Conference 7.286::digital

    The best place to go on a sinking ship is the life raft.
    
    
    

    
    
    Morale?  What's morale?
    
       GJD

    My lack of energy (most of which is used up trying to survive
    disfunctional Digital management) won't permit me to go down any
    coherent (or incoherent, I'm not fussy) discussions as to morale
    (actually, lack of positive) in this company in general, but, I'll
    point out the obvious, just in case anyone who cares, and can do
    anything about it actually reads this conference, that lack of positive
    morale among the employees of ANY company translates to the bottom
    line, and eventually, to a messy and untimely demise.  Demoralized
    employees will do the bare minimum required to perform their jobs, and
    no more, and eventually expend their energies on getting out.
    
    Ruling by fiat, intimidation, etc., if one is a student of history,
    never work, very well, for very long.  In our century, look at the
    short period of influence the Soviet Communists enjoyed, slightly over
    1/2 century...  and we were here to witness it's explosive demise.
    Won't belabour the point, 'nuff said.
    
    This is where the kind, unshaven, with his arms bound behind his back,
    is led into the courtyard, and beheaded, thinking all the while:  "Oh,
    dear" and "Maybe the people have a point".
    
    Let them eat cake!
    
    /m
    
    (No, NOT Marie Antoinette!) 

    PKO-3 is like a mausoleum.
    
    Rumors have it that MCS training is cancelling many, many courses, and
    that DLS training is flat-out LEAVING... to take up residency at the
    Heartbreak Hotel.  
    
    Several other facilities in DLS have done this (most recently ALF moved
    out to the Windham Hotel in Atlanta...a refurbished Holiday Inn) and
    the hotels do this to pick up the extra traffic our customers bring in.
    
    I imagine there is some penalty Digital must pay the hotels if we don't
    provide enuf in the way of increased occupancy.
    
    Is what is good for DLS also good for Digital?
    
    t

... brings back fond memories... I was in training in PKO2 the last week
it was held there (before moving to BUO).

Sigh.

Lee (veteran of Rosie's)

    I just received the following via E-mail.  It was sent by someone in
    Field Service, forwarded to a ton of folk by someone in Human Resorces,
    then passed down from my manager.  This should cure everyone's problem:
    
    
                      A POSITIVE ATTITUDE CREATES POSITIVE RESULTS
    
                                      ATTITUDE
    
    The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on
    life.  Attitude, to me, is more important than facts.
    
    It is more important than the past, than education, than money,
    than circumstances, than failures, than successes, than what
    other people think or say or do.  It is more important than
    appearance, giftedness or skill.  It will make or break a
    company...a church...a home.
    
    The remarkable thing is we have a choice every day regarding the
    attitude we will embrance for that day.  We cannot change our past...
    we cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We
    cannot change the inevitable.  The only thing we can do is play on the
    one string that we have, and that is our attitude...
    
    I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% how I react
    to it.  And so it is with you...we are in charge of our Attitudes.
    
                                -Charles Swindoll-
    
    
    
                 ATTITUDES ARE CONTAGIOUS...IS YOURS WORTH CATCHING?
    
                   A NEW ATTITUDE INVARIABLY CREATES A NEW RESULT.
    
                ATTITUDE...A LITTLE THING THAT MAKES A BIG DIFFERENCE.
    
                               ATTITUDE IS EVERYTHING

    
    
    Re .6:
    
    	That sounds great!  I just hope I remember it when I get booted
    out, and loose everything I worked for, and when I have no food to 
    feed my kids.  Attitude, it sounds great.
    
    Jim Morton

Don't worry.  Be happy.  Read worn-out platitudes.  Embrace Hallmark card
philosophies.

Morale is now, apparently:

 The uncanny ability to be blissfully ignorant, 
unaware and untroubled by injustice, by corporate entropy, 
by incompetence, and a general
lack of trustworthiness on the part of one's coworkers.

Others who are less kind might refer to it as _denying reality_.


