Farewell ProActive

I was shocked recently to hear that a previous employer, ProActive Integrators, one of the larger SYSPRO VARs in South Africa, had closed its doors. As with a large Sage VAR, the MIS Group in the US, it seems that a combination of market conditions and financial issues forced the company to cease business. I wish Duncan, Eugene, Bev, Ray and all the other people there, all the best and trust in God’s blessing for them.

My Office Home experience

For at least ten years I have worked on PCs that use Microsoft Office productivity software (Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint), at work and home. However, the PC at home had an old version of Office (either 2000 or XP) and did not have PowerPoint; this became a major problem for my youngest child who needed PowerPoint for some school work. So she took matters into her own hands, got a CD of Office 2007 from a friend and loaded all the Office software on the home PC. Unfortunately, she was unaware that Office needs a product key, and since we could not find one, my eldest child decide to uninstall the software, leaving our home PC without any Office software at all (the CD of the old Office version was long lost). That created a difficulty for me as my Outlook .PST file, with six years of personal email, was on that PC.

No problem, I thought, I can buy a new version of Office from a local retail outlet; that was where my first lesson in Office started. Lesson 1: The cheapest version of Office – Home and Student Edition -  has Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote, and currently costs about R900 in South Africa (list price). When I asked for a version that includes Outlook, I was astounded to learn that it would cost over three times as much, and the version that has all the Office software (including Visio and Groove) costs over seven times as much.

I remembered that I could use Outlook Express as that came standard with Windows, so I bought the Home and Student version and thought I had all my problems sorted out. Then came the next lesson, in fact two. Lesson 2: Outlook Express did not have an import option for Outlook, so I went searching on Google for a solution and found out that you cannot import an Outlook .PST into Outlook Express unless Outlook is installed on the same PC. Lesson 3: I also found out that Microsoft had replaced Outlook Express with Windows Live Mail.

Thinking that I might get better support for my problem with Windows Live Mail, I downloaded the Live Mail installer, and was impressed that it was less than 2Mb. Lesson 4: The installer is only a stub, when you run it, the following files are downloaded from a Microsoft site (note: I also opted to install a Microsoft application called Family Care):

• - Application Error Runtime
• - Visual Studio Runtime
• - Communications Platform
• - Junk Mail Filter
• - Live Update Tool
• - Live Sign-in
• - Installer
• - Choice Guard
• - Mail
• - Search Enhancement
• - Synch Framework Runtime
• - Synch Framework Services
• - Toolbar
• - Family Safety

After I got Windows Live Mail set up and running, I discovered Lesson 5: Windows Live Mail does import from Outlook Express, but has no import from Outlook. I thought I was screwed, until I realised that my work laptop (which is still on Windows XP) had Outlook and Outlook Express. This lead to Lesson 6: how to finally import my .PST file into Live Mail, the steps were:

1. copy the .PST file from the home PC to the work laptop using a memory stick,
2. create an Outlook profile on the work PC to use the .PST file,
3. start Outlook Express and import data from Outlook using the profile I had just created,
4. copy the Outlook Express storage directory (it’s not a simple file like Outlook) from the work laptop to the home PC using a memory stick,
5. start Windows Live Mail and import the Outlook Express data from the storage directory on the memory stick.

By this time, I had finally recovered my history of emails, but from the time of buying the Office software to having emails available again took me over five hours.

Now I am ready to start being a Windows Live Mail user at home, and also wondering whether or not there is value in moving to a web-based mail service like Gmail.

My blog stats

I am pleased to see how my blog is being viewed. While I’m not in the same league as Dennis, Ray, Michael or Vinnie, I am more than happy to see the number of views I am getting on a regular basis.

Some personal data lost

I have received a letter in the mail from Zurich Insurance that they noticed that a back-up storage tape with some of my personal data has been lost during a transfer.

