Category Archives: rants

The Vendor in Black Comes Back

Editor’s Note: This is the sequel to The Vendor in Black which originally ran here on SI on February 17, 2007. And just like the sequel to The Cat in The Hat (appropriately titled The Cat in the Hat Comes Back) was even more esoteric and radical than the first, so is this sequel. Plus, it’s also quite symbolic, analogic, and terse* in a manner that is meant to obscure the deeper meaning and criticism. It is supposed to be this way. If you think about it long and hard enough, you should understand why. (And if you do not want to think deeply about it, just enjoy the rhyme. It will permeate your subconscious and one day you will have an epiphany.)

This was no time for play.
This was no time for fun.
This was no time for games.
There was work to be done.

All that deep,
deep, deep data,
all that data had to fit a schemata.

When the big boss went
out to a meet for the day,
she said, “somebody has to
clean all this away.
Somebody, somebody
has to, you see.”
Then she picked out two somebodies.
Sally and me.

Well …
there we were.
We were working like that
and then who should show up
but the Vendor in Black!

“Uh-oh!” Sally said.
“Don’t you talk to that Jack.
That Vendor is a bad one,
that Vendor in Black.

He plays lots of bad tricks.
Don’t you let him come near.
You know what he did
the last time he was here.”

“Play tricks?” laughed the Vendor.
“Oh, my my! No, no, no!
I just want to go in
to get off of the road.

Keep you mind on your work.
You just stay there, you two.
I will go to the servers
and find something to do.”

Then the Vendor went right in!
He was up to no good!
So I ran in after
as fast as I could!

Do you know where I found him?
You know where he was?
He was installing an app on the server!
He was!

The disc drive was spinning
and the hard drive heads, too.
And I said to the Vendor,
“What a bad thing to do!”

“But I like to install apps
on the server,” laughed the Vendor.
“You should try it some time,”
laughed the Vendor with splendour.

And then I got mad.
This was no time for fun.
I said, “Vendor! You get out!
There is work to be done.

I have no time for tricks.
I must go back and cube.
I can’t have you in here
installing apps like a rube!

You get out of this office!
We don’t want you about!”
Then I removed the CD
and let the timer run out.

The timer ran out.
And then I saw the tab!
A tab on the screen!
And, oh boy! What a tab!

An obnoxious cleansing tab!
It looked out of sync!
And I said, “Will this ever
work right? I don’t think!”

“Have no fear of that tab,”
laughed the Vendor in Black.
“Why, it will clean your input data.
Just like that!”

Do you know how he did it?
With old spending rules!
Now the data was mapped,
but our reports were April fool’s!

Then Sally looked in.
Sally saw the mess, too!
And Sally and I
did not know what to do.

We should work with the data.
But that mess! What a rot!
“It may never be fixed!”
Sally said. “It may not!”

But the Vendor laughed, “Ho! Ho!
I can clean the mess.
The way I fix report mappings
is express!”

“See here!” laughed the Vendor.
“It is not hard at all.
The way to clean up
a big mess is rule sprawl!”

Then we saw the Vendor code
more rules in the app.
Now the reports were all clean.
But the rules! What a frap!

“Oh, rule sprawl!” He laughed.
“Let me tell you some news.
The way to stop rule sprawl
is to create some more views!”

Whose views did he use?
I looked and saw whose!
And I said to the Vendor,
“This is very bad news.

Now the data is split
between S A P views!”
“But your boss will not
know about that,”

the Vendor did ack.
“She will never find out,”
Laughed the Vendor in Black.

“Her spending reports will have
no need for SAP.
I will clean up those views
with the embedded map-app.”

“But now we have too many views!”
I yelled. “What a day!
Map apps! What next?
Can you take them away?”

“Don’t ask me,” he laughed!
“Why, you know that I’m able!”
Then he popped up a dialog
and the Vendor he tabled.

“I can clean up these new views
before you count three!
No views are too hard
for a Big Vendor like me!”

He ran to the servers
and then the Vendor did twitch,
“It is good that your techs
have the right kind of switch.”

Then he mirrored the SAN!
Whoosh!
Now the views were in twos!

And all I could say was,
“Now what, Vendor?
What do I do?”

