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Posts tagged ‘Firm of the Future’

Mar 9

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I’ve got some bad news for you, sunshine

For those not in the know, the title of this post was taken from “In the Flesh” – a song on Pink Floyd’s The Wall album. The Wall resonates heavily with themes of abandonment and isolation and relates the story of a protagonist who steadily builds up a wall to hide behind in response to the negative pressures in his life.

[Here's a link to the video for those interested: WARNING FOR LANGUAGE AND THEMES THAT MAY BE OFFENSIVE TO SOME. Please don't click if you are one of those folks that get offended at such things. In fact, no one should click on it. I'm asking you not to.]

I think the themes are appropriate as the next few articles are going to focus on the Sage Transformation journey.

What exactly is the “Sage Transformation” journey?

From what I can tell (and please understand that the following is just my opinion and is not endorsed, confirmed, approved or in any other way agreed upon by anyone at Sage), at its core, the Sage Transformation journey is a plan designed to help Sage respond to the rapidly changing landscape of software publishing.

It includes many different elements including re-branding, introduction of subscription pricing, re-organization efforts, direct sales, closer interaction with end user customers, improved cross-selling, connected services and many more. We’ll cover some of these topics in the coming days but for now, let’s keep our focus on the big picture.

Read more

Feb 5

6 Comments

Are you guilty of killing your business without realizing it?

I'm the guy with the white t-shirt - do I stand out?

I recently read a great article by Jason Blumer on the importance of creative pricing and getting out of the time and materials business.

It was a tad overlong for my infant-like attention span (think: “and to summarize my position, I would like to say … oooh something shiny! Pretty! Uhm, what was I saying?”) but well worth the read and I encourage everyone to give it a shot.

Jason drives home some great points about the importance of aligning goals through strategic pricing (aka pricing on purpose, aka value pricing, aka goal-oriented pricing) and all of the surrounding issues.

With me, he’s preachin’ to the choir and, of course, the choir always loves the good preachin’. Lay it on me, Mr. Blumer!

It got me thinking along a tangent though.

All the folks out there in service firms that are still billing by the hour are killing their businesses. In fact, it’s even worse than that.

Billing by the hour is killing the service industry.

How can I make such an outrageous claim?

It’s somewhat a matter of perspective. I help businesses become more profitable through effective and efficient usage of CRM.

In that role, I work with a lot of small and medium sized businesses and get a first-hand view into what’s happening out there. And it ain’t pretty.

The internet has changed the game for all of us. I’ve written about this previously so I won’t re-cover it here except to add one sobering thought for all of us:

Even if you have a one in a million idea, there are at least a thousand other folks out there on the internet – just a click or two away.

There’s little to no differentiation out there.

Most service firms have visions, missions, values and messages that are completely interchangeable. You could swap corporate names in and out of their marketing literature like some kind of demented fill in the blank, Mad Libs exercise designed to point out how similar each firm is to their competitors.

Combining this lack of differentiation with pricing by the hour guarantees a slow and steady drive toward a competitive landscape filled with “me too” solutions at increasingly lower prices.

Oh, I can hear some of you saying “But damnit, we ARE the best service firm and we do truly partner with our customers! Those other guys are just saying that but we really do it!” or even “But damnit, we ARE the experts in this particular field!”

Ok, ok … I believe you.

But – you don’t need me believing you. You need the customers and prospects to believe you.

And just like driving by a block full of McDonalds, each one looking nearly the same, how can your customers and prospects tell which one is going to provide the best experience? The best value for their dollar?

Hint: they can’t.

Pricing projects based on value received and offering a money back guarantee is a good start to standing out from the “me too” crowd.

Again, it’s a good start. It’s not an end game solution.

When done correctly, pricing projects based on value will change your culture and change what drives you. It enables you to discover what you really love to do and are good at and can make money at.

*This* is the start of true differentiation and will serve you well in the coming years.

If you aren’t prepared to do it, don’t be surprised as customers steadily start going to the low cost provider over the next five to ten years as they can’t figure out any other reason to choose you over your competition.

I’ll leave you with this quote (first introduced to me by confidant and fellow game-changer, Ed Kless):

“If you don’t like change, you’re going to like irrelevance even less.”  General Eric Shinseki, Chief of Staff, U. S. Army

Dec 19

10 Comments

The dirty little secret of many professional service firms

http://www.flickr.com/photos/andraspfaff/2266026377/sizes/z/in/photostream/

Ooops... the client just found out

I’ve previously blogged about why I think tracking and billing for time is a bad idea and even openly mocked it with a satirical example. I would like to cotinue along that line by revealing the <gasp> dirty little secret of many professional service firms.