The fact that the transfer happened last year but they only recently discovered the loss is a bit disconcerting. What’s also concerning is that I don’t recall ever having had any kind of policy or investment with Zurich.

It just goes to show how much of our personal data is held by organisations we have don’t deal with, even on an occasional basis.

It’s times like this that I appreciate why countries enact data privacy laws – South Africa doesn’t have any yet. Then maybe I would known that Zurich also kept personal information about me.

A sign that social business is growing up

Michael Fauscette made some wise comments about a new company, Pragmatic Enterprise 2.0, that announced itself recently:

without a methodology, a risk mitigation approach, the correct skills and change management a project is doomed. Businesses need enterprise class, scaleable social tools, social processes and knowledgeable assistance to pull off this level of business transformation.

Earlier this week some colleagues announced a partnership that is both good news for businesses that want to do social transformation projects but also an indication that social business is growing up.

I think Michael is right.

I also had a discussion with one of the founders, Michael Krigsman, on Twitter that their product diagram looked like it was designed by a committee and was difficult to understand. I am looking forward to how things develop on that front.

Safra Katz’s false analogy

Use of an analogy is one way of trying to get people to understand your proposition. Joint President of Oracle, Safra Katz, is reported by Michael Krigsman -  Oracle’s integration strategy: Customer trade-offs – to have used the analogy of buying a car vs buying technology to explain Oracle’s acquisition strategy.

… we would go online to buy thousands of disconnected parts from many vendors, which our children would assemble into a completed car because the parts would not come with instructions. Just as we finished assembling the car … a light would go on indicating that an upgrade or patch is required. Katz said, “We would then do it all again.”

Katz used this car assembly story as a metaphor for product complexity in the enterprise … Oracle reduces this complexity by bringing together under one roof infrastructure, hardware, and database products that are “engineered to work together.”

The problem is that analogy is false – its trying to make out that purchase decisions by consumers and businesses are the same. As a marketing colleague has pointed out about information, there a significant differences between the consumer and business market.

When you buy a car, you don’t have to consider whether the wrong car choice will change your personal or family life (unless you can’t pay or buy an old, unsafe car). Business decisions on enterprise software are far more complex and have a different set of considerations.

As Michael points out:

Even though integration can reduce implementation complexity on customer projects, large vendors may introduce another set of risks.

While a large end-to-end vendor can offer greater simplicity, the trade-off involves the customer transferring power to that vendor. In a single-vendor world, customers who invest in large systems can become beholden to the large vendor, which gains greater control over pricing, product features, maintenance costs, and future development.

Experiential marketing for enterprise software

Brian Sommer suggests that technology marketers should adopt the practices of consumer marketing and use ‘experiential’ marketing techniques -  Selling that Technology: Functions, Features & Fools.

I’m trying to imagine how an ERP vendor would approach this. What’s the experience of a sales order clerk capturing an order, or a production manager managing work-in-progress?

The issue is that they don’t make the buying decision. The only experience you would have to focus on it that of the CEO or CFO. And what would that be?

Disclosure: my new role at SYSPRO

The bloggers I respect disclose their business-related interests. So I feel it appropriate that I disclose my new business role.

I am joining the ERP vendor SYSPRO. My position will be in Product and Industry Marketing and my responsibilities will include some standard duties like:

- product-based messaging and collateral,
- working with Product Managers to understand and articulate product value,
- assist and communicate with sales to position, articulate and sell product,
- working with Marketing to optimise marketing through all channels and drive demand generation and awareness programs,
- support the company’s analyst relations effort,
- work with User Groups around the world.

In addition I will be able to participate in social media and networking, so what used to be a hobby now is part of my job.

I will also be working with the team on the launch of a new release of SYSPRO in the coming months.

