When Complexity Buries Value
There's nothing more consistent in an enterprise department than complexity.
I worked in a scrappy group at Microsoft in the late 90s where 16 people served 18,000 partners worldwide. It's unfathomable to think that I managed the following myself: a monthly box delivery, a monthly (printed) newsletter, AND the private web site for partners that I started in raw HTML (that I had learned on the job) with help from just three vendors.
There was a beauty in the rawness of our work.
We did not have the luxury of intricacies. As swiftly as we were able to get 18,000 boxes out the door containing the monthly culmination of Microsoft-wide product information, demos, and betas, we were already starting on the next box-- no time to stop and celebrate.
This came with its share of problems like a shortage of human editors, where spell-checker missed "Ask the Produce Manager" (yes, Product Manager) and sassy partners started mailing in questions like, "When are mangos in season?" I guess we knew who had read the newsletter! We even monitored the influx of emails from all partners ourselves and even asked that partners send their questions in English so we could respond quickly. We later splurged and hired a localization vendor to translate the content into eight languages -- from content on the CDs to the written newsletter. Every month.
The problems were frequent but small. Our intentions were to deliver essential information in the fastest, most efficient method without the Internet. This meant quick-turn diskette & CD production and lots of paper. But the information was vital and partners got the raw, brown paper sack version of Microsoft's genuine attempts to support its channel.
From then until March 2020, enterprises have grown healthier, more professional-- and fatter.
It's easy to gradually bury primary value in complexity.
Well-funded enterprises experience what I call "FOUR-CAR GARAGE SYNDROME". You've moved from a one-car to a four-car garage and find yourself one day buried in all of your stuff. You may even have given up parking in it -- the primary value of a garage.
In most successful enterprises, most initiatives turn into a group project -- one of collaboration, negotiation, concessions, launches, and celebrations. All the contributors are represented in the final outcome -- the idealists, the operators, the ladder-climbing managers, and the lawyers.
If your enterprise is disciplined, you might throw in a Steve-Jobs type -- someone to call the shots and ask the hard questions: Why is this so hard? Why can't it be easier for the customer?" Sometimes that person is seen as the Asshole. But it's a start.
Maybe now is time to think about letting go of the intricacies.
Returning to the Microsoft Partner Program example of the 2000s. One might say that the overall PRIMARY value shared between Microsoft and its partners has always been the dual responsibility of serving the customer well. Our main concern then was MATCHING the best partner for the job and dispatching them to the right customer using a partner-finding directory.
Enter Microsoft Partner Competencies. I truly believe that Competencies, introduced in the WPG and now OCP, were a genuine attempt for Microsoft to further validate the abilities of the partner to serve the customer. But the problem was less about credentials and more about the directory logistics of prioritizing and connecting partners. Through a series of complexities and built-up bureaucracies, the primary value has been buried and now the notion of "jumping through hoops" has never been more apparent to partners. Keeping up with thousands of variations of solutions, industries, and terminologies has made for an impossible tangle for matching. In fact, I noticed that the partner-finding directory is not visible from most pages on Microsoft.com. That's a shame when Microsoft depends almost fully on partners to deliver solutions to customers.
Fortunately, the solution to complexity isn't a dolled-up matrix, systematic process or Magic Quadrant. The beauty of simplicity is that it is its own solution. Simplicity just wants you to ask every day, every decision: What is my primary value?