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So, how are we doing in this credit/tech crunch?
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I will not ask the silly question who has not been hit by this down turn - I assume that most hi-tech organization these days are feeling the pressure. What will 2009 hold for us is hard to tell but obviously we need to make a few changes in the way we conduct our businesses – funding is going to be hard to get and customers will cut back on their spending for sure – the perfect recipe for a headache.
I would like to focus this discussion on the way (I think) sales organizations should reinvent themselves due to this new market situation and my next post would examine what support they (Sales) will need from their product colleagues to be successful.
I think that more and more sales organizations are going to adapt a “laser approach” rather than a “shotgun approach” – meaning extreme focus on markets or specific customers which a sale can be achieved with higher probability rather than expanding over too many territories and opportunities.
This means:
• Less territories to focus on
• Increased efficiency in managing territories
• Reduce operational costs
The first 2 bullets are linked together, which means we need to identify the markets carefully and have our sales people more in the territory to meet customers than flying around between territories (more air miles for the sales person but less over all effectiveness in selling). More than that, territories which seemed previously unappealing may now be the most appropriate ones to address – everyone wants to sell in Western Europe but maybe now the opportunities are in Africa – can this shift in approach help hedge the downturn? Who said that these days a sale to MTN (in South Africa) is less appealing than to T-Mobile (in the UK or Germany)?
Reduction of (sales) operational costs is a favourite one for CFOs. I think that more organizations will tackle this goal by relying on larger networks of agents and representatives which will deliver local sales at overall reduced costs. The sales people may be tilted more towards channel management rather than direct sales. What do we save – mainly travel costs which have a devastating effect on profitability. What is needed – versatile sales people and open minded sales management.
Tal
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Special Meeting in The ALM Group - Guest Lecturer from Microsoft India Shay Mandel
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Shay will talk to the group about: Microsoft Lab Management for smoother ALM process Abstract:
Meeting will take place this Wednesday, the 24th in Microsoft's offices in Ra'anana, at 17:30
Abstract:
So much was said about using Virtualization in production and Data Centers, but Virtualization is even more amazing when it is used in the development lifecycle. In this session you will learn how to leverage virtualization and the new tools that are available in VSTS 2010 to speed up the development process, enhance collaboration and improve software quality. You will see how you can easily save a lot of time by using the new Lab Management tool to use virtual machines for easily deploying isolated environments for each developer and tester. Deploy the application automatically. Run tests and file actionable bugs that enable easy debugging, even weeks after the bug was filed, as if they occurred just now. Automate the build process and the continuous integration
For full description of the meeting visit Maor's blog
Registration link
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Once upon a time we had a waterfall management system and requirements handling was so straightforward…
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Not very long ago, defining the scope for software requirements management activities was quite simple:
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Spend a lot of time thinking and documenting in the beginning of the project (assuming that the result of all this mental effort will be a very solid definition that will not change)
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Send the documents/diagrams to the involved parties
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If they don’t supply you with a feedback, assume that they accept it, if they do have comments, make the minimal needed alterations
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Send the final version
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You are done! Wait for your new project
Today, it is very clear that the workflow described here is practically a recipe for disaster and those organizations that still implement waterfall methodologies in their development processes are very likely to end up like this
Orchestrating a successful product is extremely challenging and is an on-going effort that requires the coordination of multi discipline resources (in other words, what we call: Product Readiness), in this post (and the following ones) I will discuss the role of the product manager/ analyst/business owner in an rapid changing, highly demanding environment where every requirement is only final until the market has stated otherwise and that, on the other hand, performing changes outside of the original scope place a significant hazard on the ability to keep budget limits
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Where is the product Manager when we need him?
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In my last visit to one of our customers I measured the physical distance between the R&D department and the sales department – it was 15 strides so let’s say 14 meters. In the same day we had a project planning session after we sold a new project to a tier 1 international customer. After this meeting the same distance (14 Meters) seemed to grow to an unimaginative length.
The reason was that in this project, a critical software component of the system, was of grade and scalability anticipated for a SME (Small Medium Enterprise) installation and not acceptable for a $4Billion corporate.
I was told by the product team – “…It works in other places just fine so why shouldn’t it work here…”
Gals and Guys listen up and pay attention to this delicate nuance, our companies are all about creating cash and value for the investors and shareholders and NOT about creating cool software… sad but true.
Too many times we see the product people creating a product and features which they like but are: a) totally useless and/or b) adhering to no acceptable standards by our end customers. This skews our sales efforts and deems them ineffective most of the time.