I'm sure it is only our 'perception' that stock prices are low
and customers aren't buying our products.
 

Yeah, that's it.


R

    re: .6 & following
    
    Note that Chuck Swindoll's words are aimed at the individual.  They are
    meant to inspire one to do one's best.
    
    However, the attempt to bludgeon the masses with the message is one of
    the problems Digital has today.  Yes, you can control your attitudes.  Yes,
    it affects your results.  But when people start to say "this company
    has problems because of YOUR attitude -- YOU'RE at fault!", it is
    attempting to say that the company has no problems -- there is no
    reason for your discontent except for your attitude.
    
    Swindoll's words are for those who wish to take them to heart, not for
    one group of people to beat another group into submission.
    
    -- Russ

    
    
    Russ, RIGHT ON!
    
    Jim Morton

    I think we hit rock bottom in Q1. Since that time however I have felt
    that things are improving. I believe that after a looooong struggle
    our customers are starting to see our new products in a positive
    light. Our Alpha boxes are great! We are competitive for the first
    time since the introduction of the DS5000 3 years ago. Our network
    products are being revamped and our competitive too. I knew things
    were really changing for the better in this company when I attended
    the Network Training Academy 3 weeks ago. There, the Polycenter
    Netview product was introduced. For the first time I saw a good
    product developed on a UNIX platform first, not VMS! What a 
    refreshing change. 
    
    I think we all would have liked to seen the company change
    faster but it took 30 years to get where we were when Bob
    Palmer assumed control. We were too fat and lazy and not listening
    to the customer before Bob. I don't believe thats the case anymore
    although there will always be room for improvement. 
    
    I think that having 2 profitable quarters back to back would
    make most of us happier then we have been in years. 
    
    			-Jim-

>For the first time I saw a good
>product developed on a UNIX platform first, not VMS! What a 
>refreshing change. 
    
    	This is exactly what customers said to me a couple of years ago
    when I was doing non-disclosure presentations on DECdas.

Taken from the VOGON News Service

 Nynex, Ameritech - Said to choose Digital to supply video-server systems
	{The Wall Street Journal, 25-Feb-94, p. B8}
	[This is the entire article - TT]
   Unfazed by the collapse of the Bell Atlantic Corp.-Tele-Communications Inc.
 acquisition agreement, other Bell companies are pushing ahead with plans to
 build parts of the information superhighway on their own.
   Industry insiders said yesterday that two more regional telephone companies,
 Nynex Corp. and Ameritech Corp., have picked a supplier for video-server
 equipment - the systems that will digitize, store and distribute movies and
 other interactive fare over telephone lines.  The surprise winner is dark
 horse Digital Equipment Corp., which had one only one other video-server
 contract, with U S West Inc.
   Nynex is expected to announce new plans soon for a test of video-on-demand
 services in New York, Portland, Maine, and eastern Massachusetts, pending
 regulatory approvals.  Digital's role will be to provide the computer and
 data-storage systems for the trials.
   Digital also has won a video-server contract with Ameritech, the
 Chicago-based Baby Bell, people close to the discussions say.  Digital has
 apparently displaced IBM, which was expected to win the order.
   Digital and U S West, the Colorado-based Bell company, are proceeding with a
 video-on-demand trial beginning this spring in Omaha, Neb.  In California,
 Pacific Telesis Corp. has teamed up with Hewlett-Packard Co. for video
 servers.  The company said it plans for a high-capacity interactive network
 are unaffected by the Bell Atlantic-TCI breakup.  Nynex and Ameritech echoed
 that settlement.

