Saturday, December 9, 2006

Turning a company Here's an interesting article from The New York Times about the difficulty a new executive faces trying to turn around Microsoft's online business. One reason I find this interesting is that I've been probing executives of major companies about how they are going to manage the change from being primarily hardware product providers to software and solution providers. Most companies are moving this direction. By the way, the market segment is called "performance management" and is a roll-up of current technologies into a software application that provides advanced analytics and visualization. I asked then-president Mike Caliel of Invensys that question at the InFusion product launch last April. At that time he talked about hiring a new type of sales person who could sell a different type of product at a higher level within the customer management. At this week's customer conference, what I heard was that the company is going through a training and sorting process looking for that type of sales person. Isao Uchida of Yokogawa had an answer immediately ready for my question--"We must become consultative with our customers. Where once we were a product company concerned only pre-project, now we must become consultative and help customers post-project." Once again, a change is sales strategy with a need for a different type of sales person, training and probably compensation. Something I didn't get a clear picture of from Rockwell Automation's conference--and is the subject of many hallway discussions wherever industry insiders gather--is how Kevin Roach at Rockwell is going to convince the Rockwell sales force and distributors to sell software. The company has tried for upwards of 10 years with only marginal success. This is going to be a tough one. Will the company's powerful distribution channel add the resources and training required to move from selling at the maintenance level to the executive level? Will it allow a separate software sales force? Will an internal sales force comfortable calling on distributors learn to sell at a higher management level? It's a challenge almost as big, but certainly just as crucial, as the challenge at Microsoft. It's about the future of the company. I think that even more crucial to the long term success of these (and others) companies is not just the technology involved but more importantly how they can effectively market and sell these new products. Long term, hardware only will be almost a commodity game. Who will execute the strategy best? Stay tuned. Looking for a Gambit to Win at Google[base ']s Game. Microsoft[base ']s online chief wants to change the way his company runs its Internet business. But he is finding that redirecting such a behemoth is slow going. By SAUL HANSELL. [NYT > Technology] By the way, the new executive comes from Ask Jeeves, now Ask.com. That is my new search engine of choice. Seems to give more relevant responses than Google and has more flexibility in questioning. 7:53:31 AM    comment []