Conference 7.286::digital

        Nope, posted without permission.  Cheerfully removed from this
        conference should anyone convince me that it's bogus, or that
        K.O. wants it removed.
        
        Tom

FWIW, I got the same memo from my manager ("with forwarding information
removed to save resources").

				-- Bob

    
>            Nope, posted without permission.  Cheerfully removed from this
>        conference should anyone convince me that it's bogus, or that
>        K.O. wants it removed.
 
    The letter appeared in today's Vogon News, with the source identified
    as Livewire (April 26). I guess you were safe in assuming it was
    for real.
    
    Dick

        Re: .4
        
>    The letter appeared in today's Vogon News, with the source identified
>    as Livewire (April 26). I guess you were safe in assuming it was
>    for real.
        
        Unless, of course, Livewire picked up the letter from
        this conference.  :-)
        
        					B.J.

    Is this the first _OFFICIAL_ acknowledgement that a major staff
    re-organization is in the workings?  Rumors have been circulating
    around in the field that when FY90 arrives, we will be going through
    "musical chairs" in a big way.
    
    Any other offical confirmations would be helpful to stop the rumor
    mill from "mis-interpeting" what's really happening.
    
    Just Curious.
    Les

        You can always read almost anything you like into a K.O. letter.
        
        As for the rumors, they're not circulating just in the field.
        It is not uncommon for reorganizations to coincide with the
        beginning of the fiscal year.  In any case, the "rumor mill"
        interprets, or mis-interprets, anything at all, for the sake
        of having grist for the mill.
        
        Tom

    I won't be cynical about this, so this is out of step with most of the
    rest of DIGITAL and SOAPBOX...
    
    What do people read into in .0 that's anything but the usual herald of
    a reorganization to come?
    
    It seems that it's always "the right thing to do", that is to look into
    how any company is organized especially in a area as volatile as
    computers.
    
    As a matter of style, it suggests that Digital has reacted to
    something, and that you, the employee, should be prepared to react to
    some future announcement, but in the meantime, keep on the same course.

	This is the third or fourth time I've read the message in .0.
	I really don't understand what it means. It appears to be the
	usually 'motherhood' stuff that gets repeated year after year.
	IN my opinion one would have more luck finding DECs future reading
	tea leaves than KOs message. It doesn't say anything solid at all.

	Now I understand that there are (and have been?) a number of high
	level meetings for managers. Some 1100 are scheduled to meet in
	MRO with Jack Smith tomorrow for example. Perhaps something I
	can plan on will come out of that. I hope so.

				Alfred

    I too have heard *many* rumors of *many* reorgs that are going to
    happen starting in FY90.  It has come from so many different and
    unrelated sources that there must be something to it. (?)
    
    Besides, I personally know of at least 3 groups in the area who
    have not done a reorg in over 6 months!!!   :-)
    
    Jon

    I, for one, look forward to the constructive re-organisation of our
    company.
    
    Andy

re: < Note 793.9 by CVG::THOMPSON "Protect the guilty, punish the innocent" >

>	Now I understand that there are (and have been?) a number of high
>	level meetings for managers. Some 1100 are scheduled to meet in
>	MRO with Jack Smith tomorrow for example. Perhaps something I
>	can plan on will come out of that. I hope so.

    Alfred, could this refer to the "Jack Smith road trip series", such
    as the appearances he and Strecker and others will be making in ZK,
    once on next Tuesday to everyone except Bill Keating's people, and
    again in early June for Bill's organization? If so, one would expect
    nothing mind boggling to come of it, especially when you consider
    two separate presentations at the same site over a month apart.

    -Jack

    To: All HPS Employees       		 DATE: April 24, 1989
                                                 FROM: Ed Paterline
                                                 DEPT: HPS TRAINING
                                                 EXT.: 297-2126
                                                 LOC.: MRO1-2/E89
                                 
    
    SUBJECT: MEETING WITH JACK SMITH AND STAFF - APRIL 28TH
    
    
        
    
    
         Jack Smith and his staff are conducting a series of meetings with 
    all major MEM organizations concerning the state of the company and the 
    challenges which we face.  On April 28th from 3:00 - 5:00 a session for 
    HPS Managers, Supervisors and key technical leaders will be held in the 
    MRO-1 cafeteria.
    
