition !
    
                                               WE HAVE TO BE _NEW_
    Dan

    I've been around since '72, and I'm not so sure there ever was an
    old Digital.  Perhaps .8 came closest in defining much of the
    difference.  In the 70's we were exclusively a high-margin "iron"
    company, which also reluctantly provided some software.  In fact,
    in the early 70's, the board business was still the largest profit
    center in the company.
    
    There was a terrible lot of waste.  Incredibly expensive off-site
    meetings which served no good purpose.....virtually no control on
    routine expenses.....it wasn't all wonderful.
    
    I think the review cycle thing is a red herring.  From mid 70's to
    mid 80's we were dealing with 12-18% annual inflation.  Aggressive
    raise were a necessity....they aren't now.
    
    Also agree that the bottom fell out in 83-85....and we weren't ready.
    In fact, we were in denial mode for several more years.  Remember the
    "snake oil" comment.  We were about as ready for the brave new world
    of open systems as the USSR was for a stock market.
            

    
    >>> The old good things got lost, the old bad things became 
    >>> institutionalized.
    
    As a 10-year veteran, I think this is the best description of 
    what has happened between then and now.  And it's sad.
    
    *Susan
     
                                        
    
    
    

    Re : .11
    
    
    
    
                          B R A V O !

    
    Ahhhhh the Old-DEC!  15 years for me.
    
    The old DEC to me was:
    
    "What we're short a cable, a cab too ?"  We go to the blue-print room,
    pull prints and make them to spec ourselves in an hour. Order ships.
    
    "What!, we can't ship because the side-panel is dented?" We go into the
     computer room borrow a panel, we replace it when the vendor delivers.
     We ship the order in an hours time.
    
    Politics?  What's that? no one cared? We we're to busy having fun
    growing and watching IBM trip.
    
    DEC in trouble?  It was war, we worked together like the gears of a
    swiss watch and beat the competition.
    
    A fellow Decie needs help on the job, Hey it's not my area, it's OUR
    area, we team up complete the task, Next time, he/she comes and helps
    out in my area.
    
    The Digital Glue!!!!!!  We do anything and everything to insure DEC
    wins..we insure it's the right thing to do for the customer. There's no
    walls. A customer need is always fulfilled. Anyone could go into the
    warehouse sign out a part that's needed to fill a out-going order.
    
    Very little complaints from fellow workers, we all and I mean all
    high-level to entry-level rolled up our shirt sleves and packed, built,
    shipped, drove fork-trucks anything to insure we got the job done.
    We knew each-others job and everyone pulled their weight, gave up
    weekends, worked til god knows how long if you had to, but you were
    never told to do any of the above...we all just did it!
    
    That to me is the old-DEC!
    
    BTW: Remember when our stocks were $199. Well I'm in N.Y.C. on a
    business trip. I'm on my way home and in a bus to the airport. I forget
    to take off my Digital badge. Other business people are on the bus from
    different corporations.....THEY SWAMP ME with questions! You work for
    DEC! Wow, What a company, What products! Any openings? What's new?
    K.O. must be feeling great huh?
    
    I don't know about you but I was one proud son-of a gun!!! I want to
    get back there and I don't want to take years to do it.
    
    Rick
    
    

    Although I would not qualify as an old DECie by any standard, I would
    like to comment as a new DECie, comments in .8 describe the impetus 
    that segregated the "old" from the "new" digital. There is a direct 
    though not necessarily linear relationship between digital financial
    performance and digital's caricatures ( old,new...). It is also true
    to .8 comments, that back then digital had a monopoly, however the
    competition has caught up and we froze!

    re .14 .....re on the bus, etal....I'm pleased you had that experience.
    Mine is that outside of the immediate New England area, most people
    have no idea who/what Digital is.

    Wait a bit now.  The Digital I remember in the late 60's , 70's. and
    early 80's was only limited by imagination.  Mickey Mouse could have
    successfully managed DEC, as far as money was concerned.  DEC was on an
    upward spiral that everyone thought would never end.  I guess the
    reality is that there is a recession, many of our "Hot Products" are
    commodities, and there is keen competition in the marketplace.  The
    decisions made today have much more dire consequences than they did
    then.  Its easy to be a armchair admiral but, business decisions are
    made in "Real Time" and not after the fact.

    Re .9:
    
    The bars were down in July of 1987; the new bars were up in September.
    
    
    				-- edp

    
    Re .11: I think the review cycle, far from being a red herring, is
    symptomatic of a major problem in the new Digital. In the old DEC, we
    would get smaller raises in a predictable cycle. The new Digital, lacking
    the intestinal fortitude to announce the real (lower) corporate average
    raise, hides it behind a "variable" (ie, longer) cycle. This same basic
    problem has resulted in the plethora of amusing euphemisms for "layoff".
    I like to think of is as "valuing obfuscation".
    

    re: 19:
    
    "Valuing obfuscation" - that's a good one! 
    
    Remember when Digital "unbundled" hardware warranty from systems and
    lowered the price of the hardware? If you bought the unbundled warranty
    to get the same thing as before, you discovered a 10-15% price
    increase. 
    
    Digital told the world that we had reduced the prices of VAXes.
    
    Customers weren't fooled.
    
    In fact, hardly anybody was fooled.
    
    Perhaps that was the turning point?

re: .19

	The Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary defines layoff:

	"2: to cease to employ (a worker) usu. temporarily"

well what ever you want to call the action that has resulted in employees 
being no longer employed by Digital, it certainly doesn't seem to be
"temporarily"

-Terry

    Ah, this use of the term "layoff" is politically incorrect.  The term
    dujour is "transition".  Ooops, excuse me.  That is politically
    incorrect.  The correct term is now "down size".  Er, I'm sorry.
    We already did that.  The really politically correct term is now
    "right size".  Yup, that's it.  That's our problem now.  It is SO 
    gratifying to finally succomb to political correctness.  
    
    Steve

         <<< Note 1562.19 by WLDBIL::KILGORE "Digital had it Then!" >>>

>    The new Digital, lacking
>    the intestinal fortitude to announce the real (lower) corporate average
>    raise, hides it behind a "variable" (ie, longer) cycle.

    It hides a more important problem.  If the cycle is variable, then whenever
    the manager gets around to doing the paperwork for an increase is now
    defined as the correct timeframe.  It also puts the inforcement on the
    employee to badger the manager for a review which sets a bad tone.  And if
    you change jobs or your manager leaves, what then??

    I may have had differences of opinion with one of the companies I used to
    work for but I will give them VERY high marks in this area.  They
    instituted a policy that ALL reviews were done in November and ALL raises
    are effective 1-Jan.  The major impact of this was that I, as an employee,
    could depend on the review being done and I did not have to guess and/or
    push for a review.  Any manager who didn't get the reviews done was called
    on the carpet by their department manager.
    
    Lee G.

    re: .-14
    
    Strange (Old-DEC comments).  That's how things work here in the field...
    today.  Thank god for positive, optimistic co-workers...
    
    --- Gavin

    Ah, the "old DEC."  It was a big part of my life for many years, until
    its death about, oh, five years or so ago.
    
    It was a place where people worked together as a team for the good of
    the company and the customer.  It was a place where employees felt such
    loyalty that they would sometimes voluntarily go far, far above and
    beyond the call of duty for a customer or for the good of Digital.  It
    was a place you could look forward to going to every day.  It was a
    place where the work was hard, demanding, and fun, and the days passed
    so quickly sometimes dinnertime would come and go and you wouldn't even
    realize it because you were so absorbed in what you were doing.  It was
    a place where slick politicians didn't last long, and where true
    competence was rewarded.
    
    It was a place where managers *earned* the respect of their
    subordinates by caring sincerely and showing it.  It was a place where
    it was OK to dissent, to disagree.  Sometimes you were told "Well,
    that's the way it has to be."  But you could express your opinions
    without fear of reprisal.
    
    I miss it.
    
    Steve

    Re:
    
>    It hides a more important problem.  If the cycle is variable, then whenever
>    the manager gets around to doing the paperwork for an increase is now
>    defined as the correct timeframe.  It also puts the inforcement on the
>    employee to badger the manager for a review which sets a bad tone.  And if
>    you change jobs or your manager leaves, what then??
    
    I'd just like to correct a misconception here. Salary planning is done
    in November of each year. At that time each and every employee's raise
    (or lack thereof) and month of that raise is decided for the following
    calendar year. In order to change either the amount or the timing of
    that raise requires paperwork to be filled out and approvals to be
    obtained. If that is not done what was decided the previous November
    stands. And you can rest assure that a manager can not just forget
    to give the raise when scheduled or delay it on a whim or because he
    can't be bothered to get to it. So badgering your manager will have no
    affect on this.
    
    Company policy states that you should not communicate to an employee their
    planned raise and timing until you give it to the employee. Now
    personally I disagree with this policy, I think there is something to
    be said for communicating the plan and then if you subsequently change
    it (either up or down) to communicate this to the employee with the
    reasons. I think this would provide an either stronger link between
    pay and performance. But given this is not the policy I keep planned
    raises and timing confidential.
    
    By the way the lattitude for a manager to change a planned raise
    (especially upwards) is very limited and quite correctly it requires
    a thorough justification and approval process.
    
    Dave

    re .20
    
    	And then DCU took a page out of the same book and thought 
    	that they could get away with a new "choices" campaign.
    
    	But that's another topic.  Another conference even.
    
    re .23
    
    	I also worked for a company that made ALL raises effective
    	Jan 1.  (Did you work for TBS too?)  I thought it was great
    	to find out before Thanksgiving what your raise would be.  
    	It made me work with new vitality, and my raise was a whole
    	5 weeks away.  Actually 8-9 weeks since we were paid monthly.
    	My vitality was again bolstered when the actual raise was in
    	hand.
    
    	Raises were handled this way (as it was explained to me) because
    	their customers didn't want to deal with gradually increasing
    	contract costs as each participant got his/her respecitve raise.
    	They were much more willing to accept one-time increases that
    	were guaranteed to remain fixed for 12 more months.  (Many 
    	contracts were billed for time-and-materials.)
    
    	Joe Oppelt

    The old "Digital" had an effective way of doing things in the field
    based on teamwork. Gradually, the walls and the stovepipes and the
    management systems got in the way of teamwork.

    Now we're struggling and, at least in customer satisfaction, we'll
    never be able to turn back the clock.  The irony is that phrases like
    "customer accountability" and "empowerment" were actual practices
    before they were slogans, and now that there are slogans, they are not
    practiced.

    But I agree with previous writers, the turning point had to be
    1983-1985, when the company faced failure on several fronts but was
    incapable of facing it.  Thanks to the MicroVAX II and other VAX's,
    the crisis was postponed, but the internal problems and environmental
    changes of those years were never addressed.

