Building bridges versus painting them

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Until recently in the UK there was a saying which meant ‘never ending’, ‘eternal’ and ‘a thankless task’. Thanks to new technology, ‘Painting the Forth Bridge’ has now changed its meaning forever. Using a new paint formulation, the job of protecting this remarkable 220 year old engineering marvel from the Scottish wind and rain, will need no more applications (of paint) for the next quarter of a century.

At November’s HP Discover in Vienna, I also noticed a real difference compared to previous years. It was a very good event, the venue looked great and once again I got to meet with a lot of attending software customers. However, the feedback from the customers I met with this time was very different. 

In previous years, we received feedback about the skill levels of first level engineers, the frustration about having to repeat information as support cases were transferred from expert to expert and (as always) the need to speed up resolution of issues. This was fed back to my team straight afterwards.

This year was very different, most customers commented that they had noticed improvements in our support over the last 12 months, Premier customers like and appreciate their assigned resources and some customers just asked us to keep doing what we are doing. We won’t of course, because we will always be looking to improve, even when customers tell us they are happy with everything.

It was great to hear that customers have noticed the improvements, and that issues we faced a year ago have been addressed through the changes made in FY11. We are indeed privileged to have customers who feel it worth their while to bring our shortcomings to our attention because it enables us to drive improvements in areas that matter most to our customers.  And based on the feedback from customers in Vienna, I am particularly pleased that we are already working on the areas they highlighted for us to work on over the next year. 

However unlike the, presumably redeployed, Forth Bridge painters of Eastern Scotland, we have not yet perfected the art of Exceeding Expectations. Thanks to the never-ending maintenance of its painting crews this magnificent structure, a testament to engineering genius, has remained standing over two centuries. By contrast, enterprise software never stands still – it just gets more complex. Customer expectations are constantly increasing and the Cloud’s arrival has kept us all on our toes. So we will always be ‘Painting the Forth Bridge’ and the task of exceeding expectations continues year after year. We like that challenge and so, here’s to 2012!