Beagle Research Group

Boycot American Airlines

Boycott American Airlines.  I usually don't write on topics unrelated to CRM but this is different.  Again I say boycott American Airlines.

It won't inconvenience you much and it might do some good for a whole lot of people.

In the country at large American is still having to deal with the SNAFU a couple of weeks ago related to grounding a large portion of their fleet for repairs that had not been performed in a timely manner.  In Boston there are labor issues as well.  The company recently lost a suit by its skycaps over lost tips.

Apparently when American went to charging $2 to check bag at the curb, customers complied but were then reluctant to tip the skycaps for the service.  In effect the airline was horning in on the skycaps earnings.  The sky caps sued and a federal court in Boston agreed and American was ordered to repay the skycaps for the lost wages. 

At the time these hard working people were being paid only $5.15 per hour so tips were an important and necessary part of their income.  Undeterred by the courts, the corporation just put up signs at its Boston airport location informing customers that they were restricted from giving tips -- read the news story here.  The airline also boosted the wages of the skycaps to the $12 to $15 range but according to sources, that doesn't make up for the lost income. 

I think it's entirely reasonable to tip skycaps and, at all other airports I have ever been, it is an accepted custom, like tipping a waiter (but not the counter help at McDonalds, for example).  Skycaps handle a lot of jobs at curbside -- checking bags, issuing borading passes and performing the first line security check.  True counter agents inside the terminal don't receive tips but they don't help you with your bags or stand out in the heat and cold all year either.

All this is happening only in Boston, by the way, so the intent of punishing the skycaps by the airline could not be more obvious.  So my response to this to boycott the airline.  There are enough alternatives that it won't inconvenience people and it might teach the airline how to deal with a very important constituency -- its employees.  As a wise man once told me, the inconvenience would be like being deprived of rutabagas.

Safe flying.

2007: What’s Ahead?

When making forecasts for a year ahead, I have always found the ‘greater fool’ theory comforting. 

In short, it takes a fool to make a forecast and a greater one to believe it.  On balance then, I think it wise to hide these predictions from children, the gullible, the insane, etc.  Some people will look at this and see doom and gloom because there are some things to be concerned about, but the concerns are simply the environment we have to deal with.  We can still find some ways to make lemonade out of our lemons and that’s what I hope to do here.

First, the economy

The economy is our environment and it makes no sense talking about CRM until you get this baseline established. In general, I think the US economy is in for some rough sledding and I hope I am wrong.  The housing bubble is showing signs of bursting, interest rates are stable but fuel prices are on the rise again after a pre-election soft landing and the dollar is pretty weak against the Euro.  Consumer confidence has been in negative territory for a while.  All these things are indicators that economists routinely scour to figure out the economy’s direction.  As some wag once said though, they’ve predicted 12 out of the last 9 recessions so take it all with a grain of salt.

Despite the weak dollar, our exports are expensive compared to Asia and we continue to lose high paying jobs.  I heard an economist on public radio the other day say that although we are exporting jobs, we are creating jobs too.  Well, a job is not a job and some measure of job quality must be applied before we declare victory or even a truce on that front.

Speaking of fronts, we will be mired in a foreign war for 2007 and that continues to add to our economic woes.  I am not here to make a political statement but I simply must emphasize that CRM’s performance will be tethered to that of the economy at large.

One thing to keep in mind is that even if the US economy hits a rough spot, the rest of the world will not necessarily feel the pain.  The European economy looks stronger than it has in a long time and if Asia cooled off a bit, it would still be growing at a torrid rate.  To net it out, one strategy for US CRM companies might be to look to export more and given the on-demand nature of many software products today, that strategy has never been easier to implement.

A bright spot

If there is a bright spot in all this it continues to be the on-demand market.  For all of its life so far, the appeal of on-demand, at least in some measure, has been related to its significantly lower costs compared to traditional software.  Given the economic scenario I am forecasting, this should be pretty good news for on-demand providers. 

To sell their wares, on-demand providers will need to show powerful cost reduction potential and big positive ROI.  That will get some companies moving but others who have more or less paid for their traditional infrastructures will be tempted to sit on the sidelines waiting for better conditions. 

For CRM vendors, this means that existing customers might continue to pay their maintenance contracts unless they discover that maintenance, plus some amount of labor costs, plus a pending hardware upgrade equals a decision to go with an on-demand solution.  Stranger things have happened.

Beyond conventional CRM, I think there should be many smaller areas where CRM can shine.  We have talked about it before, and in the economic environment I see ahead, companies will want technology solutions that can help them do four specific things better and cheaper: enhance products, extend product lines, target market, and develop better processes that drive positive customer experiences. 

Much of the CRM world that I see is focused on the more traditional aspects of CRM, and they will be hardest hit. I think smaller companies with innovative on-demand ideas will find traction in this environment especially if they can help with the big four requirements above.  The companies that catch will grow, be acquired and do some acquiring, and form the nucleus of the brigade that will stoke the engine of growth again in time for the elections in 2008.

