RE: Oh where has my disk space gone? -- MIDRANGE-L

Bill, Al

I see that Al has summarized my views, very well, and very concisely...:-)

I would only add a few thoughts:

I've observed the same pattern as Al, though I may have implied otherwise.
I find that Distribution is somewhat of a mid-point between the predominant
methodology used in Retail and Manufacturing.

I would also add, however, that it is primarily a matter of the leadership
of the companies, rather than the particular industry, that seems to be the
determining factor of company culture.  However, executives DO tend to
gravitate towards industries that match their personal management style and
the degree of structure and risk they are comfortable with.  I think this is
why industries exhibit these patterns.


===> Al, you've told me before, but I forget...  I'm guessing you've spent
some fair amount of time, in at least some of the companies you've worked
for.  I don't think these patterns are easily discernable, until you've
spent a fair number of years in a single company.  Has that been your
experience...?


jt


"Have a GREAT day...!  And a BETTER ONE TOMORROW~~~:-)" (sm)


> -----Original Message-----
> From: midrange-l-admin@midrange.com
> [mailto:midrange-l-admin@midrange.com]On Behalf Of MacWheel99@aol.com
> Sent: Friday, November 16, 2001 3:57 PM
> To: midrange-l@midrange.com
> Subject: Re: Oh where has my disk space gone?
> Importance: High
>
>
> >  I learned the 80/20 rule the hard way, by working in Retail
> most of my IT
> >  career.  In Retail, it's more like the 50/50 rule, because
> everything seems
> >  to be done half-a'd.  It's an experimental approach, as opposed to
> >  Manufacturing companies where the tendency (probably due to corporate
> >  culture) is to spec out IT projects to a lot more detail.
>
> I have worked about 45% of my career in Retail, about 45% in
> Manufacturing &
> about 10% in other industries.  It seems to me that corporate
> culture is more
> industry wide than individual companies & due to the proliferation of what
> specialities rise in the management structure.
>
> In manufacturing you have a lot of engineering types who understand how
> things work, how things can be made, and that experiments need to
> be measured
> very carefully, to figure out the most cost effective way to get the job
> done.  This means that top management invariably has someone in production
> methods, personnel theories, high up in the structure, and very concerned
> about measuring costs.  This means that the corporate culture
> dictates that
> the computer department conduct itself in a rather scientific
> manner compared
> to other industries.
>
> In retail, we are overwhelmed with the sales & marketing people
> who have wild
> ideas they want us to try out.  They don't want analysis.  They
> want a small
> budget to try this or that idea ... the limit of analysis is to
> measure how
> successful this or that scheme is for bringing us new customers or new
> business from old customers.  This leads to a totally different corporate
> culture.
>
> Since I have worked in more than one employer in each of manufacturing &
> retail, and seen that patterns are somewhat consistent across
> each industry &
> the only other variable is the size of the enterprise & the type
> of ownership
> (stock market or private) ... jt is right about the patterns but corporate
> culture is misnamed ... I think of it as industry society.
>
> MacWheel99@aol.com (Alister Wm Macintyre) (Al Mac)
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