    I remember back in the early 70's there was a pretty bad recession and
    a lot of engineers on 128 were being laid off and we were wondering if
    Digital would be forced to have its first layoff.  One morning when we
    came to work we found a memo from Ken Olsen on our desks.  It said that
    yes indeed the recession was pretty bad, but that layoffs weren't the
    answer.  Ken just asked that we all try harder, put in an extra hour or
    so per day and then we would be in great shape when the recession
    ended.  We thought this was kind of funny because at the time most of our
    group were indeed working a couple of extra hours per day.
    
    I loved the all around enthusiasm and intensity back then.   
    Some of it persists but it's not as widespread now.
    
    D

    RE: .19, .22, et. al
    
    Here in the Dallas area, "Involuntary Separation" is the current
    euphemism for layoff.  When pressed, personnel then started calling
    it "Transition" to remain politically correct...
    
    -Mike

    When I started 15 years ago, there was already talk about the
    difference between the *old Digital* and the *new Digital*.  All those
    good things that have been mentioned were part of *old Digital* and all
    those problems (like coping with double digit population growth) were
    part of the *new Digital*.  What I found was that we already had
    barriers between Design Engineering, FA&T, and Volume Mfg (not
    everybody, but some folks).  Life was a continual breaking down of one
    set of barriers to teamwork while someone somewhere was inventing new
    ones.
    
    Nostalgia is great, but we need to take off the rose colored glasses.
    
    The next "revolution" I saw was about 198x.  Conflict was no longer
    permitted.  We had to pretend that everything was hunky-dory while the
    real conflicts persisted.  I preferred the open conflict.
    
    Got to go, now,
    
    Dick

    I remember the hour-a-day-extra thing in the mid-70's.  For awhile,
    most of us tried to do it, but it soon became ridiculous.  I was a
    supervisor then, and after about three weeks we were all of a sudden
    required to submit a weekly report on what extra work had been
    accomplished during that hour.  Just gathering the data and doing the
    report pretty well took care of any positive impact.

RE: .27

No, Joe, it was another company from which Digital has gotten a number
of Alumni.

RE: .26

While this sounds good, I have yet to see it work.  So let me ask a very
important question.  If your last review/increase was in August, and your
next review is the following October, how can anyone suggest that in November
of the previous year you can define the preformance level and raise that far
in advance?

Sorry, that is a loaded question because the answer is that you can't.  So
any raise is based on last year's performance.  And since it is easier to down-
grade someone than to justify going over budget, quess which way the scales
are balanced for changes to the increase.

But enough of that rathole.  What I find more interesting is that with most
raises being tied to reviews, there appears to be no correlation between the
date set forth for the next review and when that review actually happens.  Is
this just a local issue or do others see the same thing?

Lee G.

    IJoined DEC on Dec., 1st, 1980. I was a chief buyer in a small firm
    in Turin (80 workers and 20 white-collars) which suddenly dismissed
    16 of 20 because of the economical crisis; communication went on
    Sep., 15th, that we would leave on 30th (sic!).
    I've been lucky.
    1st Dec. I started working in Order Processing and the 1st thing my
    supervisor told me was:" O.K. you are here now and you bring from
    the external a different attitude than I here, towards working pro-
    blems. Would you pls be so kind to look up and give your opinions and
    suggestions right now and on going? I'm sure they can be very helpful
    to all of us in order to make a better work."
    
    That was "old DEC" to me.
    
    Ciao a tutti.
    Arrigo
    
    
    

    "That's not my job" <----------- something I never heard 12 years
    ago :-(
    
    Karen
    

     Here's an interesting question: what do customers say is the difference
between the old DEC and the new DEC?

     I haven't worked here long enough to feel like I ever worked for the old
DEC, but I remember being a customer of the old DEC.  The old DEC replied to
SPRs with an answer (diffs or a patch); the new DEC replies to SPRs with a 
brushoff (considered for fix in a future release).

     Has anybody out there heard any comments from current customers on oldDEC
vs. newDEC?

     I think some of the stuff in TQM has the hope bringing together the best of
the old DEC with the best of the new DEC and makes much more sense (in terms of
a long term approach to profitability) than juggling review schedules and
banning post-its.  I don't mean the buzz phrases in TQM or lip service to the
TQM program description - I mean implementation of some of the good ideas in
TQM, like listening to the customer, continually improving products and services
and not doing things that don't benefit the customer (as a few have pointed out,
some of these are things the old DEC used to do and the new DEC merely discusses
in managerese).

     Although I can't imagine that the old DEC was uniformly and unrelentingly
better in ever way than the new DEC, I do get the impression it was more fun and
more fulfilling, for both employees and customers.
								Robt. P.

    The old DEC measured revenue in millions.
    
    The new DEC measures revenue in billions.
    
    

	I don't know about the old DEC myself either, but,

	You Load sixteen tons and what do you get?
	another day older and deeeper in debt!

	All I know is that if your having fun loading sixteen tons,
	it feels a heck lighter!
    

	- Mike

    RE:.35

   > "That's not my job" <----------- something I never heard 12 years
   > ago :-(
    
   > Karen


    I started with DEC in 1974 at the WFO plant, for you technology belt
    people that's Westfeild, MA. and not only is it west of Woscester it's
    west of the Conniticutt River.  You say there's nothing that far west,
    well not much just a few lost souls.  I never heard that statement until 
    I transferred to SHR in 1988 and then HLO in 89.  Maybe it was their 
    mindset back there lots of years in the same job maybe something else,
    but everybody seemed to pitch in to get things done.  I'm not sure but I
    like to think things are still the same there.

    Joe

        I started with DEC in 1978.

        I have the impression that the "old DEC" started to die soon
        after that.  (Perhaps it was my fault!? :-} )

        The "old DEC" had multiple product lines pursuing their own
        markets as somewhat independent businesses, including some of
        their own engineering in many cases (I was hired into product
        line engineering).  The "old DEC" pursued multiple
        strategies.

        Then, between '78 and '80, DEC seemed to settle on a
        meta-strategy that there would be only one strategy: 
        VAX/VMS/DECnet.  The strategy of VAX/VMS/DECnet was
        phenomenally successful;  the meta-strategy that there shall
        be only one strategy (you know, "one product, one egg, one
        basket") merely APPEARED to be phenomenally successful as a
        result.

        (It was increasingly frustrating to be in product line
        engineering during this transition.  It seemed that VMS
        engineering had veto power on much of what we did, and could
        freely change their product without regard to whether it
        harmed our work.  This seemed backwards to me at the time,
        and still does.)

        Well, time has passed for our phenomenally successful
        VAX/VMS/DECnet strategy.  And our meta-strategy of having
        only one strategy was never a good one:  it is the reason we
        flubbed so badly in PCs, failed to become the Unix leader,
        etc.

        I have some fear that NAS/EIS is the "one strategy" for the
        '90s.  As good as that may be, can that alone make us
        "phenomenally successful"?

        Bob

>        ...The  strategy    of  VAX/VMS/DECnet  was  phenomenally
>        successful;  the  meta-strategy  that there shall be only
>        one  strategy  (you know,  "one  product,  one  egg,  one
>        basket") merely APPEARED to be phenomenally successful as
>        a result...

        I believe "The Statement" was made  in  the  '84-'85 time
        frame --- the same period, incidently, that  many  Noters
        here point to as the "End of OldDEC".
        
        At  the  time  of  "The  Statement"  I  was part  of  the
        manufacturing team involved with a WRL  program  that was
        creating  what    was    truly  a  kick-a$$  workstation,
        representing higher performance than _anything_ out there
        at the time or a long time after.   But  it  _died_  as a
        potential  product  within   _days_  of  "The  Statement"
        because to achieve its  performance  it  adopted a highly
        pipelined, RISC (oh no!) architecture and Unix (oh NO!). 
        
        Might I be going too far if I suggested that the "OldDec"
        would  have  shipped  such a system _anyways_ and  kicked
        some  butt,  regardless?  Instead of _waiting_ for others
        to kick _our_ butts?
        
        Later,
        
        John

Interesting topic.  While there are very many things I remember about
DEC in the 70s and 80s that made it a GREAT place to work, there's one thing
that I've never understood about the new DEC:

In the old DEC we would never have implemented LMF.  We were in partnership
with our customers.  We knew many of them by name and often by sight.  We
gave them software and hardware and they gave us money.  Pure and simple.
Trust, respect, cooperation, communication and honest products made this
relationship work.  The more they used our stuff, the better.

Then, a high-level committee decided that we could not trust our customers.
Of course that isn't how they worded it, but that was how it was interpreted.
We were ordered to put locks and keys on our software to make sure that
customers wouldn't use it too much.

Well, we succeeded.  Now they don't use our software too much.

-steve-

    
    OLD DIGITAL
    
    When looking for a new position in DEC meant you wanted to grow,
    needed more challenging work and once they found out you where
    looking for a new job....they approched you with an opportunity.
    
    NEW DIGITAL
    
    Looking for a new position can land you a "package" you can't
    can't refuse or VTX jobs ?? Apply in the AM and the req's 
    is frozen or cancelled in the PM.
    
    

    Re: 42
    
    I think someone mentioned it earlier (or in another note); LMF
    didn't happen because some committee suddenly decided we couldn't
    trust our customers any longer.  Unfortunately, a number of customers
    made it painfully clear that we couldn't trust them "to do the right
    thing" any longer.....thus LMF and Loan of Product licenses made an
    appearance.
    
    A friend of mine happened to be one of the original Licensing BPSs
    in the field.....when she started auditing a large account, it
    became appallingly clear that between shoddy loan of product procedures
    and just plain "copying"; this account had software worth several
    hundred thousand dollars.....and they hadn't paid a dime!!!
    She tried the tactful route at first, but was met with such opposition
    when it came time for the account to cough up the $$$$, it was a no
    go for most of the money.  Unfortunately, because the account had
    changed reps so many times.....the loaned software had been out there
    so long that DEC would have a difficult time and be on shaky legal
    ground if we tried to pursue it along those lines.....or the trail
    was too cold to trace what happened.  She was able to convince a
    few individual departments to do the right thing, but we lost a LOT
    of money on this account.  Alas today, this company isn't buying
    much hardware either, so the reasoning that we should just "loan"
    SW to leverage HW sales doesn't hold up.
    
    To be honest though, I don't know whether we started playing rep 
    du jour while we were the OLD DIGITAL or whether it started with the
    NEW DIGITAL :-)
    
    Karen
    

Re: .44

I can tell you from experience as a DEC customer for 16 years that the "OLD
DEC" instituted the "rep de jour" if that is interpreted to mean pre-1980, and
I haven't seen much evidence that it's changed in the "NEW Digital" either.

-Terry

  There was an old DEC. It was real.  The old DEC was a culture, a way of 
  interacting, a good feeling about yourself, your co-workers, and your 
  company.  The old DEC died around 1986-1987.

  Its demise was not caused by markets shifting; the old DEC was around 
  through dozens of shifting markets and adapted just fine.  It was incredibly
  adaptable.

  It wasn't killed by our customers buying our products because they didn't
  have a choice, and then dumping us when competition arrived.  The old DEC 
  had lots of competitors.  We met them head on, and oftentimes kicked their 
  butts because we were more efficient, more dynamic and more flexible.