    
    The agenda will include:
    
        -  a briefing by Jack Smith on the challenges facing engineering,
        -  a financial overview by George Chamberlain, and
        -  a review of product strategy by Bill Stecker.
    
    
    Attendance at the meeting has been limited to management and key 
    technical leaders because of the lack of adequate space to accomodate 
    all 1,100 HPS employees.  The information being presented is important 
    to everyone, and will be videotaped.   I have asked each manager on my 
    staff to share these videotapes with you by conducting communication 
    meetings with all HPS employees within two weeks.  These meetings will 
    be your opportunity to understand more about the business and product 
    strategies of Digital and the challenges and opportunities that lie 
    ahead.

    What is a single most common element of a DEC offices ?
    .
    .
    .
    .
    .
    .

    .
    .
    .
    .
    .
    .
    .
    .
    .
    	a moving box.

    	We reorganize and move all the time. I've decided to get involved
    only with every second one.

This went out in mid-April around ZK. Apparently the restricted audience at
MR today is due to space considerations only.

-Jack

---------------------------------------------------------------------------


TO:   ZKO Facility

FROM: Kurt Friedrich - ZKO Site Manager 

SUBJECT: Communication Session to be held on Monday, May 1st at ZKO    


I am quite pleased to announce that Jack Smith and some of his staff are
touring most large DEC sites to deliver some important messages and to
collect feedback from the troops.

They will be doing two presentations at Spit Brook, both in the cafeteria.
The first event will be held on Monday, May 1st from 9:00 to 11:00.  
This event is for all residents of Spit Brook EXCEPT for all groups who report 
to Bill Keating. The same presentors will return on June 7th from 9:00 to 11:00
to present to the groups in Spit Brook who DO work for Bill Keating, (including
all the ZK writers). 

The seating in the cafeteria will be extremely tight for both events, so I must
insist you only go to the session for which your group is scheduled, and 
non-Spit Brook residents are not invited. The sessions will be videotaped, 
so if you cannot attend on the day you are scheduled, you will have an 
opportunity to view the tape later.

The format is as follows:

	
	Company overview,               Jack Smith
        key messages and                Senior Vice President of MEM
        challenges for Engineering     
        
        Financial overview,             George Chamberlain
        implications for engineering    Vice President of MEM Finance
        investments 

        Engineering strategy and        Bill Strecker
        issues                          Vice President, Product Strategy
                                        and Architecture

        Questions and answers           All 


 
 These will be very interesting and informative sessions, I hope you can attend.

    We believe that within a few years, there will be fewer 
full-line computer manufacturers in the world.  We plan for 
Digital to be one of them.  

*****************************************************************

    Did anyone else have a funny time with the above in how
    to take it?  It seems like it is saying that Digital is
    planning on being one of the fewer full-line computer
    manufacturers in the world.

    Another thing that is funny about this letter is that it
    doesn't follow corporate guidelines for composition.  In
    other words, the paragraphs should NOT be indented.

    I, too, received this from my CC manager.  

    This note is an expample of proper structure of a memo.

    justme....jacqui

    Digital is planning on being a full-line computer manufacturer; the
    number of them will be smaller. Or, Digital is planning on being one of
    a smaller number of computer manufacturers.
    
    I didn't have any trouble with it. I think reading it any other way is
    pushing the [not the best] syntax beyond reasonable limits. 

    Why is it that the only memos from the top that appear to have a clear
    meaning are the ones announcing the really bad news (ie disappointing
    earnings, project cancellations, and freezes).
    
    When it comes to good or neutral news, we're left scratching our heads.

re: < Note 793.20 by CALL::SWEENEY "Urgency is not Crisis" >

>    When it comes to good or neutral news, we're left scratching our heads.

    Probably because the neutral ones are _expected_ to leave you scratching
    your head and the good ones are few and far between enough to appear to
    be neutral.  :^)

    -Jack

    Ken's letter was reproduced in the DTW Bulletin issued this past
    week, indentations and all!  The middle of the flyer explained
    the "All hands on DEC" program and urged participation.

    I guess the letter is "official".

    justme....jacqui

    p.s.  anyone volunteer to participate yet here?

>    p.s.  anyone volunteer to participate yet here?


    or, should I say, "anyone HERE volunteer to participate yet?"  8*)

    justme....jacqui

    RE: Indentations in memos. As far as I'm concerned KO can write
    his memos anyway he wants. :-) Even so, who is going to tell him
    otherwise?
    