Revisiting the Gartner Tier 2 ERP Magic Quadrant

There are only two Tier 1 ERP vendors – Oracle and SAP – but there are several Tier 2 vendors (and Microsoft is a Tier 2 vendor in the ERP space, despite what some say). If your company is a large or international business, you don’t have much choice and the chances are high that you are a Tier 1 ERP customer. If, however, the business is a small- or medium-size organisation, or if you have de-centralised divisions, you have a much wider choice of ERP vendors.

In June 2009, the analyst group, Gartner, published its “Magic Quadrant for Midmarket and Tier 2-Oriented ERP for Product-Centric Companies”, which is their evaluation of some major Tier 2 ERP vendors based on two criteria – Ability to Execute, and Completeness of Vision. For some consulting research I was asked to do, I had the opportunity to review the Gartner report and some of the comments that were made about it:

Tough to retire in this economy
The One and Only Choice in SMB ERP: Microsoft Dynamics AX
Gartner Mid-Market ERP Magic Quadrant: Should Have Stayed in Retirement
Gartner’s conservative mid-tier ERP Magic Quadrant

Leaving aside the comments about “where are the SaaS vendors?”, it interested me how analysts, all based in northern hemisphere, 1st World countries, were surprised why some vendors were placed where they were. For example, Frank Scavo’s amazement that:

QAD and Syspro show a better "ability to execute" than any SAP or Oracle product

Epicor Vantage shows a better "completeness of vision" than any SAP or Oracle product

The point is that these vendors have dealt with mid-market customers since they started and understand how those organisations operate and think. As I have mentioned in a previous blog, the super-size IT vendors have such a bloat of bureaucracy that they discourage the smaller, more nimble companies. The only way the Tier 1 ERP vendors can approach small- and mid-size companies is via a reseller channel which can communicate with that market in the appropriate way.

Gartner’s report classed only one Tier 2 ERP product as a leader, Microsoft Dynamics AX (Axapta has it used to be called). This surprised a number of bloggers, including me. The problem is that AX does not have a large customer base, and is more complex to implement than some of the other Tier 2 products. There has been a spate of comments on the ITToolbox ERP selection site about AX, for example, here; finding good and experienced AX implementation partners and consultants is not that easy, compared to a number of the other Tier 2 vendors.

Some people think that, because Microsoft is the global leading brand when it comes to desktop and server software, its ERP software must have the same attributes. Except for the CRM product, its ERP products were acquired – GP (formerly Great Plains) because it was strong in the US and UK, and NAV (Navision) and AX because of their presence in Europe. But as Dennis Howlett noted:

The reality is that Microsoft’s acquired products … don’t travel well. When they do, they travel inconsistently.

Another problem with Microsoft’s Dynamics division is the inconsistency of regional management; to some extent Microsoft is still dominated by a desktop and server marketing and sales mentality.

The Tier 2 vendors to watch are the Challengers as they “have broad and mature ERP systems” – SYSPRO, QAD, Oracle’s JD Edwards Enterprise One (formerly JD Edwards OneWorld), and Infor Syteline. I remember being told some time ago that it was the Challengers that have the best chance of becoming leaders, rather than the Visionaries.

When do acquisitions make a company too big?

There seems to be a belief in some quarters that when it comes to IT companies, the larger the better; for example, Acquire Me! Oracle’s and SAP’s Next Likely Targets which quotes:

"A move by Big Blue, say on a midmarket ERP partner like Lawson or Infor, could presage further consolidation in that arena by Oracle and SAP." (The 451 Group report – Where Might Old Foes Oracle and SAP Each Look Next to Stave Off Apps Hunger Pangs?)

However, from a customer (and a partner) point-of-view, dealing with some larger ERP vendors means going through the bureaucracy to get even small things done. Also, large software vendors seem to go for a centralised control model. It might be old news, but at a conference in 2008, I was told by a senior local representative that Oracle’s process for confirming quotes for SA companies could only be done by Head Office in the US, this required a wait of several weeks before a quote could be approved.

Waiting that long for a quote might be OK in some countries, but South African business people are not typically enamoured by long decision cycles.