   Potential $5.1 billion market
   The seven Bells are among the largest potential buyers of video servers, as
 each upgrades its network to handle interactive video programming.  Hardware
 and software companies are scrambling for a piece of this emerging market,
 though estimates of its size vary widely: Dataquest Inc., a market researcher,
 says it could grow to as much as $5.1 billion in three years.
   Those in the fray include IBM, AT&T, Hewlett-Packard, Oracle, and Silicon
 Graphics.
   A Digital spokesman wouldn't comment on pending contracts.  Nynex confirmed
 that Digital has won server contracts but wouldn't detail the New York,
 Massachusetts and Maine video-service rollouts.  An Ameritech spokesman would
 say only that "we're in the final stages of negotiation.  We expect to make an
 announcement in the near future."
   The Ameritech spokesman added, however, that a trial of video-server
 technology running on an IBM mainframe, which began in late 1992 and was
 widely reported, "has concluded."  He wouldn't discuss the test's results,
 calling it "a learning experience."  In Armonk, N.Y., an IBM spokesman
 declined to comment.

   A boost for Digital's Alpha

  The new business is a boost for Digital and its new product line built
 around the high-speed Alpha computer chip, which Digital says is uniquely
 suited to the rapid compression and transmission of large amounts of data
 required in video servers.  But Barry F. Willman, an analyst at Goldman Sachs
                       VNS COMPUTER NEWS                       

 & Co., said that the likely contracts "will have little near-term impact on
 the company's financial picture.  It's an important benefit for the long term,
 but restoring profitability is more important right now."
   Digital, struggling with a wrenching transition to the new Alpha product
 lines, reported a $72 million loss, or 53 cents a share, on revenue of $3.25
 billion in the fiscal second quarter ended Jan. 1.
   Joe deMauro, a Nynex product developer, said the company picked Digital for
 its initial trials on the strength of its scalable design and the "very
 attractive" way it handles storage of video data.
   "You can start small and grow as large as you need, as your requirements
 grow," he says.  The system also has a tiered storage architecture that
 allows the most popular movies to be held in instantly accessible memory,
 less-popular movies to be stored on hard-disk arrays and a larger library of
 films in a tape library.

>    	This is exactly what customers said to me a couple of years ago
>    when I was doing non-disclosure presentations on DECdas.

What, you're not going to bring up what happened to DECdas, Brian?!? ;-) :-)

...petri

    Couldn't resist it, because it *is* exactly what some of them said to
    me.  ;-)

    
    
    
    re .1
    
    you were at TRAINING? (that in itself is something to get excited
    about!!)
    
    re .6
    
    I've tried that great attitude stuff on customers when they asked me
    why we have no training on the products we support. I Like to tell em
    that we don't NEED no stinking training, cause our good attitudes
    should be plenty....and maybe if THEIR attitude was a little better,
    they wouldn't get so snippy about the BIG$$$ they're paying us to provide
    'shot in the dark' support to them...
    
    Morale problems? No morale problems here.....

Re: .12

The tone of your reply is that morale is shaped by product
success/failure. Maybe in some parts of the company that is true, but
where I am at it is shaped by the following:

        1) The perpetual looming spectre of layoffs

        2) Seemingly mindless business decisions and the
           'reorg du jour' style of operation

        3) Treatment of employees that differs markedly from
           stated policy as well as commonly accepted standards of common
           sense and decency

        4) Lack of clear goals, direction and focus

There are a few others, I will post/elaborate as I find time.

Lee

Maybe we need to ask ourselves this:

1.	Will our sales/profits improve when our attitudes improve.

		or

2.	Will our attitudes change when sales/profits improve.

I say the former.  The more attitudes can change the sonner, the better we'll 
all be as a result.  If all we do is say but, but, but then we become part of 
the problem and not part of the solution.

/Mario

    I heard (second-hand) that we were connected with a decision on HDTV,
    but I do not have any details either.
    
    Mark

    sales and profits.  Are you sure those are supposed to go together?
    I think Lee hit the nail on the head on note .18.  I guess it depends
    on where you work.  Last year, I was in department that was dynamic,
    moving, shaking, pulling down the big numbers.  it was electric. 
    Everyone else was complaining about morale.  We did not see that as an
    issue with our group.
    