  In my opinion, the death of the old DEC can be traced to a single 
  disastrous event that was brought upon us by our own management.  It was
  caused by the stupendous over-hiring that occurred in 1986 and 1987.
  DEC hired something like 30,000 people in those years.  At the peak of the
  hiring frenzy, payroll was adding more than 2000 badges per month.
  How did this kill the old DEC?  By causing a situation where there were 
  more people than there was work to be done.  Here is my explanation:

  When there is MORE work to do than people to do it, everybody can be a
  part of the team.  Indeed, teamwork was the only way to accomplish the
  monumental tasks that were before us.  Participation feels great, and
  is motivating.

  When there is MORE work to do than people to do it, people learn to
  solve problems in diverse fields ("If I don't do it, who will?")  They
  develop broad knowledge bases, and understand the business from many 
  perspectives.

  When there is MORE work to do than people to do it, knowledge is freely
  shared, because if you were the only one who could do the task, you would
  find yourself working weekends.

  When there is MORE work to do than people to do it, the important stuff
  gets done, and the trivial and BS issues are ignored.  There simply isn't
  enough time to think about them.

  HOWEVER, when there is LESS work to do than people to do it, teamwork
  disappears.  If you work together, efficiently, then some people won't
  have anything to do.  Better to duplicate effort than to have nothing
  to do.  

  When there is LESS work to do than people to do it, people are forced into
  a tiny specialty.  They can't solve problems in any other area because
  they've never had to solve problems in any other area because there
  are ENTIRE GROUPS devoted to solving problems in all the other areas.
  People develop narrow knowledge bases, and only understand the business
  from their tiny perspective.

  When there is LESS work to do than people to do it, knowledge is hoarded.
  If you are the only one who can do the task, maybe you'll keep your job.
  It becomes important to protect your "turf", so you bite the head off of
  anyone who tries to help you with (i.e. learn) your job.

  When there is LESS work to do than people to do it, people are given 
  trivial and BS issues to work on, because there are no other issues to
  work on.  These trivial and BS issues are touted as "IMPORTANT" to 
  lessen the degradation of the people working on them.  Everybody begins
  to lose sight of what REALLY is important.

  Now for the big question.  Is the current downsizing going to reverse
  the downward spiral, cause there to be more work than people to do it,
  and bring back the old DEC?  (e.g. Chrysler).  Or have productivity-killing 
  behaviors become accepted, expected, and institutionalized, and the nosedive
  can't be stopped?  (e.g. Unisys, Wang, Data General).  Or, on a more
  personal level, have I hitched my wagon to a star?  Or to a stump?

	The old DEC was chaos.

	Everyone was "doing the right thing" , the trouble was, they were doing
	the right thing for their own particular needs and results, and didn't 
	look at how this would affect others.

	There was no understanding of how to stop being a junior in a small 
	market, and to move to being a professional organisation with a larger
	market share. Many people thought they could continue to do business
	in the old way, and ignored the change in environment.
	The money was their to fund extravagances, and so if people wanted
	to "do their own thing", the old way, they just hired people to do it, 
	and ignored what this did to the rest of the company.
	
	We are now paying the price for this, however, we are learning from 
	our mistakes, and moving forwards. I hope we continue down this path, 
	and don't revert to the old world thinking and practices. 

	Heather

    My date of hire, 6 Dec 1976, so I guess that I can qualify as being
    somewhat of an old hand around here.
    
    I think that Rick came closest to the way that I feel (.14) when we
    start looking at the old DEC vs new DEC.  There was a feeling of real
    teamwork a few years ago.  Now it seems that a lot of people that are
    on teams of any kind are there because it looks good when they come
    up for review, no other reason.  When I try to analysis why we lost 
    the feeling of team work the only thing I can come up with is that
    now no matter how much you bust your butt some day when you least
    expect it someone is going to walk up behind you, tap you on the
    shoulder and inform you that your position was not funded in the new
    budget and that you will be given an escort out of the building.
    
    Another thought while I'm in here is that from reading many of the
    NOTESFILES one might get the impression that everyone that works in
    these hallowed halls has at least a Masters Degree in Business or
    Engineering from Harvard or MIT.  Not true.  Many of us have a high
    school diploma and some have but a GED. We are the ones that got this
    company to the position of leadership that it held in the 60s and 70s.
    We are the ones that did the dirty jobs in the trenches that built the
    foundation that has supported this company for so long.  Now we feel
    left out of the process.
    
    God, I hope that someone someplace down the road never looks back on
    the 90s and proclaims them "The Good Old Days."
    
    Just my .02 worth!! 

    GENRAL::MCBROOM rings a bell as to the mechanism, but the timing was
    earlier, at least in Puerto Rico.  Even by the time I started working
    in the Mill in '77, there were already people who wouldn't "do
    windows".  I am sure I heard "not my job" that soon.
    
    "Old DEC" started dying a lot further back than my 15 years.  Perhaps
    we are really repeating the myths we were indoctrinated with.
    
    Dick

    hired in '67 and the major change between the "old DEC" and the
    "new DEC" has been stated in some other notes very well, especially
    the one that said we all did what needed doing to get the job done..
    
    but to me the major change has been the following:
    
    old DEC:	people did what was right to insure the customer got
    		what they ordered and that it worked....
    
    
    new DEC:	people do what is politically right to insure their
    		careers don't suffer..to hell with the customer or
    		anyone else...

	One way to look at this is to compare culture with the
	company's position in its life cycle at any given point.

	As a startup, there was lots of excitement, lots of
	opportunity for flexibility, creativity, teaming, with
	a feeling of we're all in this together.

	As a quickly growing company, with very bright prospects,
	we assumed this growth would continue apace for the
	foreseeable future.  The hiring spurt in '86 was not
	an end in itself, but an attempt to prepare for this
	massive anticipated growth.  Even IBM expected great
	things, predicting it would be a $100billion dollar
	company by, what, 1990?

	What we didn't expect is for little computers to become
	so "big" so quickly.  Consequently, instead of that
	continuing growth we quickly plateaued, and were
	blindsided by this.  Our map for dealing with upslopes
	did not reflect the territory of plains.  The culture
	of growth and new beginnings did not completely 
	reflect the reality of a time of retrenchment.

    	The challenge now is still to anticipate the future, and
    	to mold the company to it.
    
		Dave

    Hmmmm, old vs new...From reading this note it seems like maybe
    there's the "old old" DEC, the "old" DEC and the "new" DEC. I've
    only been here 7 years, but I'd like to think I made it in to the
    tale end of the middle category. 
    
    Most people I speak with seem to think that the "old" DEC took care
    of it's people, and the new DEC uses them. There's a sense that
    "most of us worked real hard, received drawn out, minimal pay
    increases, but stuck it out because DEC always stood by us.
    That's why through this terrible recession we would of still turned
    a profit if not for the restructuring charges. Now to gain a few bucks
    in stock price we're turning our people into the street at a time when
    most won't be able to find employment." I don't know anyone who
    is happy here anymore....That's a shame because I fear that once
    the industry turns around many of our best people will leave...
    I had assumed that this attitude was prevalent through most of the
    company, but after reading through DIGITAL some it appears that
    that's not the case. That's good, because if peoples spirits don't
    pick up some we're doomed. 
    
    I think people have had it beaten into them that we really did bad.
    It would probably help some to hear something like "Yes, we're
    not perfect as a company, but you know something, thanks to many
    peoples talents and efforts we came through this tuff period
    pretty good! Thanks! If we continue to strive at beeing better,
    the next time around we should come through ok too."
                                                  
    Marty                 
    
    

    Re .46  and the massive hiring in 1986/87
    
    Agreed !  I recall overhearing a personnel mgr in the hallway saying 
    " I don't care what he is asking (salary), hire him"    People came in
    from the outside - many were good and have been productive.  Many were
    hired seemingly to fill quotas.  
    
    Furthermore many of the newcomers came in at salaries much higher than
    existing employess.   I didn't appreciate having to explain to certain
    consultants literally what the difference between a VAX and a PC was, or
    what DECnet was when that person made nearly twice as much as me.
    
    I'm not saying all the newhires were bad.  Many have become solid
    performers.   However, many were also just hired to fill a quota before
    the reqs expired.
    
    Pat

I will also agree that the turning point was in the early 80's. Digital in 
those days was booming.  People were over worked.  They did it with great 
pride and always were willing to contribute. Digital hire People from 
anywhere,  business was booming. Digital had To cover the work load, and 
potential growth. It was Up to the ones that had more time with the company 
to train the new hires On the jobs. After sometime, they were send for 
formal training.

Don't know if it was for ones benefit to have good skills, business sense 
and old fashion now how. You were then promoted and became an account 
representative. Those that did not do so well in the field (Digitals no 
firing policy) moved most of these people into management. They never did 
take under consideration the effect it had on the rest that were in the 
group and if they reacted it was easy to be label as a trouble maker. The 
company was growing in an alarming pace and digital needed people. Wouldn't 
have it been better for the benefit of all to have fired those that were no 
good and were reluctant to give that extra mile for the team back then? 
Most likely NOW there are the ones who must judge how to let go.

Probable some of these achievers make it to a point were their decisions 
start the transition from the old to the new DEC that we have to deal with 
now days.	
 

    I'm not a strong believer in the DEC mythology after 20 years, but
    can think of a couple differences.
    
         - Re .48 .... it was very rare, in fact prohibited, to list or
           require certain educational requirements on a req....except
           for obvious cases such as nurses, lawyers, etc.  Now you have
           to have an MBA and five years experience in concentrated crap
           for a simple product manglement job.  15-20 years ago, the
           guts of this company consisted of high school grads...including
           quite a few "engineers"....and a small bearded gentleman named
           Jack Shields.
    
         - If you were interested in an internal opportunity, you could
           usually get an interview in a couple days.....and quite often
           get an offer on the spot.  Of course, this was before we
           decided we needed "recruiters".  Now everything goes into a
           bottomless black hole.
    
         - It was actually expected to have company provided coffee and
           whatever at staff meetings (gasp!!).
    
         - Your manager might actually take you out to a restaurant (gasp)
           for lunch (on the company) to discuss an issue, celebrate a
           promotion, or simply to get to know you better (Gasp, Gasp).
    
    Guess it was a better place to work......too bad.

    IMHO The "Old Digital" was acompany run by engineers for engineers. Its
    prime customer was in the engineering field. When an electronics
    company wanted a computer it picked Digital. There wasn't even a
    choice (Or need for good sales) it seemed to come naturally.
    	The "New Digital" is dominated by "MBA's" not engineers. As a result
    we (Digital) have lost the confidence of the outside engineering world.
    At the same time, we have not gained the confidence of the business
    world (Saturated by "Big Blue" and others). 
    	This change is going to take time, a good sales force and much
    advertising in an entirely different media then we are used to.
    (Engineering publications ect.)
    	
