Views from Around the World

The most reliable software in the world is software that is never used. Once we install software, of any kind, we introduce an element of randomness to the flow. Most of the time, the random elements together add up to nothing significant. Sometimes they add up to something significant. Another piece of software installed on the same machine, or interacting across a network, or an untested use case, or a use case outside of tested scope; all can bring about the dreaded bug, the flaw or the failure.

As a software company we build and deliver amazing solutions. But as long as people touch it, there is a chance that the user will find something wrong, or something that doesn’t perform to some specification.

The differentiation for corporate customers is what comes next. Why is openSuSE not well suited for corporate use? It’s built by great people, with the purest of intent, and they will want to make things better. The problem is that corporate needs something more.

The “more” for us is Novell Technical Services. Without NTS our ability to walk the complete path is incomplete. Once we’ve sold something, who takes accountability for that next step? That’s NTS. In the original days, you could call Novell and actually speak to the talented engineer who wrote the code. In today’s world that won’t work. Demand for service has only increased, while time to deliver has only decreased. We have to change the model. We used to sell support based on incidents. In our world today, we are faced with industry created expectations that a customer can ask as many questions as they wish. To deliver on that expectation we’ve gone to web based support for everything except Sev 1 calls for contracted customers. For non-customers the process is still web based and is run by committed volunteers. This isn’t new. I remember the old days of NetWire on CompuServe and it looks a lot like the forum model of today.

Some folks have been critical of the change away from an incident based model. I’m proposing that we all need to embrace the change and celebrate it. By making incidents unlimited via the web, we push the bar past our large competitors and demonstrate how to do web support well for smaller software providers. By allowing customers and partners to not have to “allocate” incidents, they will now ask more questions. This means more rapid deployment, less shelfware and confidence that implementing the newest thing isn’t going to decrement “expensive limited incidents”. Our opportunity is to communicate this aggressively. We all know that the easiest way to lose adoption is to have a customer using outmoded and potentially unsupported code. I bet the decision to move to the web support model was a tough one, and that it was not popular everywhere. That said, I fundamentally believe it is game changing for our future because it removes significant barriers to implementation. Manuals and training go so far, but when that random event, the butterfly effect, occurs, we want to maximize the ability to get answers without the high costs and simplex model of telephone only support. Since Dave Cutler took the time to explain the rationale to me, I’ve been delivering this message to our customers. Here’s the reality. They get it, and thus far, I’ve received zero negative feedback.

There is one more thing we can all do. Encourage our customers and partners to look at the Forums. Back in the day, we learned as much from each other as we did from the Novell experts who helped out on NetWire. It’s an opportunity to create the next generation of the world’s most powerful software support infrastructure, the community.

Until next time, peace.

In the spirit of open disclosure, I have a bias. When I look across our BUs and at the other players in our industry, and listen to customers, I think we build top line software in each of our customer buying center areas. I’ve said it before, we make amazing solutions for our customers and partners to create value with.

Because I am a member of the SRM BMT and PLT teams, and with the Workgroup PLT to a lesser extent, I have the joy to converse with our engineering teams. I don’t claim to be an expert in engineering and its demands and I have to tell you it’s an incredible process. For those of us who are out in the field, talking to customers, partners and prospects, we hear demands for new services, for enhancements, and yes, to address gaps on a pretty regular basis. What we don’t know may cause us to have misunderstandings of the work that goes on in our development model. First the IPD process brought into play by Dr. Jaffe and his team has brought a consistency and powerful framework that defines what we build and how we build it. Moreover in participating with these wonderful Novell teammates, I do get to see the level of detail that they go to in the development and testing perspective. The development models are rich and powerful. I particularly want to call out what I see from a testing perspective prior to release.

We all understand that no software project is ever “perfect” mostly because the definition moves around with the freneticism of a mouse on speed. I have to tell you that our internal teams go through a very serious testing process prior to release, and the level of commitment to quality is readily apparent. Quality is a key and ongoing customer metric. Like any software company, something from time to time is going to get past the shields, but I think the most important element is the attitude towards customer joy that I have the opportunity to see from the folks who work on our amazing products every day. These folks get it and are incredibly committed.

I want to close with a story shared with me by Client Executive Karine Lachapelle who was being challenged on the cost of ongoing maintenance by one of her customers. Here’s the gist of the conversation Karine shared.

The Director opened the discussion by telling me:

“The problem we find is that we understand that the maintenance we are paying is granting us access to tech support. The problem is that your products are never down so we don’t need to use the tech support. We have the feeling of paying for something we don’t use.”

I looked at him and said:

“So Denis, you would need to explain to me more clearly how the fact that our products are never down is a problem for you”… His face in response? Priceless!

So thanks to all the folks who do great work to help us be successful together, thanks to Karine for this real world story and let’s all remember the quality of the people at Novell who drive the quality of what we all bring to the marketplace.

Until next time, peace.

Ross