| T.R | Title | User | Personal
Name | Date | Lines |
|---|
| 152.1 | does that mean there are openings at the top?? | RAJA::MERRILL | Win one for the Glypher. | Thu Jul 10 1986 15:12 | 3 |
| Is there still the position of "Group Vice President"?
|
| 152.2 | Not group Vice Presidents | HUMAN::CONKLIN | Peter Conklin | Fri Jul 11 1986 00:06 | 6 |
| "Group Vice President" was never an official title. It was a term
that Ken used at one time for the members of Operations Committee,
and at another time for Marketing Committee. In that sense, the
proper spelling was probably "group Vice President", meaning the
VP of a group of VPs! But then who ever said DEC was careful about
upper/lower case :-).....oops, perhaps I should have said dEC!
|
| 152.3 | tricky "title" that | RAJA::MERRILL | Win one for the Glypher. | Fri Jul 11 1986 17:42 | 3 |
| "official" title or not, it used to appear in the Annual Report,
but, I think you're right, it was with the lower case spelling!
|
| 152.4 | | MILDEW::DEROSA | Obviously, a major malfunction. | Sat Jul 12 1986 16:57 | 2 |
| Who knows how many VP's we have? H-floating point format will be
acceptable.
|
| 152.5 | | LATOUR::MCCUTCHEON | Charlie McCutcheon | Sun Jul 13 1986 19:08 | 4 |
| Seems to me that I only see a new Digital This Week out lately if
they have some new VP's to announce! I'd be curious too to see
the grand total...
|
| 152.6 | 30+ | BESPIN::FARRELL | Joe Farrell | Wed Jul 16 1986 18:49 | 2 |
| I recall the # of V.P'S being somewhere around 30+...
|
| 152.7 | 45 | CADSYS::COOK | Neil | Fri Jul 18 1986 06:22 | 2 |
| As mentioned in one of the trade weeklies, when refering to the
newly created Senior Vice Presidents...
|
| 152.8 | | MILDEW::DEROSA | Obviously, a major malfunction. | Sat Jul 19 1986 06:42 | 6 |
| This is a good example of the adage that anything used too frequently
loses its value. Being a VP used to be a big deal, now everytime
I turn around there's a new one.
Say. That was 45 *Senior* VPs? How many "non-senior" VPs do we
have?
|
| 152.9 | not quite yet | TIGEMS::ARNOLD | Jon Arnold @MKO | Sat Jul 19 1986 17:07 | 4 |
| Nope, only a couple (3?) *senior* VP's, the rest of them are the
normal garden-variety VP's.
Jon
|
| 152.10 | EXPECT M-O-R-E VPs as we continue to grow | JAWS::AUSTIN | Tom Austin @UPO - Channels Marketing | Sat Jul 19 1986 17:47 | 25 |
| .8> This is a good example of the adage that anything used too frequently
.8> loses its value. Being a VP used to be a big deal, now everytime
.8> I turn around there's a new one.
Would you prefer that we only had half a dozen VP's and had all
decision making and commitment responsibility concentrated in the
hands of a half a dozen people?
Veeps are the officers of the company, with the authority to commit
the corporation. When you're a 10 million dollar company, you have
a half a dozen. When you have a company going on 10,000,000,000
in sales, and when you believe in distributing responsibility, it
makes a lot of sense to have 50 Veeps.
We ARE a B-I-G company. We have a L O T of customers and a L O T
of businesses. And we tend to distribute authority, although in
times past, it may have felt like it was M O R E distributed than
it is today.
The large number of VP's isn't disturbing in that context. What
we may see in the future is even more ... as a sign that we are
continuing to grow and take advantage of our limited window of
opportunity. Within a few years, I expect to see JUNIOR VP's, VP's,
Senior VP's and maybe even a fourth level (Exec VP or Divisional
VP equivalent).
|
| 152.11 | re: -1: wrong | MILDEW::DEROSA | Obviously, a major malfunction. | Sun Jul 20 1986 17:04 | 13 |
| Your analysis doesn't hold water. The number of VPs are clearly
growing at a far greater rate than is the company, no matter what
metric (# employees, $ of sales, etc.) you wish to use.
I think the real answer is that a VP title allows the highest level of
management to be promoted into some new position. I.e., instead of
calling them VPs they could be called "senior <mumble> managers". The
problem is that this cheapens the title of VP, which has (should have)
a special significance.
As to a VP being able to commit the company to do something, that's
fantasy. As far as I can tell, everything is done by committee at that
level.
|
| 152.12 | | PSW::WINALSKI | Paul S. Winalski | Sun Jul 20 1986 23:33 | 16 |
| RE: .11
> As to a VP being able to commit the company to do something, that's
> fantasy. As far as I can tell, everything is done by committee at that
> level.
