Is this why Notes is "So expensive to support?"
Category Notes
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As they said on Numbers the other night, 'a bit of a thought experiment' here.
I've been chatting to some big Notes customers over the last few weeks. Really big ones. As most of these customers are really big and have been using Notes happily for many many years, they've done what we have all probably done at some point. Where the IBM-supplied functionality didn't work for them, they changed it.
So, for instance - if Out of Office didn't work *just* the way you wanted it to, it got changed. Or Stationary. or letterheads. Or reply-type options. Or etc... Whenever they come round to an upgrade there's an obvious cost to upgrading the code. We all know this, no big surprise here.
Of course, with most other mail systems - you don't get this choice. Don't like the way that Outlook deals with Out of Office? Tough. You get what you get. But then, that's not something you have to think about when upgrading - even when it changes the way in which it works. BUT - that's cheaper for the customer at that point.
So, here's the question to ponder. Should we be convincing customers NOT to modify Notes, to lower their eventual support costs? Or convince them TO modify Notes, to flex with the business of today? I suspect this is a question that Mary Beths' team have to wonder about every day....
I'd be very interested to hear your thoughts.
Bookmark :
As they said on Numbers the other night, 'a bit of a thought experiment' here.
I've been chatting to some big Notes customers over the last few weeks. Really big ones. As most of these customers are really big and have been using Notes happily for many many years, they've done what we have all probably done at some point. Where the IBM-supplied functionality didn't work for them, they changed it.
So, for instance - if Out of Office didn't work *just* the way you wanted it to, it got changed. Or Stationary. or letterheads. Or reply-type options. Or etc... Whenever they come round to an upgrade there's an obvious cost to upgrading the code. We all know this, no big surprise here.
Of course, with most other mail systems - you don't get this choice. Don't like the way that Outlook deals with Out of Office? Tough. You get what you get. But then, that's not something you have to think about when upgrading - even when it changes the way in which it works. BUT - that's cheaper for the customer at that point.
So, here's the question to ponder. Should we be convincing customers NOT to modify Notes, to lower their eventual support costs? Or convince them TO modify Notes, to flex with the business of today? I suspect this is a question that Mary Beths' team have to wonder about every day....
I'd be very interested to hear your thoughts.
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