Re: Legacy code. Was:Dates

>Where do you get this notion that I don't want to give the client more
>for his money? That's the whole point of moving forward. That's what I
>mean by providing a more valuable service. Valuable, not just expensive.
>My rates are set at the level the market will bear (I hope). Raise them
>without providing some added value and the clients will simply walk.
>Fail to improve the product (me) and the rates will steadily decline,
>certainly against inflation. The clients are not stupid, you know, and
>neither am I.

Well, Dave, that was the point I've been trying to make all along. The
question has been about the "added value". Why is it worth more if it
doesn't provide anything more for the customer? How do you tell if it
provides more for the customer without basing your training etc. on his
needs?

The exact quote from your previous post was, "It is more valuable because
the client will pay more for it." in response to my question, "What makes
it more valuable if it is not 'better'?"

I simply wanted to point out what you already know but I didn't think was
indicated in your posts. The "more valuable" service is one that fills an
actual need with the client. I suppose I should agree that it should also
be one that pays more (no sense ditching RPG to learn Java if that pays
minimum wage). 

>Are you serious? Positioning for the future of my business. It's not a
>static industry. If I decided to retrain as a lawyer my house would be

And do you position for the future of your business by looking to see what
your customers will need in the future that falls within your sphere and
training for those areas? Isn't that a little different that just
"training for what the client will pay more for"?

>I don't know, I get the feeling you're deliberately misinterpreting what
>I said out of a sense of mischief. Maybe I'm wrong.

I am sorry that I have given that impression. I did not intend to. I did
push your comment to the extreme (with the train to be a lawyer thing) to
make my point. Perhaps if you did train to be a lawyer, you could sue guys
like me for posts like this. 

>Precisely. That's why I'm not going to move into the law, sales, rock
>music, or cosmetic surgery thank you. OTOH IBM don't keep on selling you
>the same thing. They have a humungous R&D budget. If they were still
>trying to sell 360s there would be no IBM today.

Cosmetic surgery has it's appeal. ;-)

>No, they're not lawyers (although they employ quite a few). They know
>where their area of expertise is and they concentrate on developing
>that. They do not sit still. That's exactly the strategy that I'm
>recommending.

Me too! Hey, we agreed all along. The point I wanted to make was that I
felt it was more important to look for the areas that would solve your
customers needs, rather than simply look for what they pay most for.

Some customers are stupid, and they will pay most for stupid things.
That's great in teh short run, but when the stupid customer goes belly up,
it isn't always easy to find another fool to make money off of. However,
some business needs are consistant across an industry or even business as
a whole. I think watching those needs and equipping yourself to better
solve them will provide good revenue over time. 

>Dave Kahn - TCO, Tengiz, Kazakstan


Chris Rehm
Mr.AS400@ibm.net
You have to ask yourself, "How often can I afford to be unexpectedly out of 
business?" 
Get an AS/400.
+---
| This is the Midrange System Mailing List!
| To submit a new message, send your mail to "MIDRANGE-L@midrange.com".
| To unsubscribe from this list send email to MAJORDOMO@midrange.com
|    and specify 'unsubscribe MIDRANGE-L' in the body of your message.
| Questions should be directed to the list owner/operator: david@midrange.com
+---