I'm afraid you're wrong here. Only an officer of a corporation can execute
a legally-binding contract on behalf of the corporation. For DEC to enter
into a contract, that contract must be signed by the President, a Vice
President, the Corporate Secretary, or the Corporate Treasurer. That is why
banks have so many Vice Presidents, and why seemingly insignificant bank
branch offices may have a VP in charge. It is also why the need for people
with the VP title within DEC may grow at a different rate than the company
as a whole does.
--PSW
|
| 152.13 | The Chief High Consulting Manager of Mumblefratz | JAWS::AUSTIN | Tom Austin @UPO - Channels Marketing | Mon Jul 21 1986 02:58 | 7 |
| And as we become more and more of a marketing company, focusing
on calling at the HIGHEST levels of the large corporations around
the world, do you think the Vice President of Mumbling at the Widget
Corporation has his ego massaged by talking to the Chief Senior
Consulting Manager of Whatchimacallit from Digital? Titles DO count.
When we were selling technical solutions to technical personnel,
maybe it was important that we not have a vice president involved...
|
| 152.14 | More on selling strategies | CSTVAX::MCLURE | Vaxnote your way to ubiquity | Mon Jul 21 1986 03:38 | 20 |
| Good point Tom, I was talking to my Brother-In-Law (an engineer at
Standard Oil Co.), and he was describing how a VP (or was it the P himself?)
from IBM had called the P of Standard Oil to talk to him about his
"computer system". Up until then, Standard Oil had been blessed with a
few VAXes along with their hodgepodge of other (mainly IBM) computers,
but by "selling high" the IBM exec succeeded in convincing the Standard
Oil President to get rid of all of his old stuff and buy a complete IBM
system.
This decision was made solely on the high-ranking influence of the
IBM salesman, and had little to do with what the actual engineers at
Standard Oil wanted (they wanted more VAXes!). The positive side of this
particular story is that my Brother-In-Law and his fello engineers plan
to slip in a MicroVAX for a "special project" or two, and before long,
end up with a complete system of VAXes anyway. But, if we had tried the
same trick using a "New and Improved Senior Corporate Executive Manager
Plus", then I doubt if it would have worked as effectively in speaking
to the President of Standard Oil as would our President or Vice-President.
-DAV0
|
| 152.15 | The list gets longer, daily | NSSG::FUSCI | DEC has it (on backorder) NOW! | Mon Jul 21 1986 16:58 | 44 |
| re: .14 Someone must have heard you:
.
(forwarding deleted)
.
Message-class: DECMAIL-MS
From: NAME: SHUE
INITLS: CHICK
FUNC: US SALES
ADDR: MRO3-3/B13
TEL: 297-6067 <7991@DECMAIL@GRECO@PKO>
Posted-date: 18-Jul-1986
Subject: ANNOUNCEMENT.....SALES VP POSITIONS APPROVED
THE POSITIONS OF AREA SALES MANAGER AND CORPORATE ACCOUNT PROGRAMS
MANAGER HAVE BEEN APPROVED BY DIGITAL'S EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE AND BOARD
OF DIRECTORS AS VICE PRESIDENTIAL APPOINTED POSITIONS.
FOR SOMETIME WE HAVE RECOGNIZED AND EXPERIENCED THAT TO EFFECTIVELY
ACCESS AND CLOSE BUSINESS AT THE EXECUTIVE LEVEL, WE MUST HAVE
EXECUTIVE PEERS MAKING THOSE CUSTOMER CALLS. IN ESSENCE, VPs TALKING
WITH VPs. THIS IS ESPECIALLY TRUE AS WE DRIVE OUR END-USER BUSINESS
BEYOND OUR TRADITIONAL TECHNICALLY ORIENTED CUSTOMER BASE. THUS, THE
AREA SALES MANAGERS AND THE CORPORATE ACCOUNT PROGRAMS MANAGER, WITHOUT
A CHANGE IN RESPONSIBILITIES, ARE NOW V. P. TITLED POSITIONS,
EFFECTIVE JULY 21, 1986.
OUR TEN NEW VICE PRESIDENTS ARE:
FRANK BOWDEN SOUTH CENTRAL AREA SALES VICE PRESIDENT
HARRY EISENGREIN SOUTHERN AREA SALES VICE PRESIDENT
RON EISENHAUER CENTRAL AREA SALES VICE PRESIDENT
LARRY GOODWIN WESTERN AREA SALES VICE PRESIDENT
RON HEVEY NEW YORK AREA SALES VICE PRESIDENT
BOB LONG SOUTHWEST AREA SALES VICE PRESIDENT
BILL LYNCH CORPORATE ACCOUNT PROGRAMS SALES V. P.