    	

    DIGITAL old or new is not the question. What does DIGITAL need in its
    people for the business at hand and in the future. I still believe
    that what made DIGITAL successful is still available right here in
    this company, the people ! The people with GED's to MBA's. We need
    to get a grip on what we can do to turn things around. So we are not
    experience in sales and marketing. Let's push to get that training
    set up here in the company. We know our products better that anyone you
    can hire from outside and yes, they would need to be trained also when
    they are hired. Let start saying what we can do NOT what we can do.
    Start cross training. So you've never done a certain job before.....
    we are always learning whether our why of life forces that. Remember
    your first VCR and the fear of using the Micro wave and........the
    first time you logged in on a terminal. You see ....GED's or MBA's 
    really dosen't mean a thing unless you can apply common sense and 
    when you say I'm not funded for this are that or I can't ,just think
    about how important your experience and that MBA is when your sitting
    home reading the Want ADV that have nothing in it that you've learned
    at DEC.............It's time to pull together again.
    
    							Gene
    

    The idea in .46 about more work causing productive activity and less
    work causing territorial behavior certainly deserve consideration. 
    They provide a new explanation for something that occurred to me.
    
    As I was completing one assignment, a supervisor was considering what I
    should do next.  There were two projects that needed doing, and the
    supervisor was deciding between them.  I suggested that I might try
    doing both of them.  This idea went in one ear and out the other -- it
    was just dismissed without any perceivable thought.
    
    I've mulled over several explanations.  Obviously, one explanation is
    that having multiple assignments just wasn't the way things were done,
    and the group, and this supervisor in particular, did things according
    to set methods.  But .46 provides a somewhat deeper explanation: 
    Taking two assignments would violate territoriality.  It would also
    decrease the number of engineers needed, and this group was looking to
    expand.
    
    
    				-- edp

    Re .55:
    
    I can remember when I joined the company in 1980 some that things Dave
    refers to:
    
    o All engineering program meetings had coffee and donuts.  SOP
    
    o We often went out to lunch with our manager (I was in SWS [COG] then)
      he never thought twice about charging lunch to the CC.
    
    o I received an informal verbal offer from engineering before
      interviewing and with 15 minutes to accept the offer (a hiring freeze
      was coming down).
    
    Those were incredible days.  One bad thing was that we were pretty HW
    poor (no workstations, one 780 supporting 20-30 people...) whereas
    today we're pretty HW rich.
    
    -Ken

    re -1 ..... I've got news for you, we're still hardware poor (I'm in
    SPS, BTW).  Still struggling along with a 220....wouldn't know how to
    turn on a workstation, much less what to do with it.  Also, can't
    get equipment for home use.  This paucity of modern hardware is really
    interesting considering that I getting ready to support ACE/NAS/DCE,
    etc., products.  What was the story about the shoe-maker's kids?
    
    At least things have changed since about three years ago in ZKO when
    a group of visiting customers stopped by my cubicle to guffaw at the
    VT100 I was using.

    re: .59
    
>    One bad thing was that we were pretty HW
>    poor (no workstations, one 780 supporting 20-30 people...) 
    
    Make that "one 785 supporting 50-60 people" and you describe our office
    condition circa 1989.  Thankfully, we have a good number of workstations
    around now (I'm using a VS2000 w/RD53 system disk at the moment).
    
    -- Russ

    A lot of discussion in here about the old vision vs the new vision. I
    believe the biggest difference between OLD DEC (14 years ago when I
    joined) and the NEW DEC is that we don't have a clear vision now.
    
    By the way for what it is worth we also a VISIONARY or two in the OLD
    DEC like (dare I say?) Gordon Bell. Who are our visionaries today? 
    
    You may argue that we had the wrong product strategy, but at least we
    had one that was clearly articulated and we could rally around it.
    
    Who feels that we have a clear complete strategy that we can all rally
    around now? Pick a dimension: product (ACE?, Alpha?, POSIX?),
    applications? services? accounts?
    
    How can we ever hope to form teams, make appropriate investment
    tradeoffs, and develope people again if we're not quite sure what game
    we are in?
    
    I DO think we are close. I think "Open Advantage" is the right concept.
    It needs to be developed more in the area of product (what do we make
    vs buy?) service (what do we integrate, package, support, educate?)
    accounts (where are our strengths?, focus, priorities -- where do we
    lead, where do we support)
    
    Once our leadership puts a clearly articulated strategy together (test-
    can you explain to one of your computer challenged relatives WHY DEC is
    better than IBM, SUN, HP etc. and will be five years from now?) then I
    think a lot of those other problems will take care of themselves and we
    can back to basics.
    
     

    	It has been interesting, almost without exception, respondents
    	to this note who date the transition from old to new peg it
    	between '85 and '87.  Some momentous happening during this
    	time period were:
    
    		o the failure of our Admin systems leading to the
    		  disaterous Q1'84 results (remember thhe stock
    		  tumbling from 117 to 70 in a single day??)
    
    		o our PS strategy
    
    		o the termination of our RISC program (Prism???)
    
    
    	I would have to agree with .46 re: the unrestrained hiring
    	during the mid-80's.  We hired 'em faster than out culture could
    	assimilate 'em.
    
    	Pushback used to be as common as paper clips.  Now it is
    	seldom heard, the activity as well as the term.  I can recall
    	some staff meeting were we would pushback so strongly on
    	one another that I thought we would come to blows.  But after
    	the staff meeting we would still be friends.  The quality of
    	the decisions which came out of that environment far exceeded
    	what is common today. 
    
    	"He Who Proposes, Disposes" was once a challenge for the
    	employee to make a difference, to excell.  Now it seems more
    	often a tool to stymie discussion.
    
    	I once lamented the lack of direction from the top, but I've
    	come to understand that the only way to make a difference, to
    	effect a structual change, in DEC, is bottoms-up.  I believe that
    	there is still enough of the old DEC culture around to make a
    	difference.  I genuinely hope it does.

RE:              <<< Note 1562.63 by ROYALT::SHERWIN "Jim Sherwin" >>>

>    	It has been interesting, almost without exception, respondents
>    	to this note who date the transition from old to new peg it
>    	between '85 and '87.  Some momentous happening during this
>    	time period were:

To this I'd add

	o The BI Fiasco
	o The DECUS rape the customer software upgrade announcement
	o The crack down on 3rd party peripherial makers
	o The spat with Digital Review
	o LMF and its well organized introduction

re when it happened:

    You can argue about whether the old DEC died when we stopped shipping
vector CRTs with each CPU or when the latest recession hit or anytime in
between.  It was certainly a gradual process, not an abrupt one.  I don't
think anybody ever woke up and said "we had our vision yesterday, but I
can't seem to recall what it is this morning".  But I agree that we have
lost our vision.

re .63:

>    		o the termination of our RISC program (Prism???)

     I think the death of Prism was the 2nd (or 2nd and 3rd) cancellation(s) of
our RISC program.  The 1st cancellation was when SAFE was killed.  I've also
heard (may or may not be true, haven't seen 1st hand evidence) that what we
have now more closely resembles the >5 yr old SAFE than it does Prism.  Amazing
how we long sat on this stuff.
								    Robt. P.

    Another major occurrence in the mid 80s that (at least IMHO) had a hand
    in the demise of the old DEC was decentralization. Just one example is
    components engineering. there had been one central focus for parts
    purchase, quality, conformity and testing. with one group who had
    expertise in plastics, metallurgy, connectivity, magnetic,
    thermodynamics, vibration, shock, chemistry, IC fab, etc, etc. Then all
    of a sudden there were components labs all over the country each
    seeming to go it's own way and buying the same parts from different
    vendors at different quality levels. 

    Decentralization seemed to re-enforce and in many cases ensure dynasty
    building and compartmentalization. (It's my job I'll do it and not teach
    anyone else or, I'm a manager now so I'll hire fifty more people so
    make my little splinter group look really important.)

    BTW I was hired in 1974, APRIL FOOLS day no less. At times now I wonder if
    it were the least or most foolish career move. 8*)

PRISM was cancelled in 1988, not 1987.

RE: .66

>    Another major occurrence in the mid 80s that (at least IMHO) had a hand
>    in the demise of the old DEC was decentralization.

Funny, I would have said just the opposite:  a key factor in the demise of
the old DEC was centralization.


The DEC that I joined in 1980 was a medium-sized company content with being
the major player in several niche markets.  Or, actually, from the customer's
standpoint, 19 different companies content with being the major player in
19 different niche markets--the product lines were effectively independent
fiefdoms in those days.  "Sales" was really "Order Taking" (provided that
the customer could first get them to return their phone calls, of course).
Service was legendary--the saying among computer customers was, "minicomputers
aren't sold, they're abandoned".

On the positive side, that DEC was optimistic, interested in leading the
market, had a vision of where it wanted to be, communicated that vision to
its employees, made long-range plans on how to achieve its vision, and stuck
to those plans once they were made.  


Digital (the "new DEC") is a large company trying to be a major player in
several very large markets.  On the positive side, we have a sales force
that really can effectively sell (although they still have problems returning
customer phone calls) and a service organization that can effectively help
customers.  We are also united into one company intent on presenting a single
image to the outside world.

However, the new Digital is more reactive than proactive in the marketplace.
We have no clearly articulated vision, and we are structurally incapable of
developing and carrying out long-range plans.  I also detect less of a feeling
of individual empowerment at all levels in Digital versus DEC.


Much of the difference between the Digital of 1991 and the DEC of 1980 is
merely the difference between a $10+ billion company and a $1 billion company.
I came to DEC from IBM.  I have always observed that when one finds a problem
in DEC due to size, you will find the same situation at IBM, but at least 10
times worse.  That has continued to be the case.

--PSW  

    * You can get a 33Mhz 486 charged to your credit card and shipped second-day
      air - with preloaded software, and be up and running in a few hours.
    
    * All the easy problems have been solved (if not, there's now several
      million computer literate people to handle what's left).
    
    * Customers don't want computers, they want solutions.  The thrill of
      owning a computer is wearing off.  Everyone's got one.
    
    * We're competing in a different market. Customer expectations have 
      changed.  
    
    The old Digital is like:
    
    	Galvinized beer cans (they took a REAL man to crush)
    	Punched Cards (I used to enjoy folding, spindling, and mutilating)
        Slide rules (I've still got mine - never use it)
        Record Players (What am I going to do with all those LPs)
    	AM radios (station WEEI just went under this week)
    	Rotary Telephones ("...You've reached 911, If you're calling from a 
    		touch-tone phone...")
    
    We want to hold on to the old ways for a while, but then we let go,
    knowning that there's no going back.
    
    Yesterday we delt with yesterdays problems, today we must deal with
    todays problems.  It's funny how the technology we create is responsible 
    for such revolutionary change in our users, yet people in our industry
    are relatively inflexible to change in areas other than technology.
    
    While I do have my bad days, I really do think the new Digital
    will be BETTER than the old Digital if we stop denying the changes in
    our industry (...and if management takes responsibility for leadership
    of this company)
    
    The old Digital is fond memories of simpler times.  It was fun, but
    I don't want to go back.
    