But the Vendor just stood still.
He just looked at the rack.
“This is NOT the right kind of a switch,”
the Vendor did ack.

“To axe views with this switch
will be hard, I take it all back.
I can’t do it alone,”
said the Vendor in Black.

“It is good I have someone
to help me,” he said.
“Outside in the van
at the back near the shed!

It is good that I have him
here with me today.
He helps me a lot.
This is Vendor Rep A.”

And then Vendor Rep A
took his Hat off his head.
“It is good I have some one
to help me,” he said.

“This is Vendor Rep B.
And I keep him about,
and when I need help,
then I let him come out.”

And then B said,
“I think we need Vendor Rep C.
These views are too much
for the A Rep and me.

But now, have no fear!
We will clean them away!
The three of us! Vendor Reps B, C, and A!”

“Come on! Take it away!”
Yelled Vendor Rep A.
“I will cleanse the new views
just like this! I avow!

It comes off the old SAN!
It goes to the web cloud.”
And then Vendor Rep B
cleaned up the web cloud

He cleaned it with SaaS,
put the views on dot net!
And then C replaced
all the views with ancient Vignettes!

“But look where it went!”
I said. “Look where it blew!
You blew the mess
off of the SAN. That is true.
But now our views are all free!
What are we to do?”

“Let us think about that now,”
said C, B, and A.
“With some help, we can do it!”
said Vendor Rep C.
Then pop! From the van
emerged Vendor Rep D.
Then, pop! Pop! Pop!
Vendor Reps E, F and G!

“We will clean up those views
if it takes us all day!
If it takes us all night,
we will clean them today!”
said Vendor Reps G, F, E, D, C, B, A.

They ran to the servers
and we ran to them too.
And the big Vendor laughed,
“Now you will see something new!

My Reps are all clever.
My Reps have the muse.
My Reps have good skills.
They will clean all those views!”

But this did not look
very clever to me.
Seven reps to clean views?
That just could not be!

“All those reps do is make more views!”
We yelled at the Vendor.
“Your Vendors are no good.
Take back those pretenders.”

“Take your Vendor Reps G,
F, E, D, C, B, A.
Shove them back in your van
And you take them away!”

“Oh no!” said the Vendor.
“All they need is more help.
Help is all that they need.
So keep still and don’t yelp.”

Then Vendor Rep G
took the phone off his hip.
“I’ll call Vendor Rep H
here to help us, ” he quipped.
“Vendor Reps H, I, J,
K, L, and M.
But our work is so hard
we must have more than them.

We need Vendor Rep N.
We need O. We need P.
We need Vendor Reps Q, R, S, T,
U, and V.”

“Come on! Kill those views!
Kill the mess!” yell the Reps.
And they jumped at the servers
with SQL and greps.

They coded in basic
on terminals Citrix!
Green and black! DOS attack!
The views were transfixed!

Oh, the things that they did!
And they all worked so proud,
It was all one big mess now
all over the cloud!

But the big Vendor stood there
and he said, “this is good”.
This is what they should do
and I knew that they would.

“With a little more help,
all the work will be done.
They need one more Rep.
And I know just the one.”

“Look close! In the back
You’ll see Vendor Rep V.
By his side are Reps W, X, Y, and Z.”

“Z’s a Rep you rarely see.
Don’t ask why. Or what’s up.
But Z is the Rep
who will clean the views up!”

“Now here is the Z
you will see,” said the Vendor.
“And I bet you can’t guess
where he gets all his splendor!”

“He has something called Voom.
Voom is so hard to get,
you never saw anything
like it, I bet.

Why, Voom cleans up anything
clean as can be!”
Then he yelled,
“Time to get going,
Vendor Rep Z!

Do your job, use the Voom!
Time to put on a show!
Hurry! Now Vendor Rep!
One! Two! Three! Go!”

Then the Voom …
It went Voom!
And, oh boy! What a Voom!
Now, you know what the Voom did?

It put everything back!
The views were deleted.
The reports were unhacked!

“So you see!” laughed the Vendor,
“Now your screens are all tight!
Now your work can be done!
Your reports are put right!

And you know where my Vendor Reps are?”
asked the Vendor.
“They all went back to the van
services tendered.