MIKE MARSHALL NORTHEAST AREA SALES VICE PRESIDENT
CHUCK PICKLE EAST CENTRAL AREA SALES VICE PRESIDENT
RAY WOOD MID-ATLANTIC AREA SALES VICE PRESIDENT
THESE NEW SALES TITLES ARE A VALUABLE TOOL FOR WINNING AGAINST THE
COMPETITION. I ENCOURAGE ALL CORPORATE AND FIELD EMPLOYEES TO TAKE
FULL ADVANTAGE OF THIS RESOURCE.
|
| 152.16 | Only "OFFICERS" can sign contracts? | ATLANT::SCHMIDT | I Use VMS. My Cereal? Raw Bits! | Mon Jul 21 1986 17:09 | 27 |
| < Note 152.12 by PSW::WINALSKI "Paul S. Winalski" >
> I'm afraid you're wrong here. Only an officer of a
> corporation can execute a legally-binding contract on behalf
> of the corporation. For DEC to enter into a contract, that
> contract must be signed by the President, a Vice President,
> the Corporate Secretary, or the Corporate Treasurer.
Hmm. I thought that a lot of our paperwork represented "a
contract", far more than *any* number of Veeps could ever
sign. Here are some things I thought were contracts, and
which don't require individual sign-off by a VP:
o Field Service Contracts
o Field-Test Agreements
o MOFs (Master Order Forms)
o Software Licenses
o Software Services Contracts
o Quantity Discount Agreements
Maybe even:
o Employment offer letters
o UOFs (Unusual Order Forms)
o Purchase orders
Atlant
|
| 152.17 | what about me? | CYGNUS::OGRADY | George, ISWS 297-4183 | Wed Jul 23 1986 03:02 | 12 |
| re 14:
Obviously Chick reads this conference :-). Now, is he going
to give you any credit? I do think this group of VP's is a good
idea. VP's selling to VP's does work.
and...if there are so many VP title floating around can I expect
one in my next review? Let's see, vice-president of......
Oh, well, passed by again....
GOG
|
| 152.18 | IT REALLY REALLY WORKS!!! | CSTVAX::MCLURE | Vaxnote your way to ubiquity | Wed Jul 23 1986 05:12 | 15 |
| re: -1,
Sorry George, Starkist wants tunas with good taste...just kidding -
better luck next time around.
How many of you want to bet that my note had anything to do with
this recent announcement? If it did, that would mark a great day in
Vaxnotes history for providing DEC executives the information they
need to make those lightening-bolt decisions when they need to be made.
Whatever the case, I take back anything bad I ever might have
said about salesmen. Did you ever hear the one about the salesman
who...ooops, I mean programmer...
-DAV0
|
| 152.19 | POSITION NAMING: Adding versus Subtracting Titles | JAWS::AUSTIN | Tom Austin @UPO - Channels Marketing | Thu Jul 24 1986 04:04 | 62 |
| .17 provokes an interesting line of thought at this hour.
In Digital, we continue to create more and more job classifications.
Since I joined Digital 10 years ago in a field software services
position, I've seen a lot of new job titles/descriptions/codes get
created to properly reward and title people as they grew with the
company.
For example, in the 70's, I saw the positions of Principal Software
Specialist and Software Consultant created for field SWS folks.
I've seen many new marketing, sales and engineering positions created
since I came out of the field.
All of these new positions are additive (or most of them are, anyhow).
That is, they add additional titles and honors and so forth for
folks.
Another approach might be to create job titles where promotion removes
a limitation (versus job titles where promotion adds an honor).
Thus, someone might start out as a
JUNIOR ASSISTANT ADVISING ADJUTANT VICE PRESIDENT OF INDIRECT SALES
at their next promotion, if they deserved a promotion, one of these
titles might be dropped, making them an
ASSISTANT ADVISING ADJUTANT VICE PRESIDENT OF INDIRECT SALES
after demonstrating their outstanding ability in this position,
they might be promoted to be an
ASSISTANT ADVISING ADJUTANT VICE PRESIDENT OF SALES (!!!) or even
an
ADJUTANT ASSISTANT VICE PRESIDENT (which is one below an
ASSISTANT ADJUTANT VICE PRESIDENT....
you get the picture.
Actually, I think this is the way that many banks work, having 3
vice presidents for every clerk.
Inside Digital, fortunately, this will never happen. It's far more
important to reward people by honoring them than to reward them
by REMOVING A RESTRICTIVE TITLE.