    Today.  I think it's a different story.  The corporate view at 30,000
    ft is great.  However, by the time it trickles down to us, it sucks.
    Our area is still in charge of the big numbers.  The problem is that
    there are not that many opportunities available to us now, and we see
    our existing business slowly slipping away from us.  I can't speak for
    anyone else in my group except for myself, BUT I don't see any
    improvement.  I close new business, and it compensates for SOME of the
    lost business.  
    
    Solution to poor morale from my point of view:  Get these damn layoffs
    complete.  EVeryday someone gets tapped, or has to get a box.  That is
    no kind of environment to work in.  You do not return to profitablity
    thru increased headcount reduction on a constant ongoing basis.  Trim
    the fat, and let's get back to it.  A clear vision is necessary.  With
    no true, clear goals, you don't go anywhere.  This company has a
    problem with sticking to a goal for the time it takes to get there. 
    Honest to god, I heard that we are reorganizing back to the district
    level.
    
    Digital is now famous for being the company that is experienced in
    reorganizing.  That's all we do!  I like working for this company,
    and hope to retire from Digital, however I just don't see that
    happening until we get our act straight.  I am afraid of being laid off
    or our company being bought out.  But who wants us?  I think if someone
    wanted us, we would have been bought out by now.
    
    In summary, morale is low because we have become a product of our
    enviornment.  And the environment sucks.
    
    

    See 2925.14
    
    Barry
    

		The beatings will continue until,






			MORALE INPROVES

    
    Woke up this morning to the News on the radio.  It said that Digital
    Equipment Corporation in Colorado Springs will be hiring about 800
    employees shortly for the Disk Drive Plant.  We just TFSO'd people this
    week.  I've seen friends who were real contributors loose their jobs,
    and yet we are going to hire.  How about retrain?  So much for getting
    the corporations head count down...
    
    Just yesterday, my manager addressed our group.  He said our
    productivity had been above what was expected, so they just raised the
    productivity percentage from 55% to 60%.  Now considering Vacations,
    holidays, sicktime, and no training, the max productivity we can have
    is 80%, we have 20% left to paperwork, managerial work, TRAINING
    (whatever that is), and coffee breaks.  If we don't meet those goals,
    it is TFSO.  Does wonders for my morale and attitude, along with my
    peers.
    
    Jim Morton

    Re: .20
    
    The government would not allow us to be bought. Management should
    realize that the company needs to be broken up and made into 'real'
    business operations. I could see PC's, Storage, Consulting and others
    made into full, independant businesses with only limited strings to
    the parent corporation. Many other corporations in our business
    realized this and did this. Why are we too proud to think that the
    corporation needs to be the same as it always has been?
    
    DME  
    

    I have been with Digital for 10 years. I have seen morale go up and down.
It takes real courage to have a good attitude about yourself and do what you
can do. However, you do burn out, because you cannot control the results, you
have to internalize what you do. Since the company is in trouble, it forgets
the pats on the back, the meetings to give employees the truth about layoffs,
about the future.

    I have seen people TFSOed that were major contributors. I knew some of
them personally or from notes conferences. Some were engineers, others
managers and personal friends. Several of the people were in the DECforms
group. I knew the circumstances, it was demoralizing, because, I looked up to
these people as models, as representatives of what good employees do to earn
respect. Yes, the word, RESPECT, from their fellow employees. When we let go
of people I respect and model I start looking for other models. Lately all
my models have left. Here at the CSC in the VAX/VIA group we have lost 10 or
12 people to outside companies. At least 4 of these left because they could
not make a difference, they were men and women of vision and they had dreams.

When the dream dies, the company dies. Its not layoffs or poor company standing
for me that has caused my drop in moral, its much deeper, its about dyning.
Yes, we are dying. We need to become reborn as a company. I hope to see it 
happen, but then again, I may not be here when it does.

If you walk down the halls of another company  here in Colorado Springs, you 
can feel the enthusiasm, ideas are new, people are talking ideas, 
The people have dreams and vision, they wake up in the morning and see the
sunshine.

