Posted on 10/10/2005 6:18:36 PM PDT by MrsEmmaPeel
SEATTLE: Microsoft promises its software will make people better workers — more productive, more profitable, more able, as the company likes to say, to achieve their potential. Yet some wonder why the software behemoth isn’t taking more of its own medicine.
As Microsoft hits 30, critics reel off a list of complaints that sounds like, well, a Microsoft commercial: stifling bureaucracy, frustrating miscommunication, different units working on overlapping technology without adequate cooperation. In short, the very ills promises to cure with its software.
Growing pains have delayed products, leaving the door open for Microsoft to be beaten to market by younger, more nimble competitors led by
Meanwhile, Microsoft shares have been trading at about the same level for several years. As it gears up to release a slew of new products, Microsoft is trying to untangle bureaucratic snags with a corporate shakeup meant to get the best ideas to market faster and increase the company’s push toward over-the-Internet software and services.
(Excerpt) Read more at economictimes.indiatimes.com ...
Thanks. Can you say which area you worked?
That article was posted on one of the most obnoxious websites ever -- multiple animated ads on the same screen made me nauseous.
The in-fighting between groups was pretty insane.
No one was concerned about quality of product. What they were concerned was their own job.
I have heard stories similar to response #2. It's almost like a business based on the C++ class model where groups only see the public methods but not the internal implementations themselves.
Bill Gates once described Microsoft as (to paraphrase) "a fleet of speedboats connected by bungee chords". Could it be that model doesn't scale?
Microsoft appears to be suffering transitional atrophy. Business organizations, Social clubs, Charity's even Religious organizations routinely suffer a decline in productivity as the 1st generation of leadership struggles to maintain leadership/management positions and resists the changes that must take place. Those changes in todays climate cannot occur on the 25 year cycles that use to be the norm (and sufficient to maintain an effective organization). This cycle now has been compressed to 5 to 7 years. Major overhauls must be initiated on a regular basis and leadership must be passed forward much more frequently (retirement used to be a natural stepping off point) waiting until the existing management decides to retire even on an accelerated retirement schedule simply isn't quick enough. Many argue that the experience and knowledge of long term managers is worth almost any price to retain unfortunately the consumer that grew up 10 years after the existing manager assumed his postilion has grown up in a world that is radically different from the one that manager/leader grew up in, leaving him/her with a severe handicap in the execution of his duties.
Absolutely.
We can extend the analogy even further by saying that the speed boat driver is blindfolded and each boat is towing skiers in shark-invested waters.
The corporate culture is one of appeasement and mediocrity -- no one risks saying: "the emperor has no clothes". The prime impetus of the troops is to protect their own jobs and benefits so its never their fault when failure occurs. This frequently leads to absence of testing, improper test methodologies, poor quality control, anything to avoid being the bearer of bad news. Lower and middle management is largely made up of "yes" men and women. That's not to say there aren't some really good people there or projects. But those people are the exception, not the rule and they are drowned out by the mediocrity.
I'll bite too.
LINUX.
My XP Windows directory is nearly 3 gigabyes, and I don't have much installed on this machine. The whole thing is insane.
I was just at Adobe's website and their Adobe Acrobat READER requires 90 meg of hard drive space. Now that is insane.
Don't kid yourselves, when this company puts their mind to it they can devastate any company out there. (too many to list here) MS is not the most visionary company but look out if they decide to knock off your vision. Your only hope is that they buy you instead of deciding to build it in house. I am always amazed at these companies that openly decide to take them on. It reminds me of a riffle vs. a battle tank. I do think open source has a chance since there is nothing for MS to put out of business.
Over the last couple of days, Micro-Soft has been talking about their last 30 years. At this URL: http://www.microsoft.com/mscorp/goingbeyond/timeline/docs/di_Hobbyists.htm
is "An Open Letter to Hobbyists" from Bill Gates, circa 1976.
Excerpts:
"As the majority of hobbyists must be aware, most of you steal your software."
"Most directly, the thing you do is theft."
"They are the ones who give hobbyists a bad name, and should be kicked out of any club meetings they show up at."
"I would appreciate letters from any who wants to pay up, or has a suggestion or comment."
The letter is informative regarding the timeline and origins of Micro-Soft in relation to the MIPS Altair.
Modern processors and hardware are incredibly fast, but it does little good since software gets bigger and slower with each passing day. And a lot of that, I think, has to do with Microsoft and their bloated approach to programming operating systems and applications.
In a way, the operating systems Microsoft produces are a perfect reflection of the company itself: They're big and clunky and slow, but they generally tend to function. Somehow. It's almost like magic.
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