    RE: All hands on DEC. There is a seperate topic about that around
    here somewhere. a DIR/TITLE=DEC should get it for you.
    
    		Alfred

    re:  -1

    I guess anyone of us with his "open door" policy could tell him
    about his margins!  8*)

    Thanks for the pointer Alfred.


    justme....jacqui

    >I guess anyone of us with his "open door" policy could tell
    >him about his margins
    
    I sort of wish someone would. He's probably unaware that he
    employs someone to develop policy on such critical matters.

It just goes to show you: RHIP.

Rank
Has
Its
Paragraphs

	In regards the the Jack Smith road show. I've got a copy of a
	widely forwarded memo summary of it. If anyone finds a clear
	message in it I'd be interested in hearing it. :-)

From:	HPSRAD::PIKE "CAROLYN: DTN 297-2072; MRO1-1/L26; POLE LM-27>; .....ONE STEP FORWARD AND TWO STEPS BACK.....  01-May-1989 1348"
  1-MAY-1989 13:47:37.37
To:	@STAFF-MRO,@STAFF-NIO
CC:	
Subj:	SUMMARY of Friday's HPS-Forum.....

From:	HPSRAD::COUGHLAN     "Tom Coughlan, DTN 297-5407"  1-MAY-1989 13:30
To:	PIKE
CC:	COUGHLAN
Subj:	This is a one-page summary of the meeting on Friday.  
	Please forward it to the distribution.  I'll have 
	background/details on this next Monday.


			FOR INTERNAL USE ONLY


The company is entering a period of major transition.  This transition is 
larger than any DEC has ever experienced -- because of the magnitude of each
required change and because so many changes are happening at the same time.

Transition implies change, and change can cause problems, but change can also 
be a significant opportunity, for the "fleet of foot".

Key Financial Issues:

- We have had high profit levels for the VAX machines.  RISC machines and 
industry standards are forcing us to lower these margins.

- DEC's rate of growth is slowing (13% this year).  Growth used to bail us 
out of price structure problems.  It won't in the future.

- Our networks, operating systems, and applications businesses are making 
money.  Our hardware business is loosing money (partly due to investments 
that haven't paid off yet, like AQUARIUS).

- DEC's revenue per employee is the lowest in our industry (this includes 
comparison against larger and smaller companies).  Productivity needs to be 
improved.

- The market environment requires that we be cost competitive.  We are not 
right now.

Financial Summary:

The magnitude of this transition is unprecedented because:

- Productivity must be improved across the company, not just certain areas, as 
has been the case in the past.

- High-level shifts in investment are required, not the less-visible 
adjustments of the past.

- Programs are needed to deal with excess resources which are in the indirect 
labor pool, (the midrange of our salary range).  In the past excesses have
been in the direct labor (manufacturing) pool.

Product Strategy Summary: 

1. Desk-top to database.  Two operating systems: VMS and ULTRIX.
2. OSI
3. Distributed Systems
4. Application systems - focused solutions to solve the customer's problem.

Opportunities:

	- We can be the prime alternative to IBM.
	- We can compete effectively with SUN.
	- We can the be the leader in distributed computing and information 
	  systems.

The keys to managing this transition:

1. Get everyone involved.  Talk about the need for change, for improved 
productivity, and for people to be involved.  The best solutions come from 
the people who are doing the work.  Encourage people to push to make the
system more efficient.  Let people know that everything is up for grabs now.  
If they tried an idea unsuccessfully in the past they may get a different 
response this time.  

2. Listen.  Be open to suggestions.  This is the key to encouraging
creativity.

3. Act.

	"The going is getting tough, so the tough BETTER get going!"

    Tomorrow: the final frontier...
    
    These are the continuing voyages of the corporation DIGITAL...
    
    Our ongoing mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new
    life forms and to sell computers to them. To boldly sell where no
    DECcie has gone before.
    
    :-)

I think the summary posted by Alfred in .28 is a very good critique of what
was also said at ZK on Monday. My congratulations to the author for the
excellent job of note taking. I would strongly suggest that any employees
who do not have the opportunity to attend one of these "Communications
Sessions" at least take the time to review one or more of them on video
tape, as I understand they will all be available through the library
system. You may hear some _very_ interesting statements.

