An alternative to anticipatory conformity

Starting next classClass structure

15’: group 1

15’: group 2

45 minutes: Me :-)

What you have to do

Report: 1p per question (due on the day of presentation)

Presentation: STRICTLY 15 minutes total, everybody has to speak

IS strategy --> Org strategy: Sauron

Org’l strategy

IS strategy

Automatic Reporting

ContinuousVisibility

ID work(avoid shame)

AnticipatoryCOMPLIANCE

IT and leadership: Metaphor.

ID & anticipatory conformity

. Embarrass people:

‘you’re the team’s chewbacca’

. Use peer pressure

‘you’re letting the team down’

. Sell them a project for their self

‘you’re the next crop of leaders

Using surveillance

data to...

IS strategy --> Org strategy: Barbie

Org’l strategy

IS strategy

Automatic Reporting

ContinuousVisibility

AdjustedCOMPLIANCE

Rationale for adjustment

IS strategy --> Org strategy

Org’l strategyIS

strategy

Automatic Reporting

ContinuousVisibility

ID work(avoid shame)

(anticipatory)COMPLIANCE

(adjusted)

Rationale for adjustment

Use!

IS strategy --> Org strategy

Org’l strategyIS

strategy

Automatic Reporting

ContinuousVisibility

ID work(avoid shame)

(anticipatory)COMPLIANCE

(adjusted)

Rationale for adjustment

How about managers’

identity (and bonus)?

What happened at DeskSales?

Europe Telecom

E-Tel Solutions E-Tel Retail E-Tel International Services

E-Tel Web

E-Tel Residential Customers

E-Tel Corporate Customers

E-Tel Corp. Cust.Field Sales Force

E-Tel Corp. Cust.Service Units

E-Tel Corp. Cust.Desk Sales

Team Retail 1

Team Retail 2

Team Retail 4

Team Retail 3

Team Finance 1

Team Finance 2

Team Tech. & Media 1

Retail Field SalesDirectorate

Finance Field Sales Directorate

Tech. & Media Field Sales Directorate

Central Service

Escalation Unit

DSL Specialist service unit

17 other specialist service units

Team Tech. & Media 2

E-Tel & DeskSales

DeskSales

General Manager

Technology & Media

Desk Sales Manager

Retail

Desk Sales Manager

Finance

Desk Sales Manager

E-Tel Field Sales

General Manager

Finance

Field Sales Manager

Retail

Field Sales Manager

Technology & Media

Field Sales Manager

Jim: FIN DSP1

Ann: FIN DSP21

Joe: FIN DSP2

Ted: FIN DSP22

…

. . .

John: RET DSP1

Jess: RET DSP11

Kate: CP DSP2

Karl: RET DSP18

. . .

Jack: T&M DSP1

Sue: T&M DSP19

Neil: T&M DSP2

Zed: T&M DSP20

. . .

Bob: RET FSP1

Bill: RET FSP57

Ben: RET FSP2

Anna: RET FSP58

. . .

Mark: T&M FSP1

Jane: T&M FSP49

Matt: T&M FSP2

Saly: T&M FSP50

. . .

Tim: FIN FSP1

Kim: FIN FSP41

Cris: FIN FSP2

Mary: FIN FSP42

. . .

- Bank of Europe field sales team

- Bank of Europe “virtual” sales team

DeskSales & FieldSales

Desk Sales Managers’ dilemma

Improvisational pull

• DSPs lacked sales experience

• DSPs felt they lacked the ability to sell

• DSPs had difficult relationships with field

salespeople

Bureaucratic pull

• Multiple sales and saleswork targets

•‘Stretch’ targets for sales

•‘Stretch’ targets for saleswork

Siebel-based supervision: Summaries of performance, Self-entry reporting

The bureaucratic pull over DSMsDesk Sales teams had to hit multiple targets

! Sales- Target for individual sales ($350,000/DSP) - {40% if bonus}- Target for involved sales ($200,000/DSP) - {20% of bonus}

! Saleswork - {20% of bonus}*- Target for calls to customers (7/DSP)- Target for salesplans (all records)- Target for Siebel errors (zero)

DeskSales GM committed to stretch targets - 6% extra sales, in a flat revenue period - 8 months to achieve sales target - Calls to customers on holidays / sickness / training - Salesplans and no Siebel errors for past two years of sales

* The remaining 20% bonus was paid if the target for the account was met

Desk Salespeople’s Motivations

Sales target

Saleswork target

Below target

Above target

Above targetBelow target Sales

Saleswork

Ladder-climbers“go up the ladder”

20%

Money-grabbers(Prize-oriented)

“make money and win prizes”

3%

Money-grabbers(Not prize-oriented)“just make money”

20%

Ladder-hoppers “move to corporate”

1%

Wage-earners “make a living”

56%

IT and the DSMs’ dilemma

Upper-level managers used Siebel summaries for supervision! Performance = Performance in Siebel

- Desk Salespeople sales targets = reporting sales in Siebel- Desk Salespeople saleswork targets = reporting calls and doing salesplans in Siebel

! Supervising summaries, not details - Upper-level managers received MS PowerPoint reports from GMs- Upper-level managers did not check reports (when relating to GMs)- Upper-level managers used these reports for their own purposes

