This week, many of us are out in Las Vegas for our big annual internal meeting.
If you're not particularly interested in EMC culture, this would be a good post to skip.
Otherwise, you might be interested in this "state of the union" post ...
A Little Las Vegas Goes A Long Way
I don't gamble much, or drink much, or partake in other forms of grown-up entertainment, so Las Vegas doesn't do much for me, especially after a day or so.
You might not know this, but the reason why EMC (and lots of other companies) come out here for their events is simple economics: flights are cost-effective, hotels are set up for large crowds, and so on. So, as a result, I find myself here far more than I might want to be.
Lest you think that we're getting a respite from winter's icy grip, no, it's freezing outside, so we end up spending way too much time inside hotels.
The Annual Gathering
I came to EMC in 1994, so my first such meeting was way back in 1995. Back then, you could fit the entire sales force as well as most corporate leaders into a good-sized Boston ballroom. I remember one of these when it snowed bigtime (surprise!), flights were cancelled, and we ended up with a very large, empty ballroom for a good portion of the meeting.
Needless to say, we don't do that anymore ...
As we've grown, we've changed the focus to a leadership meeting, mostly focused on our field organization. But, even handpicking attendees, we're talking well over 1,000 EMCers. I have to constantly recalibrate my thinking around how large and diverse we've become.
But they all came, from every corner of the globe, from every segment of the market, from each of our business units. A wonderfully diverse and energetic gathering, to be sure -- all gathered to reflect on 2007, and plan for 2008.
I wrote a similar post about this annual meeting a year ago, and what I thought might happen largely did happen. I really hope I'm right again ...
The Mood and Tone
You might think these meetings are all about training, or detailed planning, or similar activities. Yes, there's some of that, but for me, it's all about how people are feeling: how they're feeling about the company, their roles, the opportunity ahead, the marketplace, the competition, and so on.
Simply put: the mood was downright energetic. I can't remember when people were more pumped.
And what really amazed me was the uniformity of the enthusiasm. It didn't matter what geography you were from, what segment of the market you served, or even your role in the company --- everyone was pretty charged up, in an authentic way that wasn't synthetic or manufactured.
What We Talked About
As you might expect, Joe Tucci was the keynote speaker, and spent a good deal of time taking us through our information infrastructure strategy -- what we had accomplished, and what we had to do going forward.
I think it's nice to note that EMC isn't one of those companies that comes up with a new strategy every year. We're a few years into this one, it's working extremely well, and we're continue to pour our efforts into driving it forward -- more about that in a later post.
Joe also spent some time on how we were doing in existing markets, and our thinking about new ones. Some of these we've talked about publicly (e.g. the home/SOHO market with EMC Lifeline), others aren't quite public knowledge yet.
Even thought most of the people in the room won't be involved in some of these new ventures, as part of the leadership team, they were enthused to see EMC confidently investing in new markets, some of which aren't widely understood yet.
Every major company function presented. Each one celebrated the progress they had made in 2007, then openly acknowledged the opportunities and challenges they faced in 2008, and asked for our help.
Lest you thought we talked tech the whole time, David Goulden, our CFO took us through key financial levers and what we needed to focus on next year. If you think it was dry and boring, no, it wasn't -- everyone was fully engaged.
The style was open, intelligent and transparent. No bragging (well, not too much!) just a factual, heartfelt commentary on their part of the business. It was illuminating and engaging: the breadth and depth was probably a bit overwhelming to first-timers.
The innovative spirit was everywhere. I could see where people were investing time and energy to change the game, and come up with new, creative solutions to challenging issues for us and our customers. We're not just talking about new products, there was a ton of process innovation as well -- perhaps the most important area of innovation going forward.
We talked a lot about being a team. Sure, that's a common theme at most management meetings, but this time it was a bit different. We'd made a ton of progress during 2007 towards behaving and acting as one company, and we had started to see the results. We didn't need a bunch of exhortations from management, all we needed to do is to keep doing the things we were doing, and wonderful things would continue to happen.
We had an exceptional "thought leadership" speaker, Marcus Buckingham. I've seen dozens of these guys over the years, and -- I have to say -- this guy was beyond exceptional. Every single person in the room ended up thinking very differently about their role as a leader, and their personal lives, after listening to his message.