It is nice to hear about Alpha doing well, its nice to see that we are a 
leader in thin film development. 

Yes, attitude does start with the individual, but I suspect enthusiastic 
people crave the company of other enthusiastic people, and when the 
enthusiastic people start leaving the company most of them will follow, except
those loyal diehards who have faith in their company. (And loyalty is low 
these days to)

Tom

    .26
    
    Right on! I've said this for a long time!
    

Re: .25

Last week, before the press release to the major paper in Colo.
Springs, or the politically correct spin 'news story' that aired
on the local NBC affiliate yesterday, there was an article/interview
in the local business journal, a weekly business-only paper, 
wherein DIGITAL public relations EXPLICITLY stated that former TFSO's
and serpers 'need not apply' during the staffing ramp up here in Colo
Springs. In fact, they devoted almost 1/3 of the article to emphasising
this point. This was of course different than the spin they put out
for public consumption yesterday on TV & the local paper.

I normally don't think anything should be 'guaranteed' but the tone of
last week's article offended even the laissez-faire libertarian likes
of me. 


The 'turnaround' if you want to call it that in Storage at Colo. Springs
happened DESPITE the management, not because of it.

R

    My morale has certainly taken a beating.
    
    Since joining Digital two years ago at age 25, I have done
    evrything in my power to make a positive difference.
    
    Customers I have worked with have given me a great deal of
    appreciation, as have co-workers who see what I can do.
    
    I am a technical sales resource, originally hired into
    Sales Support.  My review took place during the "let's move
    sales support to consulting" fiasco.
    
    My reward for the monumental effort it took to keep customers
    buying in spite of the troubles at Digital?
    
    I got knocked down from a 2 to a 3 for the first time in my career.
    My raise, which I had to wait 18 months for, didn't even register
    as noise in my paycheck.  Reason, not building my "delivery"
    skills.
    
    Freezing the pay of over-achieving, under-paid young people is a sure
    way to increase the company's woes.  When I voiced how inappropriate
    I felt this was, the message I got back was "Digital had a lot of
    great years, now we all have to pay for them...."
    
    I wasn't here for any of the "good times" at Digital, and I don't
    know how I can justify to myself staying with a company that will
    effectively freeze my earning power for three crucial years,
    ages 25-28 or 29.
    
    Someone had the nerve to tell me I should threaten to leave if
    I wanted more money.  Good work should speak for itself.
    If I end up in a manager's office to say "I'm leaving", it will
    be because I'M LEAVING!  
    
    It will probably be when we scrap this next "thoroughly designed"
    sales organization for yet another shuffling of the deck.
    
    In the meantime, I will be busting my a** for those of you who work
    hard and who care.
    
    Thanks for listening.
    
    
    Dan

    Dan, Dan, Dan.  It's your advanced years that have gotten you in
    trouble.  Digital is currently hiring college grads to get "new blood",
    and replace aged dinosaurs like yourself.  I mean, at 27 it's difficult
    for me to believe you'll EVER be a '2' again.  Come to grips with it,
    man!  Would you buy a 5 year old PC?  I think not!
    
    A lot of this didn't make sense to me either, Dan, I must admit.  Then
    I started drinking heavily and REALLY LISTENING to Howard Stern and
    Rush Limbaugh and it all came together.  I sell flowers at the airport
    now, just to kinda relax and put it all in perspective.  Try it sometime.
    
    					:^] Brent

    I don't spend much time thinking about it, that would certainly drive
    me to drink.
    
    I could see if I was making the big bucks, they would consider freezing
    my salary.
    
    At least at IBM, I had a chance to get up to an additional 7%
    of salary every year through customer solution bonuses.  These
    were not guaranteed pay raises, they were only awarded if you
    accomplished the desired results in a short period of time.
    
    Digital has a lot to learn about pay for performance.
    