-Jack

    From what I've heard the Q&A session at the end was not taped in
    MRO.  Did they tape the Q&A at ZK?

       
       
       	Yes, the talk at ZK was taped... (had a camera and lots of A/V
       	equipment..)  I found the talk interesting and very enlightening.
       	Especially the comments about how long it takes in DEC to get
       	rid of a total non-performer.. Jack then told a story about how
       	he said something and then was "attacked" by 1400 Personnel
       	people to which he said "Maybe there is another place to look
       	for deadwood" or something very similar to that..  The applause
       	was deafening.. :-)
       
       	I really enjoyed the talk.
       
       							mike

    The talks (and Q&A) were interesting, but what I gathered from them was
    that management isn't kidding when they say they're not sure what
    they're going to do next.  There was the usual annual bunch of problems
    (competing on two fronts, need for massive restructuring, lack of
    planning, lousy cost/payback ratio), but no solutions offered.
    
    One of the Qs asked how we were going to reconcile the usually
    contradictory goals of "change direction" and "cut costs", and the
    answer was more or less "You tell us".
    
    I hope you all have your thinking caps on.
    
    (I liked the new euphemism for "layoff" - train someone for a more
    suitable position outside the company!  They should just call it an
    "external transfer".)
    
    Ray

        Interestingly enough, a copy of reply .28, with the headings
        removed, is being circulated in some quarters of the company
        as a letter from Ken Olsen to employees (which, while the title
        of the topic, is NOT an accurate description of the memo posted
        in reply .28).
        
        If you receive this, please send a copy of the ENTIRE text
        of reply .28 back to the people who sent it to you, explaining
        that what they sent you is a BOGUS, WRONG, FALSE, LYING rumor,
        not a letter from Ken Olsen.
        
        Thanks!
        
        Tom

    Thank you, whoever you are, for removing the headers, I wouldn't want
    the employees of the corporation thinking that I had some influence or
    even clairvoiance with respect to what Ken Olsen would write in a
    letter to employees.
    
    Tom, I think I'd prefer "RE: Road show - I think this supports Pat's
    theory" _not_ to be included in the clarification message.

    re .34
    
    >that management isn't kidding when they say they're not sure what
    >they're going to do next.  There was the usual annual bunch of problems
    
    >planning, lousy cost/payback ratio), but no solutions offered.
    
    >answer was more or less "You tell us".
    
    <set mode=flame>
    
    WHAT IS WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE?
    
    Were these "management" as in "head of"... and "country..." and "vice
    president of"...  as in go out on the street and buy someone that costs
    at least a quarter of a million per year or so?  And what would you do
    with them?  YOU'D HAVE THEM PLAN THE DIRECTION TO GO!!!!!!  You sure as
    hell don't need someone that expensive to answer letters from phychotic
    customers.  
    
    And if these people that are supposed to be plotting the fate of this
    company haven't the foggiest idea what to do, and have to ask a bunch
    of grunts, then...?  Deadwood, heal thyself!

    Omnipotence is not an attribute I'd associate with DEC VP's. ..or any
    other companys VPs either. Ours may just be more honest. We do have a
    general idea about directions and have had for some time, but the
    translation from ideas to reality to sometimes hard. 
    
    Be patient but continue constructive criticism: work in progress.
    
    - Andy

	This is a synopsis of what I think I heard at Monday's 
	presentation of the internal corporate road show here at 
	Spit Brook Road.

	The format was as follows:
	
	Company overview,               Jack Smith
        key messages and                Senior Vice President of M/E/M
        challenges for Engineering     
        
        Financial overview,             George Chamberlain 
        implications for engineering    Vice President of M/E/M Finance
        investments 

        Engineering strategy and        Bill Strecker
        issues                          Vice President, Product Strategy
                                        and Architecture

        Questions and answers           All 


	There were no blinding revelations made nor any dramatic new
	initiatives announced.  In fact the occasion was relatively
	light-hearted, though clearly serious.

	Smith made very frequent use of the terms 'change' and 
	'transition' but left it largely to others to specify 'what
	was changing' and 'to what or whence Digital is now in transit'.
	He pointed out that Digital has been through a lot of change
	and some major changes in its history, but insisted that this
	time it was larger and more sweeping than any in the past.
	Since he has been with the company for nearly 20 years, he 
	might have made some direct comparisons with the elimination 
	of the Product Lines in the early 80's and how this 'transition' 
	is expected to refocus or reshape the corporate way of doing 
	business.  The overall sense I got of this presentation was that 
	there is not yet an adequate understanding of what specific 
	changes need to be / will be made to permit specific actions or 
	recommendations to be made.  Smith said "everything is up for 
	grabs" and they're looking for suggestions and participation
	from everyone.