If you can get him for your next leadership event, you'll see what I mean. Go check out his site at www.marcusbuckingham.com or read some of his books. I know I will.
Breaking Away From The Pack
That was the theme of the meeting, the rationale being that, although we had achieved good leadership in many parts of our business, and in 2008, we had the opportunity to separate ourselves from the rest of the IT providers out there -- in terms of customer loyalty, technology innovation, service and support, partner enablement -- the whole gamut.
Now, lest you think that this was one of those meaningless happy-sounding slogans that senior managers might toss around, let me assure you, this was stated as a factual goal with solid substance and plans to do so.
But if we were to achieve this, we had to not only succeed in our individual functions and business units, we had to succeed as a team. Powerful examples were abundant, all focused around some daunting customer information problems, and how we had delighted our customers by leveraging the vast capabilities of EMC and our partner ecosystem. A few of the examples left me a bit speechless.
A Few Things To Keep An Eye On
Like any IT vendor, we're keeping a watchful eye on the economy. If you're a regular reader of financial news, it's hard to ignore what people are writing about. But, strangely, that didn't dampen anyone's enthusiasm or expectations -- we know we've got great opportunities to help customers succeed ahead, regardless of good times or otherwise.
We also want to keep an eye on the complacency that can arise when things are going well. I've been at companies that became complacent (as have many of our executives) and it can be corrosive to all aspects of the business. Perhaps the best example from the sports world are the New England Patriots, a US football team who are consistently successful, but never complacent.
And we want to always keep an eye on the competition, not only the traditional guys, but the newer ones, and especially the non-traditional ones. I have this mental picture of EMC with this big target painted on our back, and -- around the world -- very smart people at other companies are working hard to make it more of an even race.
The People Side Of This
The EMC old-timers always enjoy reconnecting with their colleagues. It's fun to find out what people are up to, what part of the business they're working in now, and what they're thinking about. There's a lot of mobility at EMC -- people have the opportunity to do a lot of different things if they want to, and it's always fun to find out what new roles people have taken on.
But I think the best part were the first-timers.
We're getting a lot of good talent from other IT players (including some of our competitors) these days, and I always try and seek them out to get their impressions.
The most telling comment? "I'm so glad I made the decision to come here".
It takes one of these leadership sessions for anyone to fully comprehend the size, scope and passion of EMC's business. Everyone from Joe Tucci on down is open, accessible and engaging -- titles don't matter too much here, everyone's got an important role to play.
More than a few of the newer people were a bit taken aback at openness, the honesty, the transparency and the collegial culture.
What Do I Think?
A year ago, I thought 2007 would be an amazing year for EMC and the industry. I think I was largely correct in that assumption. If nothing else, it wasn't boring. Far from it.
At the start of 2008, I think 2007 was just a warm-up.
Information is becoming the single most important asset in the world. And EMC is smack-dab at ground zero of just about every information-related trend that matters. Whether we're smart, lucky or both -- all of our investments are doing quite well, and we're emboldened to double down in a bunch of new areas.
On one level, EMC is like family to me. I've been here a long time, and I have a lot invested (emotionally and otherwise) in this place. And, let me tell you, it's great to see your family doing well.
Really, really well.
There's Still A Lot Of Work To Do
No matter how much we do, there's always so much more we can do. Climb a mountain, and all you see are more mountains. It didn't matter which aspect of the business we talked about, the pattern was the same: we'd achieved a lot, but there was so much more that could be done.
And now the hard work begins.
We all go back to our respective functions, and take our understanding of the big picture, and make it work in our parts of the business.
And I think we all look forward to getting together again in 2009 to celebrate our achievements for a brief moment, and -- once again -- getting down to the serious business of what lies ahead.
Chuck,
I ran into EMC in 1994 as a Consultant at Microsoft and thought EMC was a "First-Class" company back then. I left Microsoft in 2000 to start a Microsoft practice at IBM and hadn't followed EMC as much until recently crossing paths with your Microsoft practice by happenstance. What a great marriage of services!
While looking into EMC today, I found your blog and am really glad I did! You've provided a refreshing insight into EMC and it's exciting to see the enthusiasm and forward leaning culture still thriving!
Thanks for sharing your time and experiences and sincere best wishes to you and the team for a great '08!
Posted by: Pat Losack | January 17, 2008 at 06:22 PM