    My co-workers here in Manhattan say they'll start worrying about
    me when I am living in a box downstairs in Penn Station.
    Talk about a tough crowd!  :^)
    
    Dan

    Re .7:
    
>    	That sounds great!  I just hope I remember it when I get booted
>    out, and loose everything I worked for, and when I have no food to 
>    feed my kids.  Attitude, it sounds great.
 
Under the same set of conditions attitude makes a positive difference. 
If one loses his job he is better off keeping a positive attitude than 
a bad one for if he keeps bitching about it he will  make it hell for his 
family, affect his health and irritate potential employers. So yes attitude 
does help. 

Moreover a person with bad attitude may not need to lose his job to make his 
life miserable.

    morale?
    
    last wend. saw an end to a string that has had a very negative effect
    on my morale. you see, last wend. was the first working day since
    2/14/94 that someone i personally know DIDN'T get laid off by DEC.

Well, if you all conveyed your feelings in the Employee Survey done a few 
weeks ago, I'm sure the SLT will realize the morale problem and do something 
about it. Right?

    An indicator perhaps, or where have all the Digits gone ?
    
    
    I was in moderatly late last night (I haven't been doing many nights and
    weekends for awhile either).   I work in Spitbrook building three. 
    When I left at about 2AM (not really late a few years ago) there were
    two cars in parking lot H, mine and a persons who was just arriving.
    
    To me this is sad.  I have never left at around that hour and seen less
    than 4 or 5 cars in each of the partial lots (E-I).  It lookes like
    4AM, before people started arriving for the new day.
    
    Bill

Bill,

In these modern times of telecommuting, many of us are logged in from home
at 2am rather than sitting in our offices like we used to have to do in the
old days.

-steve-

    
      It could also be that people are taking those "Life Balance"
    seminars and being with their family or friends more often. (you
    know, "life is too short to..."
    
          Mark

    	What's sad is that people find it sad that the parking lot is empty
    at 2 am...Why ON EARTH would people be working around the clock these
    days? Oh yeah, to save the company. Queuing up a batch job to send mail
    to your boss and a few other managers at 2 am will be just as
    effective.
    	What's sad is seeing how empty the parking lot is during *normal*
    business hours...or to see the same people arrive at 9 am, leave around
    4:30 after a hard day of kissing butts and getting credit for other
    peoples' work. That's what's sad. If a few people want to work 20 hours
    a day, that's their business, but they certainly shouldn't expect the
    people with lives to be doing the same thing.
    	Note, I realize that most people have had to put in the long hours
    on rare occasions to meet some deadline. Gasp. I've even done it
    myself, but that's my little secret.

    Re .39, "Maybe all the martyrs got laid off"
    
    No, that's not what I was observing.  I was in late to fix problems
    that customers see (CLDs), and I can usually schedule well enough to
    not come in late.  In this case I needed some time, without
    interruptions, with multiple windows (not dialinable) and decided this
    was the best way to solve the problem.
    
    I also was not back in by 8:15 }8-)}  (I dont consider myself a
    martyr).
    
    What I was bemoning was the lack of the spark, the "midnight" engineering
    that often lead to some major breakthroughs, even in the product you
    and I work on.  People feeling it was worth the effort to come in and
    work out an idea (or even dial in, which people do still do, but I'll
    be in lesser numbers) just because.
    
    I believe my time with my family is more important that my time at
    work, especially while I still have children home to commune with.
    That doesn't mean that on occasion I don't want some quiet time to
    break a bug or work an Idea that noone wants to budget for, just cause.
    
    We're missing the "just cause", that is what I was bemoning.
    
    Bill
    
    (Yes, I don't like the lack of cars during the day either, but that's
    a problem with staff cutting, not staff spirit).
    

    Maybe the spirit of two-three years ago is not there, this is a
    different place now. It's hard to kkep morale going when we have
    loss money 10 out the last 11 quarters, and the end of layoffs
    is no where in sight. What we need around here is REVENUE, and then
    re-building morale, company spirit etc....
    