    John.

	I realize this is an old topic, but I couldn't resist.  
Suffice it to say I was hired in the 70's.  I saw a lot of change.
I notice 2 types of change.

	1.  How we do business.
	2.  How we act/react socially.

	IMO, the business aspect is the SYMPTOM...  Failed products,
disarray of product lines.  Wrong products at the wrong place at the
wrong time.  Problems with sales.  (Sheesh! I am depressing myself)

	The business problems are what we see, so we blame that as the
time of change.  We see the change at about mid to late 80's.  But
someone said earlier that it was gradual.  I AGREE.

	The real change from the *OLD* to *NEW* Digital was slow.  It
hit the core of our hearts.  The change was with the attitudes.  People
became objects rather than people.

	Where did this change come from?  I believe it came from the
company.  Don't get me wrong.  I don't believe it was an insidious plot.
I believe those in charge wanted to "STREAMLINE" the company.  They
wanted to have guidelines that were "MORE RIGID".  So the management
acted in what they thought was progress, to improve the company.

	What I saw bothered me.  I mentioned it.  I tried to change it,
but it continued.  I realized I was watching the fall of ROME (nice
cliche, huh?) (back to the story).  No one in management wanted to hear.
They still don't, BECAUSE THEY BELIEVE THEY ARE DOING WHAT IS RIGHT FOR
THE COMPANY...  And that is the problem.

	These are SOME of the social changes I saw.

	1.  Slogans of the month were happening.  Such as
		"WORK SMARTER NOT HARDER".

	2.  Doing MORE than your normal duties was now EXPECTED, rather
	than appreciated.

	3.  The statement "Digital doesn't have rules, it has guidelines",
	was change to "Rules are Rules" and "The PP&PM is the Rule".

	4.  An era of HIGH PERFORMANCE ORGANIZATIONS was attempted.  What
	actually happened was a manager would make the team RESPONSIBLE,
	but gave them no AUTHORITY.  IMO, it is impossible to be
	responsible for something when you're not authorized to make
	changes...

	5.  We became more concerned about MONEY then we were about our
	EMPLOYEES or CUSTOMERS.  I know, money is why we are in business.
	I feel that if we have to treat someone wrong for money we should
	close down...


To elaborate on how we put money in front of employees and customers.  We
decided to "WORK SMARTER not HARDER" (sorry I couldn't resist).  

	Say we noticed a problem in manufacturing with a disk drive.  Say
it had a glue problem in the hda, and say it had a know R/W problem.  And
we knew about it.  Say the product was called the RA81...  Now we have
a deadline to get a product out the door.  What do we do in this new wave
of DOCTRINE?  WE SHIP IT...  Even when we know it has problems, because
we have to beat our competition.

	Now to show how this affects the customer, consider the following.
Say you bought a NEW car.  You started driving it.  One weekend you take
the family on a trip to the mumblety mum.  The brakes fail.  You hit a
tree.  One of your kids is injured, and you kill the tree.
	What do you do when you find out that the car dealer knew about the
problem even before you took the car?  I know how I would feel.

	What do we do in DEC?  We hide the fact there is a problem.  We
still sell the product.  We tell our employees, not to lie, just don't
tell the customer the facts.  IN MY BOOK THAT IS LYING...

	What we are doing is trying to "SET THE CUSTOMERS EXPECTATIONS"
and "FIX THE CUSTOMERS PERCEPTIONS".  We are told that "PERCEPTIONS ARE
REALITY" (Yea! tell it to the dead tree).  I don't like telling the
customer the half truth.  I want to "DO WHAT IS RIGHT".
	Don't get me wrong, I don't mean that we should BEAT the customer
with the truth.  Caring has to go along with truth.


Can anyone else see that *OLD* DEC was a mind set, a philosophy, a social.
It had nothing to do with stocks and money and products.

Anyone who cares to go ahead and set me straight.  Why not, I have had
enough managers try.


Jim Morton

    This is one of the best notes that I have seen in notes files in a long
    time. Three cheers. Hit it right on the head.
    
    disallusioned!
    

| What do we do in DEC?  We hide the fact there is a problem.  We
| still sell the product.  We tell our employees, not to lie, just don't
| tell the customer the facts.  IN MY BOOK THAT IS LYING...

	The company I worked for before DEC did the same thing with a printer
that went along with a gas controller (the kind where you pay first, then pump
gas). Anyway, the printers were failing left and right. We knew it and did our
part by rejecting them. Management came in and they said ship them, we need to
get these out by a certain date or we have to pay X amount of dollars (it was
in the contract). So, they sent them out, they didn't work and the oil company
was going to sue us for this problem. They ended up working out a deal where we
would make a new and improved printer and exchange it for the old ones free of
charge. If this wasn't done by a certain date, we would lose the contract
(which was in the millions). The new and improved printer was better, but not
100% good. I hope DEC doesn't have to go through all this crap before they
realize it's better to be a little late and have a working product then it is
to be on time.



Glen

Similar to this vein, one would find the Rogers Commission Report on the Space
Shuttle incident (I'd hesitate to say "accident", because it was no accident)
a prime example of lying to get something out the door.

Just read the first (of five) volumes.  If you're not infuriated by the time
you're done with it, you must be in management.  If it doesn't sound real
familiar to you, then you're probably new to DEC, and/or US industry in 
general.

    Reading Multi Volume Govt Reports on "incidents", Dawn? What's wrong
    VMS Mail listings getting too boring for you?
    
    q
    :-)
    

No, I read that back when I was still working on VMS DECnet Phase V.  I
wanted to know how the h*ll they could blow up a shuttle and look surprised
afterwards.

After reading the report, I saw that it was just normal US management
practice, and that I needn't look any farther than my immediate group for
explanation.

;-)

    re : .75 - i see, practice reading for the real thing, eh?

>             <<< Note 1562.72 by JURAN::SILVA "Eat, Papa, EAT!" >>>
>I hope DEC doesn't have to go through all this crap before they
>realize it's better to be a little late and have a working product then it is
>to be on time.

Why is it better to lose the contract for being a little late as opposed
to being a little deficient in requirements?

It's clear that the RIGHT answer is to be on time AND on target,
but if you fail on one count, what do you do to recover?
It's likely that the management in .72's anecdote came out heros.
They did save the contract, and had to leap two (albeit self compounded)
hurdles to do it.

I'm not patting anybody on the back for it, but they made a business
decision that worked for the metrics at hand.
The customer might not come back, but the short term goals were met.
If you're going to argue with "success," consider the alternatives.

- tom]

   >The customer might not come back, but the short term goals were met.
    
    	This exactly and succinctly embodies that which is wrong with
        not only us but most U.S. business ... and why we'll continue to
        see our markets eroded further by Far Eastern and EEC countries.
            

   >short term goals 
    
This (IMHO) is a major problem with Digital.   It seems to only ever think and
plan for the short term.  Long term for Digital seems to mean next Quarter. 

This is especially problematical in Software.  Nothing ever seems to be
budgeted for the long term (years).  Relatively low cost/low risk modifications
that reduce *SUPPORT* costs are never (in my experience) authorized as this
would come out of the DEVELOPMENT budget and might jepodise the inclusion of an
extra report from the release....It's time the Portfolios were charged for
support costs at the true (escalating) rate for support problems that are
carried over from release to release, that could be rectified. 

What happened to true QUALITY in this company (if it ever really existed). 

The solution to the "throw it over the wall" software problem is to have both
the development and maintenance costs come from the same budget.  I think this
is already happening -- the CSC's are now able to refuse to support an
unmaintainable product, which means they can truly negotiate to get the f
features they need.

As a software engineer, I applaud this move.  It makes it easier for me to
justify taking the time to put quality into the product.  Also, I have a bit
of a vengeful streak -- I look forward to seeing bad programmers get their
noses rubbed in their code!  (And I look forward to knowing that I can get
feedback about my own code :-)

    
    It's not just a development-vs-support issue. Short term thinking leads
    to a constant change of direction and focus that is ruinous in a
    complex software development envorinment. It's like a driving
    instructor told me a long time ago, when I was weaving all over the
    place: "You won't need to adjust your steering so often if you pick up
    your eyes and look further down the road."
    
    You know things are bad when the popular internal request for added
    functionality is:
    
    		your-prompt-here> SHOW STRATEGY /CONTINUOUS
    

    I tried to resist but couldn't !!!!
    
    The problem with all internal software development is the way the
    costs are perceived. If you use a lifecycle model such as the following
    
    CONCEPTION > BIRTH > CHILDHOOD > ADOLESCENCE > MATURITY > DEATH
    
    Then you can see the problem. The single most important decision in 
    this chain is conception. It is the most difficult one to revoke and
    alter. It is often taken without the full awareness of the problems
    and costs associated with the birth > death phase.
    
    Now if we look at this in terms of software developement what you will
    see is the "portfolio" representatives IE those that act as agents
    for the end user in their aquisition of software, at present, only
    consider the cost of the conception > Birth Phase Ie the Engineering
    process. This is not because they are at fault , it just that the way
    the company works places no requirement on them to do otherwise.
    
    The end recipients of the system ((D)IS operations ) concentrate on the
    Birth > Death cycle. Again this is a company encouraged beahavior.
    
    The net result is that no one body has the overall view of the true 
    cost and business impact from begining to end. The net result are all the
    problems described in the previous replies.
    
    If we truly made investement decisions based on Total Cost of OwnerShip
    then many developments would never start as they could not be cost
    justified. Those that could easily be cost justified would have a much
    greater chance of success because they are less likely hit any
    unknown/unthought off cost boundaries in their lifespan.
    
    Chris

(This is a completely emotional response.  I don't pretend it has anything to
do with facts (so don't bother me with 'em - this is about how I feel, not
what happened or what you think).)

     I feel like VAX & VMS raped the company I thought I could work for the
rest of my life.  They replaced products that had  character and personality
with a dry, gray, soulless mass of self-absorbed hardware and software,
disconnected from the esthetics and enjoyment that had made DEC desirable for
both employees and customers.  Unfortunately, this made DEC tons-o-money and
DEC interpreted it the wrong way.

     Now we're talking about recapturing the old spirit - "delighting the
customer."  (Of course, it's a completely different customer, a much less
technical one.)  There are all these quality & Voice of the Customer programs
going on.  Most places in the company ignore them.  Many places give them lip
service.  In a few places they work.

     Alpha, for example, is a magnificent product.  But how different is it
from SAFE and wouldn't we have had it much sooner without Cutler's ego?  And
honestly, how much did Cutler do for the company?  Opinions I hear seem very
split on him - some view him as a living legend or a patron saint of software
engineers, personally responsible for billions of dollars of revenue, others
view him as a glory hog and arrogant SOB.  Same with Gordon Bell.  What's the
truth about these people?