And so, if you ever
need views, now and then.
I will be very happy
to come here again …”

“… with Vendor Reps A, B, C, D …
E, F, G …
H, I, J, K …
L, M, N …
and O, P …

… and Q, R, S, T …
and Vendor U and Vendor V …
and Vendor Reps W
X
Y
and Z!”

* It’s so much more esoteric, radical, symbolic, analogic, and terse than the first, partially because of the forced meter, that the editor sat on it for almost a year while deliberating whether or not the time had come to post it!

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Analysts, Schmanalysts

According to Gartner’s latest blog post (in Thursday’s thoughts), the super secret formula to gaining information about a vendor’s product is the “scripted demo”.

Here’s the Big Idea: you ask the vendor how to accomplish the “applicable tasks you do most often”, and then you ask the vendor to demonstrate, step by step, how to do them.

Well, that’s a terrific idea if the vendor has nothing new or innovative to show you, and if both of you are as dull as dishwater. If all you want the vendor to do is show you how to accomplish some mundane  business task that you already do every day, then you’ll never see anything the least bit interesting or innovative. Plus, given time, the vendor will “polish” that part of the demo so it looks much more impressive than it really is.

Here’s some free advice to business and technology analysts who have to evaluate products:

  1. DON’T ask the vendor to do ordinary things.Ask the vendor to show you extraordinary things. Sometimes those extraordinary things can be quite ordinary on the surface, like making it possible for ordinary users to employ highly complex technology successfully and usefully. Problem is, you actually have to understand what’s going on under the covers to figure out whether it’s extraordinary, or just something that’s actually quite simple, or even something that’s just plain technically impossible, and therefore a load of bull (see point 3, below). If all you have is an MBA, chances are that you can’t make that evaluation.
  2. DON’T count mouse clicks.Count innovations that could really make a difference for your clients and their businesses.
  3. DON’T assume that you know anything about technology.Instead, hire (or rent) someone who does, to save you from drawing uninformed conclusions about stuff you don’t (and might never) understand. If you bring someone to the party who can’t be buffaloed by technobabble and a pretty UI, then you don’t have to worry about “scripted” or “unscripted” demos.
  4. DON’T test for “100 features and often many more — up to 500 features” to finalize a rating.That’s just “checklist testing”, and it’s not very useful. Fact is, only a few features matter; the rest are bells and whistles that nobody cares about. You need to do a deep dive on what’s important, not worry about who has the longest checklist. It’s exactly this “please the reviewer” attitude that contributed to bloatware like Microsoft Word — a product that, after years of introducing new whiz-bang features that only ever half-worked, still couldn’t get basic bulleted lists to function properly as late as Word 2003.

The other Big Idea in the Gartner article is References. Well, references are a slippery slope. Does the reference customer understand the technology? Probably not. Does he understand what else is out there? Almost certainly not. Does he think his (pick one: RFx engine, spend analysis tool, contracts management system, etc.) is the greatest thing since sliced bread? Maybe, but who cares? He could be using a crappy tool of marginal value in comparison to what he could be using and have no clue. You could interview him until the cows come home, and not learn a thing, except that he’s a happy lemming with no idea he’s about to run off a cliff.

Fact is, the old model of analysts running around interviewing and briefing the vendors that pay them, and then running off to interview the customers that the paying vendor has teed up, and therefore thinking that they’re somehow “getting a feel for what’s out there and what’s good”, is so … over. All you end up creating for your final report is an unappetizing mashup of the marketing nonsense of all the big vendors.

No wonder everyone is running to the web for guidance. Or running for the hills.

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United Breaks Guitars (The Trilogy): 10 Million Views, All Thanks To You!

Last week, and three weeks ago, I reminded you that the one year anniversary of the first video release was this week (on Tuesday, July 6), that Dave was closing fast on 10,000,000 views, and that with your support we could get him there and send airlines everywhere a strong message.

I’m happy to report that, thanks to the international date line, Dave made it. (When the editor checked Tuesday night in his time zone, Dave was just views away, crossing it the next morning in the editor’s time zone, when it was still Tuesday in Samoa). Moreover, the counters are still climbing, which is very important as it seems that, as a whole, the airlines really haven’t gotten the message. (Delta is smashing bicycles of volunteers who TriAndGiveADam and who are working hard to make sure children in Africa have clean drinking water, and refusing to even refund the $200 “we’ll keep your luggage safe” fee.)