The CRM areas that I would target include what is called sales effectiveness but which is really a market basket of companies that need better definition.  Also, marketing and social networking companies will, I think, find receptive audiences.  Finally, the call center looks to be ready to make some changes due to the increasing availability of on-demand infrastructure. 

So the strategy I would pursue in 2007 is to remain nimble and opportunistic—innovative solutions that help to lower costs should find a decent reception and opportunistic buyers might be able to score some deals.

I have been blog tagged by Paul Greenberg

I have been blog tagged by Paul Greenberg

There is apparently a game going on around the blogosphere in which bloggers tell five things about themselves that you probably don’t know and then tag five other bloggers to do the same.  And the game goes on.  This will require discovering some new skills to link others and it will also require me to find five other bloggers.  Hmmmmmm…..

First the easy part.  Five things.

1.      I have been a parent for 17 years.  My wife and I call it being in the baby tunnel.  Though it has been a long time since we dealt with diapers, it certainly has changed how I interface with the world.  I recently discovered that I know almost nothing about popular culture, fashion, art, music.

2.      My kids aren’t much help.  They’re Jazz musicians, been that way from the get-go.  The benefits associated with this are huge—they have introduced me to John Coltrane, Thelonius Monk, Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, a guy named Cannonball, and a lot more.  I love them for it.  Down side though is that I don’t know anything about current music.  My dog’s name is Jaz.

3.      The last novel I read was The English Patient and I long to find fiction about something larger than a few people’s feelings, which usually make me feel a little creepy, or another murder mystery.  That’s gotta be a resolution for 2007.

4.      I love reading op-ed pages.  I also like reading magazines like The New Yorker, The Economist, Wired and would love to write for any of them.

5.      I give myself weird projects to research.  Recently I looked up nuclear fusion.  The other day I was thinking about the Hundred Years War and then remembered there was a Thirty-years War too, and then I thought about the disastrous 20^th Century, and it all made me wonder why there has never been a Hundred Years Peace.  My hypothesis is that there has never been a clinical approach to peace.  We plan and execute every detail of war but when it comes to peace we simply try to stop war but we don’t plan and execute peace.  Anyhow this is probably too deep for blog tag but check back in a year and maybe I’ll have some answers.  Or more questions.

Now the hard part: five more bloggers...uh...truth is I don't know any

Minute Men and the Marathon

Today is April 18, Patriot's Day in Massachusetts and an official state holiday. If you come from other parts of the country you might scratch your head and wonder why we have such a strange idea of a local holiday. I am sure we are not alone, and there must be lots of states that have something to celebrate that is unique and local instead of national.

For many out of towners, just knowing the today is also marks the running of the Boston Marathon (110th and counting), just knowing about the race and the 10,000+ bodies clogging the road from Hopkinton to Boston might be reason enough for shutting things down. The Red Sox play the Mariners at 11 AM and the marathon route goes right past Fenway Park and you can always count on a great ovation when they announce the first runners passing by.

However, the real reason for Patriots Day is to commemorate the battles of Lexington and Concord back in 1775 and "the shot heard 'round the world" - for most people the beginning of the American Revolution. It was the moment when Enlightenment philosophy met gun powder and cold steel. In a set piece on Lexington Green then later at Concord's North Bridge and on a 22 mile trek back to Boston (Battle Road on land owned by the Park Service) colonials engaged the British in what would later be termed guerilla warfare.

From the vantage point of the 21st century it is hard to imagine farmers fighting the most powerful empire in history, each armed with early muzzle loading rifles, but it's all there in the re-enactments. Now and then it's good to take stock of all that.

Happy evacuation day

Today, March 17 and St. Patrick's Day, is an official holiday in Suffolk county, Massachusetts. For you out of towners, that's the city of Boston. Many people automatically think, Of course! All the Irish bars are doing great business!

Well, they probably are but that's not the point of this piece.

As it happens March 17th is celebrated here as the day in 1777(?) that the British left Boston, never to return. It wasn't their choice but one night a few days earlier some very fine cannon appeared on Dorchester heights overlooking the city. The cannon were captured at Fort Ticonderoga the previous autumn by a band of patriots led by Ethan Allen. Knox a 25 year-old book seller from Boston -- as well as Nathaniel Green of Rhode Island -- had never served in the army and what they knew of war came from reading. Nevertheless, Washington immediately saw in each of these men extraordinary ability and each quickly rose to the rank of General.

At any rate, Ethan Allen and his group of Vermont "Green Mountain Boys" captured the cannon without loss of life and Knox proceeded to drag them on sledges across New York and Massachusetts through the long winter. The effort was aided all along the route by locals who hitched up their oxen and horses in a kind of early American tag team. By March Knox was able to post his new guns in Boston to checkmate the hated British. It was an important victory for Washington in what would be a long war full of setbacks and disappointments.

St. patrick's Day is special in Boston for all kinds of reasons. When I lift my first pint today I'll be thinking of all those people dragging cannon through a long winter.