Nonetheless, the analogy seemed appropriate given the lateness of
the hour...
;-)
Tom (Junior_Assistant_Pretending_Vice_President_Ex_Officio)
(Please don't misinterpret this humorous note. The folks ...area
sales managers... who've just been appointed to VP posts are
responsible for much larger sales budgets than many of the VP's
of sales at almost all of our competitors. The ones I know deserve
the honors they're receiving ... and will use their new titles to
help make sure we continue to grow and succeed. And I trust those
I don't know will make it a point to get to know me so I can similarly
compilment them! ;-) )
|
| 152.20 | | CYGNUS::OGRADY | George, ISWS 297-4183 | Thu Jul 24 1986 13:01 | 8 |
|
Tom,
I go by the same rule I've used since coming to dec, the he**
with the title, just give me the $$. If I get a raise then I'm
doing the job!
Well, time to get to work.....
|
| 152.21 | What's in a Name? | DAMSEL::MOHN | | Thu Jul 24 1986 19:36 | 9 |
| From the mile-long DECMail I just received I gather that the new
Sales VP's are "non-officer" Vice Presidents. Is this a
self-cancelling phrase. Perhaps our customers will create a series
of "non-officer" VP's for ours to call on so that their "real" VP's
aren't bothered. (Didn't the base note say that the PRESIDENT of
IBM called on the PRESIDENT of Standard Oil? That's an entirely
different kettle of fish, folks).
Bill
|
| 152.22 | | MILDEW::DEROSA | Obviously, a major malfunction. | Thu Jul 24 1986 23:01 | 16 |
| Some of the notes arguing in favor of all these VP slots have
unwittingly argued against themselves.
When someone says that they're the VP of a bank, you don't take them
seriously, do you? I'm willing to believe that there is an anecdotal
story about how President x called President y on the telephone and got
an order. So what? If a President can't bag an order, who can?
Also, I completely fail to understand how advocating better marketing
for DEC gets translated into handing out VP titles like cookies.
Sorry, but that's not marketing.
Only a real dunderhead would be impressed that he was being called on
by a VP, if the grapevine told him that the company had 1E+6 VPs.
Given how many rags discuss Digital goings-on, I still maintain that
this cheapens the title and won't fool anyone.
|
| 152.23 | | CYGNUS::OGRADY | George, ISWS 297-4183 | Fri Jul 25 1986 15:20 | 6 |
|
> Only a real dunderhead would be impressed that he was being called on
> by a VP
Doesn't this say it all. Ever hear of egos?
|
| 152.24 | Go get 'em! | CSTVAX::MCLURE | Vaxnote your way to ubiquity | Fri Jul 25 1986 17:13 | 30 |
| I need to get my story straight here before we go making any
assumptions about whether it was the actual President of IBM (unlikely),
or whether it was a VP, and if it was an IBM VP, then whether it was a
"non-officer" equivalent at IBM or a "true" VP, etc. If you'll note in
my original comment back aways that I wasn't real sure about the exact
level of the IBM contact, but that whoever it was had called on the
President of Standard Oil.
The reason I went ahead and entered the note anyway (even without
the exact title straight) was to point out the sales strategy employed
by IBM in winning sales (over Digital). Remember how Digital used to
sell mainly through word-of-mouth in the engineering community? Well,
unfortunately, word-of-mouth doesn't always hold water compared to the
word of Senior Corporate Officers (regardless of their titles), and now
that we are trying to break into more and more of the non-engineering
markets, we need to consider the sales tactics employed by big blue.
Remember also, IBM=Marketing and the sooner we realize this, the sooner
we will be able to compete with them at their own game (unless we can
rely on slipping VAXes in under the eyes of the corporate chiefs at
our customer companies by dealing direct with the engineers instead).
I suggest we continue to keep the respect of the engineering
community, but keep in mind that the engineers (like ourselves) are
typically only the pawns in most corporate structures, and unless we
are advocating some sort of a revolution in corporate structure, I
think we are going to be forced to play ball by the existing rules
and crown the title of VP's to our best salesmen so they don't have
to be snubbed by the VP's and P's that they will have to be calling on.
-davo
|
| 152.25 | Dunderheads are customers too | MMO01::PNELSON | Searching for Topeka | Fri Jul 25 1986 23:56 | 8 |
| > Only a real dunderhead would be impressed that he was being called on
> by a VP
Since when did we require a customer to pass an IQ test before we'd
take his money and sell him a computer? Dunderheads have money
too! (^;
(^: Positive Pat :^)
|
| 152.26 | VP's aren't necessarily officers | NY1MM::SWEENEY | Pat Sweeney | Sat Jul 26 1986 04:13 | 17 |
| A service agreement executed under standard terms and conditions may be
signed by an authorized Digital employee who is not an officer and binds
Digital since it was a standard contract pre-approved by Digital. That
goes for any non-negotiated contract as well.