Siebel was used as a self-entry system

- Desk Salespeople had to enter their own sales and saleswork - Desk Sales Managers compiled reports but did not check data - Upper-level managers interpreted Siebel data as the automatic

outcome of DSPs work

The DSMs’ dilemma, really

Improvisational pull on sales and saleswork

Bureaucratic pull on reporting sales

(reinterpretation)Improvisational pull on

reporting sales

(splitting)

The façade-creation pattern

•Show representation of compliance with sales and saleswork targets

•Hide representation work

• Find ways to represent sales without doing sales

• Make DSPs create a representation of

compliance with sales and saleswork targets

Produce a representation of compliance with sales

targets

Produce a representation of compliance with saleswork

targets

Making the numbers: Sales

Help desk salespeople find revenue to report

CHALLENGEDesk salespeople couldn’t

sell, but sales managers had to meet demanding targets

SOLUTIONHelp desk salespeople find

revenue to report as sales by using systems or building

relationships with customers

“Tom bragged he had already $5.8 million in revenue under his name in Siebel and that he had sold $60 000, at most.”

Helping DSPs finding revenue

SystemsFind and claim unclaimed

revenue (e.g. phone bills)

ServiceMake friends that show

unclaimed revenue (e.g. service orders)

CustomersDo service to become central

point of contact (e.g. direct orders)

Field SalespeopleDo FSPs’ Siebel in return for

sales and silence(e.g. Siebel errors)

Making the numbers: Sales

Portray reporting revenue as selling

CHALLENGE “we don't want open sales to be

logged in Siebel at 100% probability, that looks very

reactive.”

SOLUTION“we can hold [orders] and log

them at a lower probability and close them a few days later.

We need to follow all steps [stages in the sales cycle] because it puts

them [open sales] on the radar early.”

Help desk salespeople find revenue to report

Making the numbers: Sales

Use reporting as an opportunity for compliance

CHALLENGETop performers “keep sales

under their sleeves”

SOLUTIONUnearth unreported

revenue when producing reports

Portray reporting revenue as selling

Help desk salespeople find revenue to report

“Knowing that we have a gap of 1 million, we need to have a pipeline of 3 million to make sure that we hit that.” With that in mind, he asked if they had "any sales squirreled away under the blankets.” "Do you have anything that you decided, "let's chuck it away for next month or let's keep this one off the radar,”

Making the numbers: Sales work

Help desk salespeople reach their targets(Phone team meetings, date on sales plans)

Use reporting as an opportunity for compliance

CHALLENGE“My drivers are sales. That’s it. The internal drivers are stats.

And if you try to put a salesperson next to stats it doesn’t work. Sales people don’t like stats. Because it’s paperwork, it’s

something you’ve got to do after the event”

“10-fold increase in the number of completed salesplans overnight”

Shame and representation work

Narrating the numbers

Use numbers to showcase performance CHALLENGE

“I am the one who sells [desk salespeople’s] effort, I'm the salesperson for the desk role.”

She was being “pressured […] to show [DeskSales] add[s] value, […] that we can create [new sales opportunities] and close

from the desk.”

SOLUTION

She used monthly sales and saleswork figures compiled by desk sales managers from Siebel to run what she classified as a

“great PR campaign”.

Narrating the numbers

Use numbers to showcase performance

CHALLENGE

“[They]’ll look at DeskSales and say ‘look at all the revenue they brought in’[…

They]’ll say, ‘hang on, let’s have a look at the value, the real value that DeskSales

brought in, is this an actual big number?””

SOLUTION

"[Our team] spent the past two days rehearsing so that it sounds natural",

"[managers] have been in panic for the past two weeks, but today, I've never seen so

much panic in this unit."

Rehearse visits

Using the numbers

“Desk based operatives have had delegated to them the management of the Siebel MIS. They are able to manipulate the data, should they so choose, to make representations to their hierarchy, that further their

own interests.”

“At a higher and more senior level, the management team can implement tactics within the business unit, which ensure that they too are manipulating the data, to further their own political agenda,

and appease the directors of the company.”

Desk Sales doubled in size, one year after,its manager moved to E-tel’s board in just 5 years

The upwards flow of representation

Monitor the production of representations

Hide the production of representations

Help produce representations

Re-represent work to portray success

Use re-representations for power ploys

Reification of representations

Reification of representations

The production of information

‘To see’

(panopticon)

To show’

(shop window)

Production of performance information

Automatic and unproblematic

Effortful and problematic

Use of performance information systems

To see in detail downwards

To show in summary upwards

Source of compliance Work Representation work

Relationship between work and its representation

Tightly coupled Loosely coupled

IS strategy --> Org strategy: Wizard of OZ

Org’l strategy

IS strategy

Effortful reporting

Need to enforce

reporting

Opportunity to represent compliance

FaçadeCOMPLIANCE

IS strategy --> Org strategy: Wizard of OZ

Org’l strategy

IS strategy

Effortful reporting

Need to enforce

reporting

Opportunity to represent compliance

FaçadeCOMPLIANCE

Managers want summaries to show success