	The financial presentation by George Chamberlain was very rapid 
	and not particularly clear or meaningful to me.  The gist of what 
	I understood was the same message that Osterhoff was delivering 
	at least three years ago.  Our revenue per employee is the lowest 
	among our competitors.  We must increase productivity and decrease 
	costs.  The PBUs must act as the 'integrators' of available 
	technology and resources with customer requirements and market 
	considerations for selection and implementation of 'affordable' 
	(to the corporation) product development efforts.  As 
	time-to-market drops to the vicinity of 18 months, the difference 
	in delivery time between profitability and wasted investment 
	becomes less than six months.  

	There were a few of the financial graphs that I think I 
	understood.  One showed annual corporate growth over the past 
	twenty (or so) years.  The points plotted were very erratic but 
	the trend line plotted was approaching an asymptote of 15% per 
	year, down from rates more than twice as high in the past.
	This is probably simply a reflection of our corporate size.
	I believe 15% is still higher than IBM but certainly much lower
	than Sun or Apple.  

	Another pair of plots showed the relationship between income 
	growth and expenses for Digital and Hewlett-Packard.  Over the 
	past decade our expenses grew considerably faster than our income 
	every year except during the phenomenal success of '86 and '87.  
	HP, on the other hand, held their growth of expenses very close 
	to and usually below their growth of income.  There were no 
	comments on the necessary time delay between investment and 
	the realization of return on that investment, but it was clear 
	that the past practice at DEC could not be sustained as a matter 
	of course.  Chamberlain boiled it all down to needing to plan 
	within a 9% limit on annual growth of expenses to maintain 
	profitability.  His terminology was "Plan Conservatively.  
	Scramble Up When Profitability is Up". 

	The financial data presented on software products seemed to 
	suggest that only one area (Office Systems) was not in a clearly 
	profitable position for the fiscal years of '87, '88 and '89.  
	At one point I believe software was presented as representing 
	140% of corporate profitability for 1989, the current fiscal 
	year.  If this is true it says something very surprizing about
	the profitability of our hardware products.

	Strecker started off by pointing out that our past engineering 
	development focus on a few key strategic points (VAX, VMS and
	DECnet) had led to broad success for the corporation.  The 
	present context is different from the past in technology,
	customer requirements, and competition.  The new technology 
	factors are microprocessors, industry standards, user interfacing, 
	and distributed processing.  The new customer requirements are
	for system solutions and multi-vendor integration.  Our 
	competition today is IBM and small innovative startups like Sun
	rather than other minicomputer vendors.  This presents us with 
	new opportunities to focus on, i.e. providing:
	 - the alternative to IBM for enterprise-wide systems
	 - competitive workstation products, and
	 - distributed solution systems integrating available
	   components from multiple vendors

	He discussed six technology areas including desk-top systems,
	operating systems, client-server distributed systems, data
	management systems, another I've forgotten, and what he
	called "Systems Engineering / Applications Platforms".
	In this last area we need to focus on the requirements of 
	specific market areas and provide:
	 - suites of applications which work together to satisfy 
	   those requirements, many from 3rd parties
	 - recommended hardware configurations for supporting these
	   applications suites, and
	 - characterization of the performance for these applications 
	   on these platforms.

	Strecker made no direct pitch for 'architectures' although
	this terminology was used in naming various components on a
	number of his slides.  This has been the method in the recent
	past for maintaining corporate focus by specifying a clear
	framework within which product development must occur.  He
	seems to accept adherence to and participation in development
	of industry standards as the alternative to proprietary
	'architectures' in the future.  His most quotable line was 
	"If a standard exists use it; if not, invent it."