    

    Re. .41
    
    < What we need around here is REVENUE, and then re-building morale,
      company spirit etc....>
    
    Seems that's a catch-22. It's tough to create revenue with morale
    down and less people. No revenue?  OK,  even less people and lower
    morale. 

    
    
    
    
    .39
    
    >What's sad is seeing how empty the parking lot is during *normal*
    >business hours...or to see the same people arrive at 9 am, leave around
    >4:30 after a hard day of kissing butts and getting credit for other
    >peoples' work. That's what's sad.
    
    Could not have said it any better. Maybe if we get rid of the butt
    %$#$# morale will get better
    

    
    
    Bottom line (as I see it) is that people aren't going to give thier all
    to a place where they do not feel appreciated.  I believe that most
    people want to do a good job and what's right, but now many of us are
    in a cover ourselves mode.  Shutting down some of the enthusiasm and
    all as a self preservation device.  Maybe an unrequited love and
    dedication scenario.  Many people feel that the attitude of the
    corporation today is, "the beatings will continue to morale improves".
    
    
    Mike

    Wonder how morale is at IBM these days? We're both doing layoffs,are we
    both experiencing the same feelings among employees?
    
    Ken

    Tony,
    
    Have you thought about sending your message to John Rando, the head of
    MCS?  
    
    BobW

    RE: .46
    
    My brother-in-law works for IBM and has for over 20 years. 
    
    His wife is very ill, he still has his youngest in Senior year at
    High School and he is told that he can either find 
    a job on his own or take a position in Tokyo with a 2 year contract.
    His only choice was to take the overseas offer. 9 months after
    being there, he's told that the contract is being cancelled and
    there is not a position available for him when he comes back.
    
    52 years old, wife with only a few years to live, financial
    responsibilities........Life is not fun for him at this time.

    They keep saying "the customer is the focus of everything we do",
    and "stop paying attention to Digital internal".
    
    All I care about is succeeding with the customer's, and the guys 
    who's jobs I end up doing for them are spending their time 
    bull-sh**ing their managers about how great they are.
    
    I got the message loud and clear that I might as well walk on
    water in front of customers, I still won't get paid and recognized for
    doing it.
    
    How come I get no raise after two years due to lack of funds, and I
    spend close to 100% of my time making customers happier,
    yet we find big bucks to hire VP's who will never see a fraction
    of the customer's I do.
    
    So much for rewarding customer focus.
    
    Dan

    Morale is indeed low.  But the biggest drain on my morale is not the
    feeling that the Company no longer cares or is less employee focused;
    but rather the drain of seeing a choice few purposefully take advantage
    of the company for their own benefit.
    
    I do not mind people not giving more than 100% and I don't expect the
    company to go under by taking over my social responsibilities.  I do
    mind people working every angle to get every thing possible from
    Digital, and not giving anything back in return.  I see this in abuse
    of sick time, disability, vacation reporting, travel plans, and amyriad
    of other activities.  
    
    Our jobs were meant to be a 50-50 endeavor.  I give to the company and
    the company reciprocates to me.  There are far too many of us that want
    this to be a 60-40 relationship, they are out to get more than they put
    in.  Watching them get away with it is what drains my morale.  Never in
    my 16 years have I ever felt that Digital was demanding more out of me
    than I was willing to give.
    
    Perhaps our morale problem lies within ourselves, and what we
    toleraste.

    >> How can we help.........
    
    For me, after the end of this fiscal year, things should really
    turn around, provided my position (which many still view as
    experimental) as regional technical sales does not go away.
    
    The key for me has been to not think about it.  This company
    reminds me of a dysfunctional family, where one set of rules is
    stated constantly but not followed, while the real rules for
    success are not public information.
    
    Believe me, if things were all bad, I wouldn't take the time to
    complain.
    
    I feel, for my self respect, I need to point out some of
    these things in a public forum.  Today's US DVN is a good
    opportunity.  If you want a chuckle, tune in.
    
    Dan