     My enjoyment and productivity on the job have declined (slowly but
steadily) since I joined DEC (about 9 years ago).  For the first time I'm
beginning to get inklings about leaving.  How much of DEC still works right,
is still making customers happy and making money?   How many of our customers
care if the next box of hardware or software or documentation says DEC on it? 
How many who are not yet our customers care?  Is there any reason to consider
staying here in the long run?

     I still see good aspects in DEC.  It seems to have more of a social
conscience than most companies (I mean this genuinely, not in the sense that
it's Politically Correct), even if it's far from perfect (and some of its
imperfections are increasingly obvious to me).  Most of the management I've
encountered here is less callous and arrogant than that I've experienced and
heard about at other large corporations.  Most individual employees, both
grunts and managers, seem to want things to work better, but are carrying tons
of baggage and fighting against accumulated debris.

     What do you think?  Are there still enough good vibes at DEC that the
company can float instead of sinking?

    Thanks for your honest reply, Robert. I've been meaning to find a way
    to express my own frustration - and hope - and your note has provided
    a start.
    
    You're right: the customers *have* changed, the whole computing
    paradigm has changed. VMS was born into the timesharing paradigm
    that the DECSystem-10/20 systems and others like it (IBM/CMS, XDS-940)
    had made so popular, and had moved computing out of the punched-card
    deck.
    
    What Digital needs to do is examine the new computing paradigms and
    become a paradigm pioneer, as Joel Barker says in the video
    "Discovering the Future". In short, I suggest that this entire
    corporation focus on quickly converting its software so that it runs
    on MS-DOS and NT, so that it runs in Novell networks.
    
    Why such a radical proposal? That is the mode of operation of the
    software and hardware houses that are expanding and making money.
    They have caught on to the new computing paradigm. Borland has sold
    more copies of their C compiler in the last year than the *TOTAL NUMBER
    OF ALL COMPILERS SOLD BY DIGITAL DURING ITS LIFETIME*!!! Microsoft
    has sold tens of millions of copies of MS-DOS, and millions of
    copies of MS-Windows.
    
    There are 90 *MILLION* PCs in use in the US. How does a company like
    Digital ever expect to compete in this arena, when the default desktop
    device is a PC? Some family friends of mine recently purchased a 486
    Gateway PC with 10MB of memory, a 100MB disk, and a vast array of
    software custom loaded on it. They ordered it one Saturday afternoon,
    and in 48 hours it was delivered to their doorstop. They paid the $2700
    for the entire system via MasterCard. They took the PC into the house,
    plugged the cables in, turned it on, and started using it (Windows 3.1,
    DOS 5.0, etc., etc., etc.).
    
    The packages available for PCs make Digital's base software look haggard.
    Consider MS-Word for Windows 3.0. Or Lotus 1-2-3. Or Powerpoint. Or
    Excel. Or Corel-Draw. These are truly industrial-strength high-quality
    software packages. The companies that produce them can sink heavy-duty
    resources into them because the payoff - the market base - is so huge.
    
    But Digital is still stuck in the old paradigm. To understand that, we
    merely need to look at ourselves (KO does not have a very different
    perspective than the rest of us, just more responsibility and power
    to implement what he feels is best). Here I am, working on one of the
    few Digital products that is making money - PATHWORKS for PCs
    - using a 3100/76 workstation SET HOSTed into a 6000 cluster.
    I keep most of my sources in my VMS directory. It's the way I am.
    It's reality, or "sanity". It defines me.
    
    Our client (PC software) group uses the new computing paradigm, the one
    that Digital overlooked in the '80s and is now killing us in the '90s:
    they use their PCs for *everything* they do. They only use Digital's
    VAXen because their charter is to allow connection of PCs to VAXen (and
    now ALPHA), and because they want to share files with us (in the server
    group) and we use VAXen.
    
    Big VAXen have very few places in the modern computing paradigm. Large
    businesses have begun to run their entire organizations on PC
    workstations connected to file servers.
    "The client/server model really helped the PC grow up
    and get a real job" says a recent article on distributed computing in
    one of the (dozens of) trade rags.
    
    Digital missed the first
    paradigm shift - the move from the glass house to the desktop, and we
    have not caught up yet. We're now  trying to produce high-speed
    centralized compute engines (midrange and high-end systems) with the
    alpha chip. The paradigm shift has been lost on us for those machines;
    I strongly suspect any midrange machines we produce with the alpha chip
    will collect as much dust as the 6000 and 9000 systems we just made to
    sit on the shelf (unless they are sold as file servers running NT - see
    below).
    
    And the computing paradigm is shifting again, as a result of the
    introduction of NT (another Cutler operating system - but he learned
    his lesson about compatibility with previous versions). NT will release
    in December. Along with it, NT-LANManager and its client software.
    This software makes every PC a server and a client, allowing for easy
    interchange and sharing of files.
    
    And now I ask all of you who read this to do a vision experiment:
    imagine that most of Digital's layered products are MS-DOS, Windows,
    and NT-Windows compatible, and as you walk into your nearest computer
    store, along with the Borland and Microsoft shrink-wrap packages, there
    is a dazzling array of flashy, inexpensive Digital shrink-wrap
    software. RDB for the masses. Expert systems. High-precision math
    packages. Optimizing compilers.
    
    What would it take to change Digital to make this the reality?
    It is something for all of us to ponder.
    
    							Jon Campbell
    							PCSG Server Group
    							PATHWORKS/ALPHA
    
    

   Re:                    <<< Note 1562.84 by RANGER::JCAMPBELL >>>

Don't let me get you down, but while we can change our paradigm,
we will never be the pioneers again.  We lost that opportunity a
long ways back.

Dick

.83:

FWIW, I think it was Bell who was responsible for SAFE getting killed (he 
reportedly had a hissy-fit that it wasn't a VAX), and it was Cutler who
later decided it was his idea (he reportedly had a hissy-fit and demanded 
that he own all the RISC projects - SAFE and TITAN).

In '85, SAFE was seen by engineering management as a stupid idea.  Now, Alpha
is seen as our savior.  I can't see any substantive difference between the
two - both RISCs built to run a ported VMS.  One has to wonder how things
would be now if we were selling our savior product, instead of still rushing
to build it.

For my part, I'm just demonstrating 20/20 hindsight.  My hindsight tells me
that Alan Kotok was pretty visionary in this respect.  One wonders how well
he's been rewarded for his efforts.

    Well, MY customers are MORE technical, NOT less, these days
    
    karl

re Note 1562.83 by STAR::PRAETORIUS:

>      I feel like VAX & VMS raped the company I thought I could work for the
> rest of my life.  

        Both Ken Olsen and Tom Peters would agree that success --
        especially fabulous success -- can engender a corporate
        downfall.

        I don't think that VAX & VMS were "evil" in any sense -- in
        fact they were VERY good.  As a result we neglected a lot of
        other avenues of development in the name of supporting a
        patently winning single corporate strategy.

        Also, the gods of that winning strategy, e.g., Bell,
        Strecker, and Cutler, were both very good for the corporation
        to the extent that they pursued that strategy and very bad to
        the extent that they could shut off the work of the next
        generation of innovators.

        Bob

>        I don't think that VAX & VMS were "evil" in any sense -- in
>        fact they were VERY good.

     I don't think VAX & VMS are evil - they just piss me off.

     I don't think VAX & VMS were very good (a serious is-of-identity error,
for you G.S. fans).  I think they did reasonably well (some parts very well,
other parts adequately) as extensions to the PDP-11 and RSX.  As state-of-the-
art timesharing hardware and software, I think they performed in a profoundly
mediocre fashion.

     I think that what Cutler and Bell excelled at was making compromises -
they seemed to have a sense (maybe still do) of where you had to put effort
(and conversely, what you could leave out) to succeed commercially.  This
gives some computer esthetics weenies (like myself) architectural indigestion,
but makes a lotta bucks (an entirely reasonable thing for a business to do and
in that sense, I certainly don't begrudge their efforts).  To give them their
due, they accomplished this much less repulsively than, say, IBM and Intel.

     But this is all just crust on the chunder - the real finger down the
throat was DEC's attitude.  I remember back when a was a DEC customer, we had
sort of a running joke at our LUG:

	customer calls a DEC salesperson -

	customer: I'd like a 2060 [substitute 1090 or 11/70 if you desire]

	ordertaker: how many 780s is that?

Many DECcies seemed to be evangelized or brainwashed wrt VAXen (VAXinated was
a common term for it).  There were motivated, not by what customers wanted, but
by what DEC wanted to sell to customers.  There seemed to be an analogous
attitude in engineering (has anyone related to DEC NOT heard the phrase "we're
DEC and you're not"?  Has any DEC software engineer NOT heard the phrase
"we're VMS and you're not").

     I know I'm stating this in exaggerated terms.  But I've heard a lot of
exaggeration from the other side over the years.  It doesn't make the argument
any more intelligent for me to respond in kind, but what the heck, I'm human.

							rant, rant, rant,

									RP

    Back in the early 80's when I started with DEC in Software Services I
    remember being particularly impressed (depressed?) with the very strong
    "us vs them" attitude, at least in this field office.  I did not come
    in as a former DEC customer but did have some sales experience.  I
    remember saying "but these are the folks that put the bread on your
    kids table".  No one seemed to understand or care.  It was sort of a
    machismo attitude.  Not a lot of it remains nowadays.  -- Fred

.88>            -< "One company, One strategy" -- very good, then very bad >-

.88>          Also, the gods of that winning strategy, e.g., Bell,
.88>          Strecker, and Cutler, were both very good for the corporation
.88>          to the extent that they pursued that strategy and very bad to
.88>          the extent that they could shut off the work of the next
.88>          generation of innovators.


I'm reading a book called _The Fifth Discipline_, by Peter M. Senge, a book
somewhat "making the rounds" in "Quality" discussions.  (An excellent book.)
Senge holds that big systemic problems can result from the thinking we put
into tactical solutions.

His Chapter 4 begins by laying out "The Laws of the Fifth Discipline", of
which the first is

  1.  Today's problems come from yesteday's "solutions".
           [...]
      Often we are puzzled by the causes of our problems;  when we merely need
      to look at our own solutions to other problems in the past.  A well-
      established firm may find that this quarter's sales are off sharply.
      Why?  Because the highly successful rebate program last quarter led many
      customers to buy then rather than now.  Or a new manager attacks
      chronically high inventory costs and "solves" the problem -- except
      that the salesforce is now spending 20 percent more time responding
      to angry complaints from customers who are still waiting for shipments,
      and the rest of the time trying to convince prospective customers that
      they can have "any color they want so long as it's black".


Snips of the other laws:

  2.  The harder you push, the harder the system pushes back.

      In George Orwell's _Animal Farm_, the horse Boxer always had the same
      answer to any difficulty:  "I will work harder," he said.
           [...]
      Pushing harder, whether through an increasingly aggressive intervention
      or through increasingly stressful witholding of natural instincts, is
      exhausting.  Yet, as individuals and organizations, we not only get
      drawn into compensating feedback [vicious cycles], we often glorify
      the suffering that ensues.  When our initial efforts fail to produce
      lasting improvements, we "push harder" -- faithful, as was Boxer, to
      the creed that hard work will overcome all obstacles, all the while
      blinding ourselves to how we are contributing to the obstacles
      ourselves.