	The question and answer period was cordial.  While some questions
	were only responded to but not directly answered, others provided 
	elaboration on some of Smith's general comments.  At one point
	Smith said, "there's definitely too many people in the company
	at this time but it's not yet understood where these people are
	and how many of them there are."  He said "it's not enough to 
	identify them by class, we have to identify them by name."  At
	another point he said that there's no plan to implement an
	early retirement program because our workforce is too young for
	it to be very cost effective.  We also do not plan any 'traditional
	layoffs', i.e. pink slip on Friday, unemployment office on Monday.
	He did say that once excess staffing was identified, programs would
	be put in place it to 'incent' those people to re-skill themselves
	and relocate elsewhere in the company or the industry.  In response 
	to a question on whether we would have another wage freeze, he said 
	"there's no decision yet on the salary plan."

	With regard to corporate reorganization, Smith said that 
	discussions were underway at the corporate level relative to 
	structure.  Digital is now a "$14B monolith", the largest 
	functionally structured company in the world.  I take this to
	mean that it is only a matter of time (and probably not very 
	long) before some form of divisional structure will be introduced.

	Only one question caught Smith completely guard.  One employee
	asked "How many parents will Digital have to lose before on-site
	day-care will be provided?"  Smith's response was that he thought
	that we already provided that.  Kurt Friedrich, ZKO Site Manager 
	and host for this presentation, explained to Jack that we only 
	provide lists of child-care services available in the local area
	for parents to make their own independent arrangements.

    Just an aside...How do we compare with the rest of the industry
    with respect to numbers of upper level managers? I'm particularly
    curious as to our ranking concerning number of vice
    presidents,sometimes it seems like we've got a million.

    re VP's - just 92...

Re: .41  "92"

That's not so bad; the "world's most exclusive club" has 100...

				-- Bob

    this summary of the road show brings out a few more points that
    i don't think have been brought out yet...
    
    (reproduced with permission).

From:	3D::STAR::DIPIRRO "01-May-1989 1630"  1-MAY-1989 17:04
To:	3D::SWGROUP
Subj:	Quick update on the Jack Smith meeting

	This morning, from 9-11, I attended a meeting with most of VMS and
many other groups in ZK. The meeting was held by Kurt Friedrich (SSG/VMS
manager), Jack Smith (Sr. VP engineering), Bill Strecker (STF chair), and
George (?) Chamberlain (corporate finance). Each gave a short presentation
and then accepted questions from the floor. The presentations dealt with
the financial picture, corporate philosophy/direction, product strategy,
and the computer industry in general. The message from all these people
can be summed up in a few bullet items:

o We will be making some major changes in how we do business (building products,
  selling them, etc.).
o We have too many people and improper skill distributions.
o We have to get more in line with industry standards and focus less on
  proprietary systems.
o As we move more into the open market, we must pay more attention to time-to-
  market, costs, competitive performance metrics, etc.
o We'll be addressing "enterprise-wide solutions" for customers and doing less
  component products.
o We'll be doing more software and less hardware engineering.
o We must increase our productivity per person to be more in line with our
  competitors.

	And more of the same...Basically, we'll be trying to operate as a
lean and mean company now...Slow growth..the usual hiring "freezes" and
putting a lot of attention on budgets, eliminating duplicate efforts, etc.
We're sort of familiar with this in LES and workstations, but it's a little
new for VMS to be slapped in the face with reality.
	Harry Hersh opened the question and answer period with one of his
typical irrational, incomprehensible questions. Most of the questions dealt
with issues such as layoffs, wage freezes, retraining of employees, new
processes (or lack thereof) to solve our product development problems. They
weren't very definitive in their answers except in a few areas: no early
retirement program is being considered (but Jack Smith said that Ken might
be considering one for his senior managers). They wouldn't use the term
"layoff" at all, but Jack Smith must have used the term "transition" 100
times at least. They also said the phase review process is receiving an
overhaul and that we can expect more programs like "All hands on DEC" to
bring all resources to bear on certain problems. They did say we have too
many engineers, finance people, marketing people, manufacturing people, and
personnel people. However, they don't believe the "cost" problems are in
engineering as long as schedules are close to projected schedules. Most of
the cost problems are in manufacturing and the many layers of processes
required to gets products out the door. Jack blamed high-level stupidity
for projecting our growth rate to continue as it did in our "banner year of
1987," causing us to grow inappropriately, forcast incorrectly, and put
processes in place which soon became a burden. However, they believe all
the problems can be fixed and that DEC can again be where it was in a year
or so (he kept saying 1992).
	Jack Smith was in rare form, making frequent jokes about high level
management, the company, Bill Strecker, and himself. It was pretty strange,
but it WAS funny. Jack even told a joke I thought was funny:

	This farmer and his new wife are riding along on their horse-cart
when, all of a sudden, the horse stops. So the farmer gets out of the cart,
grabs a 2x4, and smashes the horse over the head, saying, "That's one." The
horse started walking again and after a while stopped again. The farmer gets
out, grabs the 2x4 and whacks the horse again saying, "That's two." After
going along a while longer, the horse stops a third time. The farmer gets
out, grabs his gun and shoots the horse in the head saying, "That's three."
Upon seeing this, the wife says, "I can't believe you just did that! You
just killed a valuable and beautiful animal." And the farmer said,
"That's one."