An officer has the authority to sign [any] contracts that bind a
corporation. That's by definition: _that_ authority distinguishes
employees from officers.
If we have indeed promoted managers to vice presidents without the
authority to contractually bind Digital, that's strange. There's no
requirement for VP's to be officers, however it does show some lack of
good faith in having our non-officer VP's negotiate with customer
officer-VP's and then end the negotiating with "I'm a VP but I can't
sign a legally binding contract for Digital, I'll pass this up to my
boss's boss for a signature."
|
| 152.27 | Have any women broken the "old-boy" network? | PAUPER::EPSTEIN | Contradance; no contra support | Mon Jul 28 1986 21:31 | 6 |
| One question: Are there any *women* at the VP level in our
wonderful corporation? (I was reminded by the recent article
in DTW about the mother-daughter Consulting engineers (or was that
Senior Consulting, or Corporate Consulting, or...))
Bruce
|
| 152.28 | At least two women VPs | LSTARK::THOMPSON | Noter of the LoST ARK | Mon Jul 28 1986 21:56 | 5 |
| Ilein Jacobs (sp?) was promoted to VP not too long ago. Also
Roseanne Geadono (I know that one is spelled wrong) has been a
VP for a number of years.
Alfred
|
| 152.29 | | STAR::BECK | Paul Beck | Mon Jul 28 1986 23:10 | 4 |
| re .27
They're Senior Consulting Engineers. There are still no women in the
technical tree at Corporate Consulting or higher.
|
| 152.30 | very slow growth in VP's | OFFRT9::GHOM | | Tue Aug 05 1986 20:40 | 26 |
| >============================================================================
>Note 152.11 Senior Vice Presidents 11 of 29
>MILDEW::DEROSA "Obviously, a major malfunction." 13 lines 20-JUL-1986 13:04
> -< re: -1: wrong >-
>----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Your analysis doesn't hold water. The number of VPs are clearly
> growing at a far greater rate than is the company, no matter what
> metric (# employees, $ of sales, etc.) you wish to use.
>
I don't know how 152.11 calculated his numbers but the absolute number of
officers has been growing at a rate less than the sales growth rate. Based
on the annual reports, here are the actuals:
Sales
YEAR $B VP's and other officers
---- ----- ------------------------
fy85 6.686 39
fy84 5.584 38
fy83 4.271 29
fy82 3.880 35
fy81 3.198 37
|
| 152.31 | The answer came to me in the mail this week | NY1MM::SWEENEY | Pat Sweeney | Sat Oct 11 1986 03:02 | 10 |
| Mentioned in the Proxy Statement for FY1986 is that the Board of
Directors voted to let the President assign titles as he sees fit.
This explains, for one thing, that several new Vice Presidents are
_not_ officers of the corporation. As I pointed out earlier, it is
bizarre. It took a vote from the Board of Directors to elevate
these managers to "Vice President" without letting them also become
corporate officers (ie legally bind DEC in a contract). They are
not listed among the list of officers. The former area sales managers
are examples of such promotions.
|
| 152.32 | Officers and contracts? | DENTON::AMARTIN | Alan H. Martin | Sat Oct 11 1986 10:50 | 9 |
| Re .31:
Pat, could you clarify this twice-mentioned "only officers can bind
DEC in a contract" assertion with respect to the point raised in .16 that
many people would seem to be agents of the corporation, and many of them
have customers sign things like field service contracts without it
resulting in writer's cramp for the VPs? Must all unique contracts
be OKed by an officer before they can be used?
/AHM/THX
|
| 152.33 | | NY1MM::SWEENEY | Pat Sweeney | Sun Oct 12 1986 23:46 | 19 |
| re: 31
You are correct. In principle, authority to bind the corporation
in a contract originates not with the Board of Directors, not with
the Presidents, but with each individual officer.
Managers who sign contracts that are fill-in-the-blank forms do
so with the knowledge that the terms and conditions therein are
approved and that they are designated to sign that type of contract
by some sort of written policy that originates with an officer.
A contract-from-scratch _can_ be signed by an officer without further
approval, but in actual practice you can bet that there will be
review by all the managers, vice presidents, and legal counsel,
that the contract will possibly affect.
The "VP but not officer" thing is symbolic, but at that level in
the corporation symbols and appearances take on a life of their
own.
|