  3.  Behavior grows better before it grows worse.
           [...]
      The better before worse response to many management interventions
      is what makes political decision making so counterproductive.  By
      "political decision making," I mean situations where factors other
      than intrinsice merits of alternative courses of action weigh in
      making decisions -- factors such as building one's own power base,
      or "looking good", or "pleasing the boss".  In complex human systems
      there are many ways to make things look better in the short run.
      Only later does the compensating feedback come back to haunt you.


  4.  The easy way out usually leads back in.
           [...]
      After all, if the solution _were_ easy to see or obvious to everyone,
      it would probably already have been found.  Pushing harder and harder
      on familiar solutions, while fundamental problems persist or worsen,
      is a reliable indicator of nonsystemic thinking -- what we often call
      the "what we need here is a bigger hammer" syndrome.
  

  5.  The cure can be worse than the disease.
           [...]
      "Shifting the Burden" structures show that any long-term solution must,
      as Meadows says, "strenghthen the ability of the system to shoulder
      its own burdens."  Sometimes that is difficult;  other times it is
      surprisingly easy.  A manager who has shifted the burden of his
      personnel problems onto a Human Relations Specialist may find that the
      hard part is deciding to take the burden back;  once that happens,
      learning how to handle people is mainly a matter of time and commitment.


  6.  Faster is slower.
           [...]
      Lewis Thomas has observed, "When you are dealing with a complex social
      system, such as an urban center or a hamster, with things about it that
      you are dissatisfied with and eager to fix, you cannot just step in and
      set about fixing with much hope of helping.  This realization is one of
      the sore discouragements of our century."


  7.  Cause and effect are not closely related in time and space.

  8.  Small changes can produce big results -- but the areas of highest
      leverage are often the least obvious.

  9.  You can have your cake and eat it too -- but not at once.

 10.  Dividing an elephant in half does not produce two small elephants.


 11.  There is no blame.

      We tend to blame outside circumstances for our problems.  "Someone else"
      -- the competitors, the press, the changing mood of the marketplace, the
      government -- did it to us.  Systems thinking shows us that there is no
      outside;  that you and the cause of your problems are part of a single
      system.  The cure lies in your relationship with your "enemy".

    re .91
    
    Good note!
    
    What we need is more Boxers, right?!!

re: .87:

    Well, MY customers are MORE technical, NOT less, these days
    
Yes, I can understand that: unfortunately, it's likely that your
non-technical customers are probably running Windows and/or Mac's.
We'll keep the old core of our business; but that's an ever shrinking
segment of the marketplace.

    re: .89 (and previous notes by RP)
    
    Well, RSTS doesn't hold a candle to TOPS as a timesharing system, but
    we've gone through our bitterness stage.  Eventually I put that behind
    me and even worked for VMS a couple of years.

     Yeah, I thought I'd got through my bitterness stage, too, until I came to
work for VMS.  Now it's the baggage that bothers me more than the brain
damage - but having those nerve endings re-irritated has revived lots of old,
festering (& probably misplaced) sentiments.

     I don't pretend it's really about VMS.  It's about me thinking DEC might
be a nice, interesting, stimulating place to work and me making bad career
decisions (not financially or positionwise, just sanitywise) and DEC getting
bloated on hubris.  I just thought there might be other people out there who'd
been through the same and have some interesting perspectives on how they'd
worked through it (or hadn't).  Probably some of the most interesting
viewpoints might come from people who don't work for DEC anymore.

						Robert Praetorius
						Principal Engineer
						VMS Sustaining Engineering
						RMS Maintenance Group

> -< ni hui bu hui zhongguo hua? >-
    (Translation: "Do you understand Chinese?")
    We better take this offline, Robert.
    
    --Simon

    This nostalgia for the old Digital reminds me of a interesting
    conclusion of opinion polls.
    
    Whereas 20 years ago Americans believed their children would have a
    higher standard of living than they did, this is not the case today.
    
    Digital realized that its vision didn't fail.  It failed to execute a
    plan that would realize that vision in products that people want and
    products that people can buy.
    
    The United States and Digital share a common problem: to reverse the
    negative expectations in a credible way.
    
    We can't just follow the lead of other profitable computer companies
    like Microsoft, Apple, Dell, etc.  We've got to do in it a way that
    recognizes continuity with Digital's installed customer base and their
    changing requirements for computing.

Re: Mr. Praetorius.

I know what you mean -- VMS is sorta lacking in
charisma, isn't it?

Some systems are born dull; some achieve dullness;
and some have dullness thrust upon them.

another aspect of the old vs. the new (in a much shorter timeframe):

     The old downsizing effort seemed to consist of things like:

	looking for volunteers for the package

	pushing out obvious 5 and 4 performers (if the department
	had any they cared to rate that way)

	cutting back parts of the company caught on the short end
	of the less-manufacturing/more-services less-hardware/more-
	software squeeze

	right-sizing: a bizarre bit of newspeak (xin hua(? :-)) in
	some non-U.S. operations.  It was applied even to profitable
	operations (with apparently good prospects) in some countries.
	(Was it due to some kind of retentive urge to share the misery
	symmetrically?)

     Having heard the sharply rising number of people talking seriously about
departing without the benefit of the package (and I don't mean just musing
fatuously about it, like I am), I've concluded that DEC has a new,
unintentional, de facto downsizing mechanism:

	make it obvious that the employee has no hope of working on a
	product that's interesting, competitive or has any kind of
	future

This also makes me wonder if there's great apprehension up there in the
hierarchy about announcing details of the 25% engineering cut because they're
afraid that people will get trampled to death in a Who-concert-esque stampede
for the door.

     I have this romantic notion that KO actually has a vision for the
company, just isn't very eloquent about it and is stifled from realizing it by
a dense bramble of frightened, territorial, self-important bureaucracy
stretching from the VP level down to CC managers.  Right now, it seems like
about the best that I can hope for.

     I enjoyed re-reading the account of the Deming seminar written by someone
from DuPont (which recently made the rounds again on the junk mail circuits -
I'll gladly forward it to anyone who's interested).  Without pretending that
Deming is omniscient, I think many people will agree there's a lot of wisdom
in there.

     One of my favorite bits of this message is:

	     * Deming recommends companies work to drive out fear.
	Fear inhibits innovation and productivity.

The stuff I see in management pronouncements lately gives me nothing but fear.
Admittedly, it's an adverse environment for DEC and many other companies in
our industry - but I think a little clearly stated vision and sense of purpose
would go a long way.  (I hate to refer back to the blatant positivism and
constructive attitude of notes like .84, .91 & .97 when I'm really just trying
to carp, but there you have it).

     It was also interesting to see the DSQC report, indicating that the
DSQC's top priority is to convince VPs (!) that they own problem of improving
our work processes ("This is a fundamental change from our current bottom-up,
grassroots origin" (which apparently hasn't helped much to date, except in the
sense that it has sensitized most of the grunts to the idea that things could
possibly be run a lot more smoothly and constructively at DEC)).

     For those of you who find that my attitude gets up your nose (and have
made it this far through the message - I can recommend a therapist (you
obviously need one if you insist on subjecting yourself to this)) you'll be
glad to know that as soon as I get back from Atlanta, where I'll being trying
to make customers feel better about RMS (don't worry, I can hide my attitude
pretty well when I have to) I'll be taking a workshop which claims that

	"It answers why individuals and organizations can be trapped in
	self-defeating behaviors and cycles which lead nowhere."

Being basically a negativistic asshole, I don't have a lot of confidence that
this will work, but it's better than going right back to my job and besides,
it can't hurt and I'm fairly desperate right now.
							cathartically,

								Robt. P.

p.s.: re .98:
>Some systems are born dull; some achieve dullness;
>and some have dullness thrust upon them.

     Isn't it interesting how everything turned gray - manuals, cabinets,
boxes, logos, business cards, etc.?  I think this was an artistically
brilliant (if depressing) subconscious expression of the spirit of VAX/VMS.

    > One of my favorite bits of this message is:
    >
    >	     * Deming recommends companies work to drive out fear.
    >	Fear inhibits innovation and productivity.
    
    	Hey, in the copy I got in the mail, that
    	part read "..drive our fear..".   
    
    

>    	Hey, in the copy I got in the mail, that
>    	part read "..drive our fear..".   

     Yeah, ditto.  I assumed it was a Freudian slap on the part of the DuPont
dude.  I took editorial license and corrected it.  So sue me.  (oops - I
should be careful saying things like that anywhere near Massachusetts).

     DEC definitely works to drive my fear.  Works hard & does it well.  How
about yours?

I ain't afraid of no DEC.

    re .102   <I ain't afraid of no DEC>
    
    Ermmmm....  does that mean:
    
    		a.  You _are_ afraid of DEC ?
    
       OR	b.  You are not worried about a DEC-less world ?
    
       OR	c.  You skipped  English Grammar 101 ?
    		
    
    :-)))
    
    John
    
    :-)
    
    John

    How about:
    
    d.  All of the above
    
    ?
    
    I'm not known for being stingy with words.  I was rather proud of that
    exception.

    You can have Option d. if you also include for completeness: 
    
    		Option e. "None of the Above"
    
    :-)
    
    John

    -.1:
>   	o I have no desire to become a manager in any way, shape or form
>   	  during my career with Digital ('What!?  You don't want to be
>   	  one of us?),
    
    First time I have heard this expressed by anyone else.  I agree and
    have said the same to a number of bosses over the past 12 years.  But I
    tell peers not to do it, regardless of their goals.  Do not say it
    because you must assume that the boss likes his job; therefore you are
    saying, in some twisted way, that you do not like him because you do
    not like what he does.  If you did you would like to emulate him.  Tell
    him you want his job.  Most managers I have had in Digital have said
    they want their boss's job.  I know, I asked and then proceeded to tell
    them I did not want theirs.  One can always turn it down if offered.  
    
    This all may or may not ring true, but it has to be a pshycological
    put-down, and in all probability will be held against you.  There are
    lots of other ways to express the phenomena, golfing, brown-nosing,
    etc, depending on which side of the fence you sit.
    
    Myself, I am no longer concerned after 12 years of not playing the
    game "the right way" ...
    
    Sadly SERPing away after 12 years, I'd rather have stayed the next
    seven years but things in DEC are changing too fast now.  - Fred

   Re:              <<< Note 1562.107 by ALOS01::MULLER "Fred Muller" >>>

I've been there and got out of management.  Later I refused
several attempts to "co-opt" me by putting me "on the team".

Not unhappy about it, since I believe there is no position
within Digital (including KO's) from which the company can be
revitalized without _MAJOR_ shakeups.  I would have liked to be
able to participate in rationalizing the company, but I've
finally heard the messsage - 

   "We'd rather fight than switch (change)!".