	Anyway, Jack also said he plans to make the rounds in the company
talking to the different groups...except east coast workstations of course.
He wants to make these regular meetings and wants input from the corporate
population on how to solve some of these problems. He said that we have
too many middle managers at this company, and if any of them come down on
employees who provide suggestions to higher level managers, they're gone.
He also said he's been shouting at personnel lately about the time/effort to
get rid of nonproducers in this company and that he'd like to see it take
less time and have us get sued more.
	That's all I can think of off the top of my head. If you have
specific questions, I'll try to remember and answer. If you get the opportunity
to go to one of these wherever they're held, I'd encourage you to go. It was
interesting, informative, and funny.

/sdd

Re: .43, the "farmer and his new wife" joke.

        Maybe I'm dense or maybe I would have had to heard the
        joke in context, but what does this little story mean in
        relation to the bullets that were outlined in your same
        note?
        
        I'm not looking for some kind of deep meaning here but
        there must have been a reason for telling somthing like
        this in a meeting...
        
        Lee
        

    Re the farmer joke:

    That's funny?  It makes light of cruelty to animals and violence against
    women.  Does valuing differences not apply to VP's?

re: .47

A friend of mine in Europe pointed out how touchy we seem to be getting here 
in the U.S.  I guess .47 is an indicator of that.  C'mon I didn't see anything
offensive in the joke.

David

    To me, the joke is aimed at certain types of intolerance that
    have developed within the company.  It has become all too common
    to encounter managers who react harshly to anyone who trys to
    portray things realistically, rather than politically ...
    Disagreeing with the boss used to mean that you better have your
    facts straight, but if you did, you were treated with respect.
   
    I'm glad to see that top management is aware of the problem.
    
    Geoff

    re .49
    
    Underline "Used to mean"
    
    

        The joke is an old joke, and in my opinion, does have problems
        about sensitivity and "valuing differences", but who am I to
        judge?  I wonder whether everyone in the audience laughed.. 
        
        Tom

    The "joke" is more of a parable: think about what the farmer
    accomplished at the sacrifice of one horse.
    
    	RMM

    This may seem like too obvious a question to ask.
    
    Since the motives for creating speculation about "changes...big
    changes" among employees seems to be a most deliberate management
    strategy for employee relations,
    
    Can anyone speculate what's the motivation for getting 125,000 people
    confused about these ambiguous discussions.  The role of top management
    is to reduce ambiguity so that employees have a sense of where the
    company is being led.
    
    Maybe I'm the only one who sees ambiguity...
    Maybe I'm the only one who is consequently confused...
    
    This isn't floating a trial balloon, this is getting everyone to stare
    at the empty sky

        If you think of the sky as "clear" rather than "empty", you
        might feel better.  At least that way, something would be clear.
        
        I often ask others in my group what we're really trying to
        accomplish, and I rarely get clear answers.  But, once in a
        while, I get them.  I'm probably lucky, in that my manager
        really does believe in doing the right thing, both for us and
        for our customers, and that the best way to work is that each
        day we try to make it easier for our customers to do business
        with us.  I wish everyone in the company had as clear and simple
        a vision.  I wish that such a clear and simple vision were
        clearly communicated to everyone, and that everyone not only
        embraced it in their hearts, but lived it.
        
        Tom

    A lot of the communication that's been coming out lately seems to be
    plowing the field for the planting that's to come.  Seems to me that
    it's better to plow then plant rather than plant then plow.
    
    Marge

    The plows's in the barn, the farm hands are sitting on the fence, and
    I can just barely make it out on the horizon...
    
    It's a twister...
    
    It's a twister...
    
    Auntie Em...
    
    Auntie Em...