Here it is: many firms compensate their professionals by the amount of billable hours they generate in a given period.

It can vary slightly – chargeable hours vs billable hours, utilization rate % (chargeable hours vs total hours worked) over a baseline amount, whatever.

What it boils down to is the individual consultants profit from charging clients more time.

Don’t get me wrong here.

I realize that this model was created with the best of intentions – to compensate workers for doing a great job by helping more clients out.

After all, the guy or girl that is busting ass and working really hard on client jobs should be rewarded. That makes sense, right? After all, they are helping the firm bring in money. And the deadbeats that aren’t charging hours shouldn’t be rewarded, right? [please re-read that last sentence and think that one through]

The problems with this model are manyfold. The biggest are:

  1. It encourages heroic efforts. I see this all the time in traditional consulting firms. Consultants faced with a problem will keep chipping away and chipping away and chipping away until they resolve it. Sometimes this requires long hours and late nights and dereliction of other responsibliities but, hey, the problem got resolved! To me, these situations are timebombs waiting to blow up in everyone’s faces.
  2. It encourages inflation of hours on timesheets. Now, I’m not questioning any one of you in particular but the point stands. When you compensate individuals for work tracked, billed or charged to a client, you will encourage that tracking, billing and charging behavior. It might be a small bump of time here, a little over there, whatever. I’m sure it doesn’t happen in your firms but it happens in other firms.
  3. It discourages team efforts. Related to point one, an individual in these firms gains nothing from bringing in their peers to resolve problems quickly. This is a serious problem for the firm, for the clients and for the entire team at the firm. Projects take longer than necessary, knowledge transfer among team members is not happening and the client relationship is at the individual level – not the firm as a whole.
  4. It discourages shared goals with clients. The firm and the individuals at firms that practice this compensation model are focused on maximizing hours while clients are focused on minimizing hours. The fox is guarding the hen house – the situation has been primed from the start to have winners and losers. With long-term value creation, everyone wins.

These points don’t even cover all of the problems with the practice but hopefully it drives home the underlying message: a true client advocacy position results from a shared goal system.

You can’t have truly shared goals when you are billing by time – particularly if your organization is incented to drive up billable hours at the individual level.

Look: I completely understand how these models come to be.

It’s an attempt by the firm to align everyone in the firm towards a common, shared goal and to compensate the individuals that are on board with the goal.

That’s wonderful … truly. I’m a huge fan of goal-setting and aligning purposes to maximize end results. But this practice isn’t good for anyone – the firms, the individuals and particularly not the clients.

The good news is the solution is simple.

Change the goal.

Instead of maximizing revenue through billable hours, consider team based revenue goals based on meeting client expectations?

Instead of individuals aiming to have the most billable hours shift focus on where do we stand as a firm?

Are we providing team-based solutions? Does the client feel that we operate effectively and efficiently to meet their goals? Is the relationship with the firm or the super-hero consultant?

How are the clients doing? Are we meeting client goals? Are we getting repeat work?

Will the client refer us to others? Will the client act as a reference?

Hopefully the suggestions above will give you something to consider the next time you evaluate your firm compensation policies.

Dec 8

9 Comments

Training vs. Education

I have a teacher. We’ll call him Ed. Ed has this notion that humans shouldn’t be trained. They should be educated. Only animals should be trained.

Want to be trained?

My approach is slightly different.

There are people who need training and others who should be educated.

What do I mean?

While there are many definitions of training, I normally think of training as “teaching specific steps in order to complete a task without delving into any of the underlying reasoning behind those steps” (completely my made up definition).

When I think education, I think more along the lines of “teaching not only the steps required to complete a task, but to also explain the underlying reasons and possibly even allowing them to participate in the process of deciding how to complete those tasks” (Again my made up definition).

There are those who need to know exactly what they need to do their job and nothing more. Some people can’t handle or process any more than that.

There are others who can handle the heavier load and may even have the need or desire to understand not only how, but why they are doing things the way they are. These people should get the education, even if their position doesn’t require they understand the reasons behind why they do things the way they do them.

Yes, ideally everyone would have the capacity and desire to the higher level reasons they do be educated.

The real goal should be to figure out who falls into either parameter and getting them the education or training they need or desire for their ability and position.

Also stop using the two interchangeably. They don’t mean the same thing.

Just my 2 cents.

Nov 29

7 Comments

Breaking News! Decades long struggle ends with Hollywood actors winning right to hourly pay!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/neilarmstrong2/5314500070/sizes/z/in/photostream/In a surprising turn of events, the Screen Actor’s Guild (SAG) has successfully lobbied all major and independent movie studios to allow their member actors and actress to begin getting paid by the hour instead of by the movie.

“We lobbied long and hard for this behind the scenes for decades” stated SAG president Imad Ummy. “We are finally done watching from the sidelines as lawyers and other professsionals benefit from the lucrative time and billing system while we struggle under a fixed price model based on demand for individual actors and actresses.”

Unsurprisingly, the majority of SAG members universally applaud this direction.

The old model left it impossible for individual actors and actresses to determine if a movie was worth doing as they were unable to predict how long they would spend on set and if the compensation would be worth it. In many cases, it was impossible to determine if movies were profitable ventures for the individual SAG members as they could not assess properly without a system to track total hours worked.

Oscar award winning actress, Meryl Streep had this to say:

“It was really an impossible situation. We were asked to set a fixed price for our services without knowing how long we would be forced to work on certain projects. It was quite unbearable. Some directors require take after take after take to get the scene just right. It’s hardly fair to expect us to be required to do this work for free. Now we can get paid fairly for work done regardless of irrational demands from the studios.”

To help ensure their members are compensated fairly, SAG is providing members with ankle bracelets that will be worn at all times while on set. These patented devices will track their movements and record time properly down to the milli-second while they are on camera – regardless of whether specific shots are used in final production or discarded on the editing floor. This will ensure that full and fair compensation is received for hours worked.

These devices provided the final break through in the decades long battle for hourly billing rights.

Studios had demanded the ability to double-check and confirm that hours were being reported accurately. Some suggestions included assigning a monitor to follow around the actors while on set or a punch card with a clock in and out system.

The final solution was simple with the new technology: the SAG-assigned bracelets will track the actors’ and actresses’ movement using equipment installed throughout movie lots to prevent time in the bathroom or trailers or other off-camera time from being billed through to the movie studios. Each individual member will be assigned a unique bracelet to prevent fraudulent behavior of actors clocking in for friends.

Heralding the tracking devices as the greatest advancement in film making since the introduction of “talkies”, Mr. Ummy suggested it was only a matter of time before professionals in all service fields were using these devices to improve client relationships by tracking their every movement and ensuring proper time recording for both the professional and the client.

Related news: All major movie studios report average movie length to decrease by 45 minutes within the next three years in an effort to make more efficient movies.

More related news: A new website promising “the right actor for the right hourly rate” has sprung up to help studios find the best priced talent.

In even more related news: Movies to begin sucking as they become more efficient.

Nov 16

1 Comment

I’m an experienced professional – why should I attend Sage Consulting Academy?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mindaugasdanys/3404247622/sizes/z/in/photostream/

Kicking myself for not attending the Jamaica Academy!

The new certification process required by Sage to ensure consistent, high-quality customer experiences across the channel requires partners to attend the mandatory Sage Consulting Academy. Now this may initially be seen as an unnecessary burden to many firms that have been in the channel satisfactorily serving clients for ten, twenty even thirty plus years.

Yeah … I feel your pain. We can sit around and gripe all day long about the injustices in the world and the foolishness of such a session for individuals as well-established and seasoned as you and I, dear reader.

Or … maybe we can look at this as an opportunity?

An opportunity to revisit our practices, routines, methodologies that we have built over the years (either explicitly or by default) to serve clients. After all, the reseller and professional service firm industry is undergoing huge transformations right now alongside the software publishers (and, frankly, almost every other industry out there as well).

Isn’t now a great time to review these things? Before it’s too late and you find yourself in an untenable position?

It’s good to keep this thought in mind:

“If you don’t like change, you’re going to like irrelevance even less.”  General Eric Shinseki, Chief of Staff, U. S. Army

You can read about one partner’s experiences here and how she (Susan Cardoza at Sysera) changed her mind after attending. I’m sure others have similar experiences to share.

One apparent hit with the Sage Consulting Academy was recently written up by Wayne Schulz on his channel-focused site, www.erplife.com. Read about here.

In the meantime, feel free to share your experiences in the comments below.

Nov 15

4 Comments

100% true story: Plato and Aristotle advocated killing the timesheet!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/haagsuitburo/2899553904/sizes/z/in/photostream/

The future looks kind of wacky!

We pick up where we left off yesterday in which Plato and Aristotle had a falling out – resulting in the dissolution of their long-standing student-mentor relationship. Today’s scene opens with a much more joyous atmosophere.

TIMESHEETUS INTERRUPTUS

ACT I.
SCENE II.

WE OPEN WITH OUR TWO PROTAGONISTS SITTING AT A TABLE WITH A GENERAL AIR OF HAPPINESS, BOTH LAUGHING.

PLATO [smiling]: My dear friend, I cannot believe I pushed you out ten months ago in my pig-headed belief that billing for time was the only way to operate.

ARISTOTLE [smiling]: Tut, tut, Plato. Who can blame you? The business was doing well from a financial standpoint and it certainly was easy to keep doing it the same old way as everyone else.

PLATO [smiling (it's all smiles from here on out so you can stop reading these cues)]: Yes, yes! Easy certainly! But preferred, no! Most definitely, not preferred.

I hadn’t realized how unsatisfying and stultifying the time tracking system was for our fellow orators. To think! We had consistently attributed an individual’s value to our organization and to our dear clients merely by measuring the sands through the hourglass.

Looking back now, I see how both uninspired and uninspiring our old time and billing model was.

ARISTOTLE [smiling (I warned you - it's all smiles from here on out)]: Agreed, good friend, agreed. It was far from optimal.

PLATO [smiling]: And think of the clients! Think how happy they are now as well. No longer do we spend hours reviewing and – let’s face it – sometimes arguing over how longs things take.

Now we are focused on the common goals of each project. It’s all about the end results and not the ways and means of production.

ARISTOTLE [smiling]: Exactly. After our heated exchange and we parted company, I had time to contemplate the situation and came upon a profound epiphany.

By focusing on the common objectives and goals of our customers, including the deliverables and target dates, we immediately moved from across the table from them to the same side of the table with them.

PLATO [smiling]: Brilliant! And to effectively deliver the promised results, it became incumbent upon us to truly understand what was important to them in reaching their goals. This deeper understanding allows us to provide better quality service.

ARISTOTLE [smiling]: And all without timesheets!

PLATO [smiling]: All that wasted time spent tracking, analyzing and arguing over timesheets is now spent aligning our goals and discussing value. A much more enjoyable experience all around.

And because clients pay for the value received, I am encouraged to hire and surround myself with the best and brightest to deliver these results in an optimal fashion. No longer are we rewarded for the ignorance of junior staff who take longer to do things.

ARISTOTLE [smiling]: Yes! Yes! Exactly! It was always temptation to put the lesser capable on a job because we would be able to fatten our purses on the un-informed customer. Not that *we* ever did that of course. But other, less scrupulous firms certainly gave in to the temptation.

PLATO [smiling]: And who can blame them? The hourly billing system is broken and rewards the less skilled and punishes the more skilled.

Now, we can chose to bring a junior person on for training and cultivation of talent. The customer is not penalized and does not bear the cost of this training because the price is set prior to work by the customer’s sense of value for the selected deliverables.

It is up to us to manage our costs in order to maintain a profitable existence that we use to provide additional services, keep up on our professional advancement and keep customers informed of beneficial news.

ARISTOTLE [smiling]: It’s as if night has given way to day.

PLATO [smiling]: …

ARISTOTLE [smiling]: What is it, Plato?

PLATO [smiling]: I was just thinking Aristotle … contemplating how amazing life can be and the twists and turns that come when you brave change. Look, my friend: the student has become the teacher.

ARISTOTLE [smiling]: Let’s not argue over who is the student and who is the teacher. Let’s settle on … “partners”.

PLATO [smiling]: “Partners”. I like the sound of that, partner.

ENTER SOPHOCLES STAGE RIGHT – SHAKING HIS FIST DEFIANTLY IN THE AIR.

SOPHOCLES [angry]: What’s this I hear about you two fools getting rid of time sheets! That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. I realize I’m semi-retired but I have to speak my mind. That’s not how it’s done and clients won’t go for it and how will we know if our employees are working or goofing off if we don’t record their every movement and …

PLATO AND ARISTOTLE [Together, laughing]: Oh, Sophocles! Sit down and let’s discuss the future.

FADE TO BLACK.

When I have the time, I will translate the lost Scene in which Aristotle founds a travelling band of disciples called Verasagus Maximus with whom he emparts his wisdom upon a young Ronaldus Bakerus who in turn would go on and mentor Edwardius Klessian.

For now, I hope you enjoyed this moment in Ancient Firm of the Future History.

Nov 14

3 Comments

How Plato and Aristotle and time keeping ended in disaster

http://www.flickr.com/photos/dynamosquito/2538560682/sizes/z/in/photostream/

Did time tracking and billing really create this devastation? Yes.

[Please accept this submission of Ancient Firm of the Future History as my attempt to class up this joint.]

I find it funny how so many firms still use timesheets and time tracking to charge their clients. It’s fairly well established that the ancient philosophers resolved this matter long ago.

Please accept my interpretation of the original, classic Greek play detailing the events around this debate. Delivered in two Scenes within a single Act, I am pleased to present:

TIMESHEETUS INTERRUPTUS

ACT I.
SCENE I.

WE OPEN WITH PLATO SITTING AT A LARGE MARBLE DESK LOOKING OVER PAPERS, SHAKING HIS HEAD, NOTICIBLY DISTURBED …

PLATO [hesitantly]: Yeah… umm… Aristotle, can you come in here for a minute?

ENTER ARISTOTLE, STAGE RIGHT

ARISTOTLE [smiling]: You rang, boss?

PLATO [uncomfortable]: I’m hoping you can clear something up for me. I just spent the last 30 minutes at the public market being accosted by Senator Acrimonius IV.

ARISTOTLE [surprised]: What?!

PLATO [bemused]: Yes.

Apparently the time keeping cards that we turned in for reimbursement did not match their own records. As example, last Wednesday you marked down 5.50 hours for Public Discourse on Republican Society but Acrimonius’ records indicated that you actually put in 4.25 hours.

And on Thursday, you marked down 7.75 hours and he says his staff vouches that you were only present for a half day. He, himself, was not present on that day but he harangued me for 30 minutes on the fact that he trusts his staff with his life and he trusts us not a whit. How can you explain this discrepancy?

ARISTOTLE [taken aback]: It’s a simple matter, Plato. I walked around the marketplace contemplating and organizing my thoughts prior to arrival in order to provide a clearer and well-structured discourse to ensure their time was well spent with me. I hardly think that is uncommon, master, as you yourself practice the same. Isn’t effective dialogue our goal?

PLATO [somewhat defensively]: That may be true but need I remind you that it’s not my practices that are at question here? Acrimonius has informed me that the Senate is holding all payments until his staff has sufficient time to review all of our records for the last twelve periods to ensure there has been no further fraudulent behavior.

ARISTOTLE [clearly agitated]: Certainly, you’re joking!

PLATO [getting displeased - slams fist to desk]: Do I look like I’m joking? I’ve told you previously that the Senate is an important client and are very precise about their timekeeping practices. They count every grain that runs through the hour glass down to the second.

ARISTOTLE [on his heels and getting defensive]: Plato, I refute these accusations. My time stands as written.

PLATO [angrier]: I appreciate your feelings but this is too large of an account for us to sacrifice. Not only does it mean a loss of our livelihood, it could result in the loss of our very lives if we displease them.

ARISTOTLE [hotly, leaning over the desk]: This is an outrage. I am at the peak of my career and I have to work twice as hard to make the same income compared to my early, ignorant years. Why … I remember not ten years gone when a Public Discourse on Republican Society would take me three or four times as long to accomplish and they paid every gold piece for my time.

Now, I do far better quality work than I ever did in the past and I’m busting my hump three times harder to make a living. To top that with being questioned about my every last minute is unacceptable, Plato!

Tell me, sir! How does this serve our client?

PLATO [nearly frothing at the mouth]: Aristotle, you ignorant ass. This is the way it’s always been done and this is the way it always will be done.

ARISTOTLE [settling back, introspective]: Well then. Maybe I’ve chosen the wrong pursuit for my life.

PLATO [slightly quieter but unnoticing of ARISTOTLE's change]: Clearly you have. And in fact, maybe it is *I* who have chosen wrong. The wrong student in you, Aristotle. Since you feel that you are clearly above my teachings and understandings, I must insist that you clear out your things and depart my troop.

There are other consultants ^H^H^H^H deep thinkers out there are eager to join my company and practice in our well-established tradition of time keeping and hourly billing without complaint. After all, *that* is what the clients want.

ARISTOTLE [quietly]: As you say, Plato. As you say. And yet … maybe there is another way … something better for all of us.

Perhaps there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

END SCENE WITH ARISTOTLE WALKING OUT OF THE OFFICE WITH HIS EYES FOCUSED ON SOME DISTANT POINT, QUIETLY MUTTERING TO HIMSELF.

END SCENE

Stay tuned! We’ll pick up with the dramatic conclusion in our next installment.

Nov 2

15 Comments

What do the new Sage pricing options mean for you?

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose

First off, let’s get this out in the open: any pricing options discussed in this post are purely speculative at this point. Sage has announced that there will be new options introduced over the next 12 – 18 months but the details have not been released yet.

So as long as we know we are playing the speculation game, let’s begin…

The prevailing speculation is that pricing will be aligned with subscription models and represent a monthly or annual fee model that allows the user to have access to their desired Sage software solution as long as the fees are kept up. This pricing model is in line with the majority of (maybe that should read “all”?) new internet-based software publishers these days – you pay an “as you go” price.

As a software publisher, this makes a ton of sense as it provides an even, smooth, predictable revenue stream that allows the organization to maintain consistent operations and budget activities such as marketing, sales, research and development, operations, capital expenditures, etc. This model is far preferred to the current model of a large initial expenditure by a customer and then they may or may not stay current on the annual support (which entitles customers to current software versions and some level of support).

From the customer perspective, this makes a ton of sense too and it’s one of the reasons that SaaS (Software as a Service) is becoming more popular. Just as this model provides the predictable financial model for the software publishers, the customers also has the same benefit of smooth expenditures vs a large initial implementation cost of services and software.

Ultimately, customers will typically pay more for the software with this model over their total usage as it works much like renting vs owning property.

The interesting thing is that this model works whether the software is in “the cloud” or installed at the customer’s website. Sage is making a push to providing off premise options (I’m not getting into the “what is the cloud” debate here) to give customers the freedom of choice and the theoretical pricing model will work for all options with, of course, some variation in pricing depending on the selection.

For Sage and their customers and prospective customers, the new model is a very good thing. Sage wants to provide options that customers are asking for these days and give the customers the flexibility to do business the way they want. It makes a lot of sense from this angle.

Customers are spending a lot more time on their own these days researching options and making their choices without the assistance of VARs (Value Added Resellers / Sage partners). When they are ready to buy, should Sage say “Whoa … hold up there, chief. You need to talk to one of our partners.” before committing the sale?

For their sake, I hope they wouldn’t do that. Customers have choices and are going to want to do business with vendors that make it easy to do business. Every last one of us follows this rule in life.

So for Sage resellers … what does that mean? Well – Sage historically has a great track record as a partner-centric organization. This might change but I don’t think it will in the near-term.

On the Accpac side of the business, there is a good track record of customers signing up with Accpac Online, the Sage-hosted version of Accpac and being assigned to local resellers to assist them with configuration, training and ongoing assistance. With the current launch of the MAS Online, from what I’ve heard the same model is being used. It’s a rare customer that can configure and setup their accounting or CRM system without some expert guidance.

For the short-term anyway, it seems that margins and end-user relationships are still safe with the channel.

That being said … I think if resellers keep doing business as usual they are going to find themselves in the soup in the coming decade. I encourage every partner in the channel to sharpen their saws and shake things up. Attend the Firm of the Future sessions. Think through how to take your services to the next level. Figure out a niche. Do something – anything – because the status quo is gone for good.

I occasionally hear partners speak as if Sage is somehow unique in facing these dilemmas and decisions and maybe the grass is greener with other publishers. This is not the case at all.

It’s every last publisher. Think about it: all new software companies are starting off going direct as internet based, cloud, subscription models. Sage, Microsoft, SAP are actually operating at a disadvantage with decades of inertia keeping them from changing course overnight. But it’s coming.

Again – the above is 100% speculation but if I look into my crystal ball, it sure seems like a winning play for Sage and Sage customers.

Jul 11

Ron Baker's Book Shelf
2 Comments

Baker’s Dozen Best Business Books (Plus A Few)

Today I was in one of the most interesting Sage Summit sessions I’ve been in. Interestingly I don’t think it was one where I actually directly learned anything. Rather it’s one where I’ve managed to pick up a great deal of potential learning or stated another way I’ve learned about a few more books to add to my unlibrary.

Note: All links on book titles are links back to Amazon.com.

This is a list of Ron Baker’s thirteen (give or take) favorite business books. In order for a book to make this list, Ron Baker’s criteria are: Does it change your world view? Or does it change how you act? To make this list these books had to do both for Ron.

Read more

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