At best when we sell products which are rich in “redundant” features we take upon our organization a huge engineering and commercial challenge to build (quickly) functionality that will “secure the deal”. I am not a great programmer (hence my sales job) but even I know what happens when you develop and deploy new software at a rush and under extreme time pressure.
So please let me introduce the product manager. Yes, that quasi-sales and product creature which is responsible to gather customer and market requirements and get them implemented into - the engineering plans, product roadmap and development project plans.
Gals and Guys, if you do not have a product manager involved in your daily product development routine then get them involved.. quickly! Their job is not only to fly to conferences and to sit in industry standards groups (boring!). These folks are here to ensure that what you develop really hits the spot with our customers and that the probes we send into the customers organizations make their way into your product development plans. Listen to them and make them part of your daily life just like that coffee break ritual you are used to in the office.
The art of integrating Product management into the organization is something that we all need to master. Product management is the resource that will navigate the development towards the promised land – the land marked by our customers expectations and not by the developer’s craving for a new and cool java functionality in the product. This approach is not as cool but much more profitable for the business in the long run.
Are you utilizing product management to the max or are you just tagging them along to sales meetings so they can get out of your hair?
Tal
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Product Readiness - an Integral Part of Marteting Strategy
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A client of mine has made a strategic decision to leverage on their strong base of hardware sales and move upwards the value chain into software and services. This is a bold and interesting move if we take into account the current economical downturn and the high level of competition in the market.
Ensuring a correct solution portfolio to start with is critical as this will determine the resources and set-up required.
One of the initial stages is how do we evaluate the products to fit into a model which will bring the highest value to the customers and yield the greatest return to my client.
The model above is one and by all means not the only one to evaluate the dynamics we are trying to quantify. The above model takes into account a multi dimensional evaluation of the top 10% of customers and strategic suspects and builds into it the competitive landscape we need to address. It also brings into the picture the critical needs and potential solutions required to meet the customer’s challenges.
A key factor and also one of the quickest ways to differentiate between vendors and service providers are technical and commercial innovation. The reason for innovation as a differentiator factor is that there are many cool and new technologies around, but mostly “me too” and therefore not unique. Technical and commercial innovation provides the measurable factor for a customer to choose one product over another. Commercial innovation is measured by flexibility of things such as discounts, payment terms and bundles.
Technical innovation is not only having a cool code it is delivering a complete package. We need to ask ourselves questions such as - Can you provide assurances of a stable development environment? Can you demonstrate transparency throughout your process? What is the level and openness for integration? Is it possible to truly evaluate your roadmap availability? Do you have the support mechanism to service a growing number and demands from clients?
At Triple Jump we called this evaluation process Product Readiness. Product Readiness takes into account the customer needs, competitor’s analysis and functional features to ensure fit for purpose status. But more importantly we examine the readiness of the development environment, lifecycles of the product and ability to deliver a complete service.
With this client we have ensured that the identification and evaluation process are homogenous and aligned to the overall strategy. We have identified over five potential vendors that support our initial vision and are now evaluating there commercial and technical propositions via the model above and Product Readiness.
I will keep you up to date as to our progress and findings in the next couple of postings.
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Why ALM and PLM are important to Sales and Marketing
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In a former life my CEO asked me to reduce my marketing budget by 25%. I had a long think and decided that letting people go is too easy, there has to be another way.
A marketing organisation must not only provide service for the organisation, it has to mirror it. It was therefore, imperative to reshape marketing to shadow our business models and operations. The first thing we did was to align marketing to the sectors we serviced but more crucially to assimilate into the services organisations into the factory – Business consulting, System Integration and Managed Services.
Each of the above had sets of technologies, vendors, bespoke developments, commercial models…… all cost money and all were prioritised as important.
What we did is streamed lined as a joint exercise the offering per service line and joint up offering so we can all share costs. We also prioritised with the business what we focus on into tiers of importance. To manage this process we had Industry sectors plans signed and approved by the business and service organisations. This was a live plan that was owned by marketing.
So you might ask where does ALM and PLM come into it – well, one of the key indicators that we are inline with offerings and solution so we can make the marketing investment to drive it into the market was using ALM and PLM tools and processes so we can keep hold on things.
We had three key outcomes:
1. We were more agile in delivering thought leadership to the market.
2. We reduced more then the 25% of our budget but more importantly increased the visibility on the ROI marketing delivers.
3. We had a more client orientated services organisation
Bottom line – if you work in technology use the platforms available to communicate in the same language.