Dick

    
    Re last few:
    
    Eureka! What an insight!
    
    For years, I've been telling management, "I'm interesting in pursuing
    an engineering track -- senior, principal, consultant, God. I have no
    interest in management jobs." Never even considered that I might be
    insulting anyone.
    
    For my next review, I believe I'll change that to, "I'm interesting in
    pursuing an engineering track -- senior, principal, consultant, God.
    After I get that far, I might feel worthy to consider a management job."
    Hey, it's worth a shot. :-)
    

    LIE, .110, that is the only REAL CHOICE.  Do it for your family if not for
    yourself.  Maybe you will change your mind, who knows, including you.
    
    But I found/find it hard to do.  - Fred

   Re: Last few to mine in .106
   
   
   When I joined Digital in 1979 I was told about the "dual career"
   path; one management, the other technical.  I heard many manager
   expound on this career path.  I have never seen it.
   
   One of the reasons Digital is in the situation it is now is because
   of the "What!? You don't want to be one of us?" mentallity.
   
   NOT EVERYONE CAN BE A MANAGER!!!  Someone has to do work.  Actually
   generate revenue.  A company cannot say in the same breath:
   
   	1. You should look at a long term career with Digital (41 years
   	   if I stayed till age 65), and
   	2. You need to strive to be a manager.
   
   For crying-out-loud.  What is this?; a pyramid scheme?
   
   When we were experiencing mondo growth in the '80s, we should have in
   no way thought we could pull all those people into management or
   staff positions.  But, that's what we tried to do.  
   
   I like being a grunt.  I enjoy cranking code, writing specs,
   designing systems, etc.  I started out in this industry as a hobby. 
   This company needs senior (experienced) technicians.  We even "fixed"
   the salary system 3-4 years ago so people could get good raises in
   grade without having to be promoted.
   
   I'm sorry to see all the SERPs who have been in this conference
   recently.  [Big assumption on my part->] I don't think we can afford
   to lose your knowledge.  What happens when everyone who knows how our
   stuff works is gone?

    Kinda scary when all the folks who know how it works are not there
    anymore.  Sorta negates my fuzzy reasoning about keeping my stocks, but
    I do have a lot of faith in KO.  I know some personal facts about his
    life that I put a lot of stock in.
    
    But will DEC ramp up on the field software folks again when ALPHA
    really hits the streets?  Us SERPers can come back on board after 26
    weeks but then only for max of 19 hrs/week.  But rules are made to be
    changed and DEC knows how to do that.
    
    Yes, what a joke the dual career path was.  I did not fall for it
    though.  I knew it was hot air (with good intentions) from the
    beginning.  The numbers show it cannot work.  I too have done some
    management work in former lives (firing people hurts hard).  My cut on
    evaluating employees is there is always the 1/10 on both sides of the
    curve that are easy choices.  It is the other eight decisions that I do
    not want to have to make -- mostly subjective: who golfs, who laughs,
    etc, like me.  Who am I to make a decision on who's kids eat better! I
    know there are folks who like to do it, and there had better be, but I
    never understood them and never will.
    
    Back when I was a perfesser at U. of Va. I even hated making out
    grades.  Lasted seven years until I got tenure and gave them a years
    notice and went flying -- really.  Funny thing, as a flight instructor,
    I never had trouble making life and death decisions -- when to let
    someone solo, etc. -- often wondered where the dichotomy was in that.
    Perhaps it lies in the immediacy (sp?) of it: decide, do it, it is
    over, no agonizing afterwards.
    
    Fred

.112:

Geez!  I remember using almost exactly those words in discussions with a
particularly incompetent manager a few years ago.  Particularly the bit
about the pyramid scheme.  (Of course, I had to explain pyramid schemes to
him, but nevermind.)

What response do I get:

1.  "Well, you can look at it that way if you want, but we like to put a
different interpretation on it."
2.  "There's nothing I can do about it."

Shyeah right.  Dual career path.  When monkeys fly outta my butt.

    Heck, if I want to get on the manager track I can always go to work for 
    Papa Gino's ...  'Course if things go badly enough I might be doing
    that anyway.  Either way, I'd rather stay off the pyramid.  :)
    
    Steve (who actually DID manage a restaurant years ago)

      re:  last few on dual-ladder career structure - I was told about
    this by some managers in Digital (none around at the moment).   There's
    also a valid academic business-management case for dual-ladder, though
    - it's recognised as a way to ensure continuing innovation within
    companies, not just in the computer business.   I saw some guru from
    MIT on a EuroPACE satellite seminar last year, describing the benefits
    of dual-ladder to companies in the chemical industry.   
    
      Now, it's just possible that some of Digital's current problems come
    from not making effective innovation.   So, as well as the emotional
    case that "forcing engineers <to be/say want to be> managers makes
    people feel bad", there's a business case that says "our business is
    partly technology-based, innovation hasn't stopped in the industry,
    how do we make good use of innovation?".
    
      There are some specific requirements for senior engineers in
    dual-ladder.   It's not enough to have a short-supply skill (though it
    helps).   You have to make a clear case for how other junior engineers
    should use technology, new and old, and get this accepted by
    management and the junior engineers.   But, it's a two-way street -
    managers have to look for guidance on technology, and not feel threatened
    by depending on non-managers for this.
    
      Not easy to change attitudes, in a business-survival situation.
    
      Lastly, as a footnote, I queried dual-ladder status with a personnel
    contact recently (and there's an on-going discussion).   The first
    response was on the lines of "Digital is generally in favour of
    dual-ladder, we have it on site <x> but don't know whether it's been
    implemented on your site".   Since I can only be in one place at a time
    :-) this didn't make me feel too comfortable.   
    
      From reading other entries in here, being in the wrong place at the
    wrong time seems to have cost some skilled people in Digital their
    jobs.   I'd like to think making effective use of innovation would stop
    the decline.

   Re:            <<< Note 1562.116 by TAGART::SCOTT "Alan Scott @AYO" >>>

There's a systematic problem with the dual ladder.  As was
mentioned before, there are managers who feel that it behooves
them to recruit new managers and act as their padrinos.  They
seem to be group oriented people and select their own kind.

Typically, however, in the technical ladder, the leaders are
individualistic, not especially interested in their junior
counterparts, and definitely much more interested in the
technical content of the job than in people.  So, there is no
patronage for the technical individual contributor.  S/he is
truly on his/her own.

The bottom line is,

   "Yes, Virginia, there is a dual ladder, but there is no Santa
   Claus to help you climb it."
   
Dick

    
    Re .117:
    
    Amen, Amen, AMEN!
    
    The first stage of development in the technical track is deciding you
    never want to be management.
    
    The second stage may well be when you realize that you are effectively
    your one and only advocate along that track.
    
    (I'm going to frame your whole note in my office, with your permission.)
    
    (Would you consider running as Perot's veep?)
    

re Note 1562.99 by STAR::PRAETORIUS:

> This also makes me wonder if there's great apprehension up there in the
> hierarchy about announcing details of the 25% engineering cut because they're
> afraid that people will get trampled to death in a Who-concert-esque stampede
> for the door.
  
        Yeah, I keep on wondering about that myself.  It's been
        months since I heard via multiple channels about the 25%
        engineering cut.  Yet nothing is happening -- very eerie!

        (Of course, some things have happened.  I believe that the
        major motivation for the TNSG "domain team" process was to
        develop a rational basis for cuts.)

        Bob

The other thing which makes the management/technical IC interface
so tricky is that the two groups don't necessarily share even the
most basic of concepts/values.
For example:
"What is success?"

I would guess (not being of the management mind-set) that for management-types,
success is measured in terms of the number of folks under your leadership, as
well as the usual salary, etc.
I personally know of several managers for whom this is true.

For many techincal-types, being successful has more to do with being respected
for your skills, and having your suggestions listened to and acted upon.

Thus, a manager may think they are rewarding you in grand style by making you
project manager of a 12 person project, when you would much rather bite off a
juicy problem and disappear for a month or two.

So the key is effectively communicating your needs and desires to your
management.  Even the ones which you consider to be obvious, and taken for
granted.

Kevin

    
    Re .119, .121:
    
    Could either of you (or anyone else, for that matter) provide more
    information on "domain teams"? A financial type dropped this term into
    a conversation recently, but wasn't very enlightening with regard to
    an explanation.
    
    

    	Just an interesting observation but it seems that some colleges are
    trying to respond to the dual career path by teaching in both areas. An 
    example of this is the Computer Information Systems degree vs. the 
    standard Computer Science degree. 

    	The CIS was explained as sort of a cross between a Business Degree 
    and a Computer Science degree. I've talked to teachers and counselors
    that have stated that the purpose is to create an awareness of business 
    management along with technical expertise all in one package.

    	I too have in the past felt the same way about management (i.e. I
    chose a technical career path.) After being exposed to some basic
    principles of management, I think my attitude about it is changing. I
    still don't see myself pursuing a management career in the near future,
    but I'm not ruling out the possibility anymore that I may, at some
    point in my career, actually give it a try. I think that I could
    actually do very well at it.

    	Although self-sufficiency has been the norm in the technical path,
    I see this as starting to change. Personally, I'm very much opposed to
    the thought of not providing support in any way, shape, or form, to
    someone that:

    	A. can benefit from my experience and,
    	B. is making an honest attempt to learn/better themselves

    Unfortunately, I have still seen my share of a complete lack of
    interest and even open opposition to sharing technical information and
    skills with junior level people. Although I don't agree with it, I can
    understand how it happens. It seems very much like the cycle of
    prejudice, and will probably be just as difficult to break.

    	There are also different areas of management, such as project
    management, where technical expertise/ability can be put to use right
    along with business management skills. For those that like a challenge,
    this becomes an even tougher one. One must be extremely good to be able
    to maintain the balance between detachment and involvement with the
    project.

    	Although many will say that the above cannot be done (i.e.
    involvement leads to not being able to see the forest through the
    trees) it's the type of challenge that interests me. In this particular 
    scenario, it seems that if you ever get the discipline perfected, or at
    least workable, you can have your cake and eat it too.

    	Ray

   Re:    <<< Note 1562.124 by VICKI::DODIER "Food for thought makes me hungry" >>>

>    	There are also different areas of management, such as project
>    management, where technical expertise/ability can be put to use right
>    along with business management skills. For those that like a challenge,
>    this becomes an even tougher one. One must be extremely good to be able
>    to maintain the balance between detachment and involvement with the
>    project.

Right.  The classical mistakes in this area are getting someone
who wants a technical management career into an operations
management position or getting a non-technical person into a
technical project management function.  Both can be disasters.

I had a very good experience (after some no-so-good) in team
management.  My partner and I backed each other up, he focused
on the external, business, political issues and I on the
internal, technical, educational issues of a project.  Since you
always need a backup anyway, I believe that staffing with a
complementary pair of project managers is good strategy.  On the
other hand, not everybody can develop a partnership like we did.

Dick