Gary, the issue is they need to get more sensitive people in there, to be responsive to customers and build up trust, which I think they are doing. Like Saturn V said, this sector is not like the microprocessor business.
It's a more sensitive culture, and ramming an insensitive pricing schedule down the throats of a highly sensitive and intellectual customer base isn't going to be forgotten too quickly.
This is a more fluid, sensitive sector - it is completely different than the microprocessor business.
They need to create a responsively sensitive environment that builds trust. Barrett should have recognized sooner there wasn't enough sensitivity underneath that organization - that the division's brute force microprocessor formula will not work in the flash business where the customers are the more sensitive mobile mfgs. But I think this error was further below Barrett - whomever thrust the pricing schedule down the customers' throats. It had the appearances of a brute force error.
They also made a brute force mistake with Itanium in the middle days --- a brute force executive (who reported into Albert H in the 90's) was managing a new emerging product and it went downhill because he lacked sensitivity to see what was really going on so he seemingly misreported things and miscoordinated. As an outsider looking in, I thought this exec was actually being dishonest and said so (how could someone be so blind and not see what is obviously wrong so it must be dishonesty, I had thought), but over the years I've realized it was a case of a lack of sensitivity that made him blind. You could go to any gathering in Silicon Valley and pick up on the pulse of a disaster ready to happen. After Itanium's bad situation became very public and when it was almost too late to even fix things, Barrett or Otellini (probably Otellini based upon the dates) finally brought in a sensitive exec to fix things -- interestingly enough, this same person was recently brought in to start fixing the mobile group maybe a tad more than a year ago I believe. Let's hope he completes this successfully. Given their need to recover from brute force errors by using sensitive execs, they should really increase the number of sensitive execs they have, especially since Intel's revenue is global now.
The microprocessor execs need to learn that winning in the communication business, takes sensitivity, not brute force. This is a weak spot for Intel.
The lack of valuing sensitivity cost us shareholders $600M, so it proves that valuing sensitivity is needed in order to win, but since the number of women working at Intel overall dropped over the past two years, this gives me pause - so I'd feel more comfortable if there were visible signs of responsiveness to a sensitive market and people. Proof in the form of reported statistics (an increase in female execs at Intel) or reported public responsiveness to the issues concerning the markets. There needs to be proof - proof that goes beyond hiding any potential issue thru wildly accelerating revenue from centrino.
Otellini is extremely gifted - the stunning marketing vision and execution on Centrino was phenominal, and the folding of wifi into microprocessor was brilliant marketing. It implies he might be sensitive enough, or at least tap into those that are. And when we see Centrino at < 2lbs I'll feel even more confident Intel is ensuring the industry is more sensitive to women buyers than they already are.
Before there's any change at Intel, we need Barrett to make sure these types of things actually get understood throughout his organization, addressed, and fixed:
One cannot be a communications company until one fully understands the women buyer, down to the level of increasing public awareness for women's needs as consumers. This starts with making the environment better for women who work in the industry, for example:
Intel can exert its force to change the CES show.
siliconinvestor.com
Tech firms aware of women, but dimly
TOYS-FOR-BOYS ATTITUDE PREVAILS AT TRADE SHOW
By Dawn C. Chmielewski
But despite efforts to understand the female customer,
manufacturers and retailers still just don't seem to
get it.
``I think the contradiction is huge,'' said Kathy
Gornik, president of Thiel Audio and chair of the
Consumer Electronics Association. ``To use women at
the show like this as a means by which you would
attract a male customer is a statement about the
attitudes toward the female consumer.''
Manufacturers do not fare much better. Only 1 percent
of women surveyed said they thought manufacturers had
them in mind when they created a gadget.
----------------------------------------
Intel can exert its force to change the CES show.
And also, make changes here too:
COMPUTEX TAIPEI 2004
3dnews.ru
(At least Tyco's events had an equal number of half-dressed guys as half-dressed gals, not only just half-dressed women. Diligence needed on mainland China's HR)
June 1-5, 2004, The 24th Taipei International Computer Show www.ComputexTaipei.com.tw
E-mail: computex@cetra.org.tw
Show Manager: Mr. Victor Chu
International Exhibitor Coordinator: Ms. Peggy Chang
Press Coordinator: Ms. Irena Chang
Exhibition Department, CETRA
5 Hsin-yi Road, Sec. 5, Taipei, Taiwan 110, ROC
Tel: 886-2-2725-1111 Ext. 639
Fax: 886-2-27253501
---------------------------------------------
Making chips for women shouldn't be an after thought.
GPS should be on every chip, integrated into the chip, to avoid this:
cnn.com
"Sjodin was last seen leaving work ...Her car never left the parking lot. Friends contacted police after ...an alarming phone call with her boyfriend that was cut short. In that call, friends say, her last words were, "No, no, no, OK, OK, OK."
...police traced a second call from Sjodin's cell phone to her boyfriend. This time no words were exchanged, but authorities were able to trace the call to within four miles of a cell phone tower. Authorities have said the second call came about three hours after the first call.
----------------------------------------------
And GPS isn't sufficient either. Loud speaker phone is needed for emergencies. Mobile mfgs need to install a sawtoothed-edge 911 button on the RHS below the antena. Pressing it down, then in, should initiate 911 on a loud speakerphone mode, transmitting a soft speaker signal to allow the dispatcher to adjust volume down accordingly. This enables someone (like a female, the other half of the world's buyers) to drop their phone from their hands, yet still maintain audible communications between dispatcher and source. Someone that's done about two dozen patents at Intel said I should patent this. No, the industry just needs to make it happen.
Where was the media spotlight on the mobile casing manufactures for essentially being responsible for the loss of this woman's life, through negligent product design that misses 50% of the population? Do we really have to start looking stupid in the media, before this is fixed? Or can we be a tad more innovative than the auto industry?
Regards,
Amy J |