    The "Wizard of Oz" analogies of the last few notes seem very
    appropriate. 

    < Note 793.57 by EAGLE1::EGGERS "Anybody can fly with an engine." >
>    The "Wizard of Oz" analogies of the last few notes seem very
>    appropriate. 

     "Ignore the little man behind the terminal !"

    Ploughing/plowing is generally followed by extensive manure spreading..
    
    Mike Day
    

    not sow.

        
    Sooooooo....Has anyone heard anything more on this
    impending tornado?
    
    I have seen a few of these "state of the company" memos 
    like the ones in the previous replies floating around 
    that indicate SERIOUS business.
    
    I can tell you that rumors are rampant here. 
    Does ANYBODY really know what the heck is going on?
    
    Mark

    I know what my manager told his 31 direct reports on a con call
    last week.  And I know what I'm hearing, which in no way conflicts
    what he said but in many cases provides more detail.
    
    What I heard on the con call was basically what's been discussed
    elsewhere in this conference as rumor:  massive reorg, doing away
    to a large extent with geographic boundaries, aligning by industry,
    creation of DCC's in the U.S., "sweeping changes in metrics" (whatever
    that means), and regarding the announcement itself, that we'll be
    hearing it very soon.
    
    Rumor I heard last week is that they were all ready to make the
    big announcement(s) last Tuesday and someone in Senior Management
    yanked it back to rework some details.  So now it'll be a couple
    more weeks before we get to find out what's happening.
    
    							Pat

    Tom Coughlan's notes (?) from the meeting of several weeks ago (793.28)
    has made it to me through official channels under the "original" byline
    of Bill Bowen (?) under five subject headings of "Jack Smith's comments".
    Sure enough there is no clear labeling of them as one attendees notes.
    
    Is this the route to electronic immortality at Digital?  To take notes
    at a meeting, share them and then have thousands read them as if they
    were an official transcript.
    
    They don't even have a word that describes this form of business
    communication yet.

        RE: .63 --
        
>    They don't even have a word that describes this form of business
>    communication yet.
        
        Sure they do.  "Rumor", or, to be more precise, "unsubstantiated
        rumor".
        
        Interestingly, when I posted the topic note, I didn't know that it
        had appeared on the VTX LiveWire infobase (which is maintained by
        the Corporate Employee Communications group in CFO).  It arrived
        in MAIL from a usually reliable source, but it had none of the
        usual MAIL headers that appear on memos that originate in K.O.'s
        office.  To give a sense of how SLOWLY things move through what I
        think of as "official channels", I recently received yet another
        copy by MAIL.  Judging by the headers, it originated with someone
        in the BTO (Burlington, VT) facility on 24-APR-1989.  From there,
        it made it into the SASE organization in Tewksbury, MA on 25-Apr,
        and by early evening on 26-Apr-1989 had found its way to the LDP
        organization in Marlboro, MA.  I can't tell how many hands it may
        have passed through between SASE and LDP, because the intervening
        headers were deleted.  From there, it made it to the U.S. Field
        Human Resource Development organization on the morning of 28-Apr,
        through a gentleperson in PKO (Maynard, MA), and back to Marlboro
        through the U.S. Sales Personnel organization on 4-May-1989.
        
        By 9-May-1989, it had reached the office of the VP of my group,
        and was forwarded onward (from Marlboro, again) at about noon. At
        this point, it had been through at least 5 "hands", and I can't
        help but wonder whether any of them checked with K.O.'s office to
        see if it was authentic.  In any case, by 11-May it had found its
        way to my group manager (in Merrimack, NH), who sent it to his
        direct reports in the early afternoon.  It had reached my cost
        center manager (back in Marlboro, MA) by the next morning, and he
        forwarded it to my supervisor at about 9:30 on 12-May.  In a case
        of time travel, my supervisor forwarded it to me at 9:12 the same
        morning! 
        
        So, it only took three weeks (15 business days) for this to reach
        me through "official channels".  While some of this can probably
        be attributed to delays in passing mail from node to node via MTS,
        much of it appears to be due to "reaction time" on the part of
        people in the loop. 
        
        I can't help but wonder how long it would take for news of a major
        reorganization to reach the troops.. 
        
        Tom

    In the absense of definitive information, of *course* rumors take
    control. Both nature and employees abhor a vacuum.
                                                         
    We're talking about peoples' *lives* here.
    
    KBS