 

As of today, we’re at:

United Breaks Guitars Views (June 29, 2010)
Song 1  8,791,174
Song 2  1,044,613
Song 3  180,778
TOTAL  10,016,565

 

I encourage you to revisit these videos and share the links regularly. They’re good songs, even if they’re not your musical style, they’re a rallying point for the bad customer service we continuously get from the airlines (as echoed by Brian Sommer in his post on Eat that Cookie!), and I’m sure not enough people have enjoyed song 3, which is every bit as good as song 1 both in lyrics and video production quality (it’s funny!).

How to Build a Bat House (Repost)

Once upon a time, there was a beautiful old wooden hotel in the North Country. The owner had coaxed an award-winning chef with a new family away from the hurry-scurry of the big city, so the food was fabulous. The staff were locals imbued with the history of the region and an encyclopedic knowledge of hiking trails, scenic vistas, off-the-beaten-track cross-country trails, and so on. The cleaning staff took pride in ensuring that floors and woodwork were polished, the rooms were well-equipped, and bathrooms were spotless. The fixtures and furniture were old but functional, and the atmosphere was charming, down to the homemade quilts on the beds, each one individually selected.

Eventually the owner, beset with health problems, sold the business to a bright young entrepreneur. Several years later, there was an economic downturn, and revenues fell off. The new owner seized the opportunity to cut costs. He replaced the chef with the sous-chef, at a much lower salary. He revised the menu to remove the most costly items. He instituted a retirement buy-out for the original staff, replacing them with rent-a-clerks and teenagers. He replaced the maids with a commercial cleaning service, and traded the difficult-to-clean quilts for store-bought linens and coverlets. He was able to decrease the room rates by 25%.

To the new owner’s dismay, revenues continued to fall. Former customers were turning up at the local Best Western and Holiday Inn franchises, whose newer buildings and minimalist rooms consistently undercut his prices, no matter how much he lowered them. He was forced to close one wing of the old hotel, then another, and more of the staff were let go. Finally, he had to shut the business entirely. After a while, windows blew out and bats moved in, hence the title of this story.

About six months later, the young man met the old owner for dinner. “I’m sorry about what happened to the old place,” he said. “The economy tanked, and no matter what I did to cut costs and lower prices, we just couldn’t recover.” The former owner stared into his wine glass for a while. Then he shrugged, looked up, and asked, “What reason did people have to stay in your hotel? The food was mediocre; the rooms had lost their charm; you fired everyone who cared about the guests, or who could help them enjoy their visit; and poorly-paid commercial cleaners will do the bare minimum, if that.” The young man asked, “What should I have done?” The old man shook his head. “Who knows,” he said. “But people always need vacations, and when times are tough they want an extra-special place to stay. I’d have made it more special, not less special; and I might even have increased my rates and my advertising. Heck, if someone is paying $200 a night for a room, $220 isn’t much of a sacrifice.”

The young man smiled tolerantly. “Yes, but this downturn is different. Everyone’s in trouble. Businesses are failing left and right.” The old man refilled his glass. “I’m sure you’re right,” he said. “Who can say whether my strategy would have worked?” The two men began applying themselves to their meals. Between forkfuls, the young man asked, “So, what are you doing with yourself these days?” “Oh, ” said the old man, “nothing special. The doctors eventually figured out what was wrong with me and fixed it, so I got restless and bought an old ski lodge about a year ago. We renovated the rooms, brought in a French chef, put in an outdoor 4-season pool, and recruited a bunch of savvy locals to run the place.”

“How are you doing?”

“We’re booked solid.”

Editor’s Note: This post, contibuted by Anonymous, originally ran on March 31, 2009. It is being reposted because too many businesses are still building bat houses. If this trend continues, it’s likely that there will be no avoiding a double dip recession that everyone is so fearful of. Just like Marketing is NOT optional, neither is forward advancement. There is no holding pattern in business. There is victory or death. Choose one.

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The Hammer Will Fall!

Remember that before you take the summer off and spend yet another quarter in a holding pattern … you can prepare for it, or join your colleagues in bankruptcy and unemployment.

While you ponder that, here’s a classic from Queen: