Last night I joined a hoard of technology executives at ITAC’s Annual
Chairs’ Dinner, which caps off a lot of the activities the vendor
association conducts over the course of the year. They celebrated the IT Hero Awards (I
was there because I was a judge); they paid tribute to outgoing chair
Bob Courteau of SAP; and they hosted SAP Americas chief customer
officer Ed Lange as keynote speaker.
You could argue that every employee in an organization like SAP should be a chief customer officer – particularly after a series of maintenance fee decisions that created an uproar –
but Lange (who is also considered an executive vice-president)
impressed me by talking more like a genuine advocate than the usual
corporate sales guy. Like anyone who gives a keynote speech in 2009, he
started out by commenting on the bleak IT spending landscape, the
global economic troubles and the dire feelings of uncertainty and
frustration among the Fortune 500. He followed up, however, with a
couple of interesting conclusions I think are worth sharing.
“No matter what customer you go to talk to day, the No. 1 issue they
cite is the cost. The cost, the cost, the cost, the cost, the cost,”
Lange said. “The other thing they say is, ‘We’re looking for leadership
from you. We want to partner with you.”
To Lange, that means not just thinking of customers on a
sales-quarter-end basis but keeping in mind their long-term needs and
issues. “They’re questioning the fundamental model on which we’ve
operated for decades,” he said.
The second thing Lange said he’s learned is not to be put off by
customers who cry poor. “Cost and innovation are not mutually
exclusive,” he said. “When someone tells me it’s too expensive, they’re
asking me to innovate around cost.” Maybe that means offering a deeper
discount until the recession rebounds, or offering more products on an
on-demand basis. Maybe it means unbundling something that could be more
affordable as a point product.
Finally, Lange looked around the room and said, “I see all kinds of
companies here tonight. We’ve got Intel, Microsoft, HP, and so on. All
of us like to talk to the customer as if we’re the only ones they’re
dealing with,” he said. “We need to work better with other vendors.” He
didn’t use the words integration or interoperability, but that’s surely
what he meant. And he’s right.
My only criticism of Lange’s speech is that he didn’t take the next
step and offer any suggestions on how those in the audience could put
these principles into action. Maybe the job of a chief customer officer
is to simply provide a feedback mechanism. Maybe the IT managers he’s
talking to aren’t spelling out how they want things to change. Or maybe
this is a conversation that is only beginning. I hope those at the ITAC
event last night, and all those who didn’t – will join in.
