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UNIX Hints & Hacks |
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Chapter 10: System Administration: The Occupation |
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Some sales representatives can be as sleazy as a stereotypical used car salesman. Some want your business so badly that they will do anything to be your best friend. They try to throw all words that will make them sound like they are always on your side with words like buddy, pal, and my friend. Everyone has their own views on how they should be treated by a sales representative. Different administrators look for different qualities in their representatives.
When sales representatives want your business, they will do many things. Although some are ethical, some may go against your own personal ethics. Here are some of the actions of sales representatives that have been witnessed by UNIX administrators:
Trespassing in the company unannounced and tracking administrators down in the buildings to get status updates on a potential sale.
Offering bribes or kickbacks.
Sneaking in while invited by the sales representative you have a meeting scheduled with.
Giving you a bigger discount now if you purchase certain exclusive products in the future just from their company.
If you dislike working with the assigned sales representative, there are things your can do. You can get rid of them. There are enough resellers and other sales representatives at the vendors to get a new one assigned. They know you can take your business elsewhere. If you go to their supervisor, you can request that a new sales representative call on you. You just have to tell the supervisor that you cannot continue to work on professional basis with the assigned representative and request a new representative. If the supervisor doesn't accept your request, you have two options: go somewhere else for the business or take it to your senior management and they can get the person taken off the account. Your management will have to back you up on the reasons.
Computer sales representatives come and go. If you deal directly with the big boys, Sun, IBM, HP, and others, you can go through a couple sales representatives a year. They are constantly getting reassigned to different territories and industries. It is also a small industry and they can pop up at another hardware or software vendor without warning.
Whenever you have a new sales representative, set the rules. They want to make their quota and make the big money in commissions, so they will listen to you. When I meet a sales representative for the first time, I tell him or her I have nothing to hide . I describe our environment and the direction we are heading with the products. We talk about any future purchases that may take place and I mention that if I have to take something to bid, I will remain open and not hide anything. I also like to be called only when there is a hot new product released by the company. Otherwise, I stay current on the product line and will make contact when the need arises. With all of that said, they leave knowing what to expect from me and I know what to expect from them.
When you meet with a vendor to discuss and get the sales pitch for the planning and configuration for a new system that you are in need of, make sure there are no hidden pieces that will come back to haunt you. When you meet with the representative, verify that they will be bringing a support engineer who will make sure that all the pieces will be put into the quotation that your sales representative will put together for you. This is an extremely important step when you budget for a specific configuration. If something is left out, the sales representatives usually come back with a statement such as, "Well you didn't ask for that." The worst part is that you didn't know you needed it or that it was separate.
When you get a quote or request a quote for a specific item, check it, verify it, and check it again. Make sure nothing is missing. Go through each line item and question everything. Don't ever expect a perfect quote the first time around. Some quotes will make several passes before they are final.
There are times when you need to get a quick quote on an item for budgeting purposes or to order an item immediately. If your normal sales representative is unavailable, you can call the local office that your vendor works out of and get a hold of a another sales representative. If none are available, there is usually a global 800 number where you can get quotes at list prices. You can work out the discount pricing later. However you get the quote, call your local representative back and leave a voice mail explaining that you where in a hurry and let him or her know who you worked with. Your local representative will then be able to get the commission on the sale in most cases. It is a courtesy call that they will respect and remember.
After you have made sure that all the pieces are on the quote, you can go back and talk about price. Prices are never set in stone. You'll be surprised at the amount of flexibility sales representatives have on pricing. Most of the time they will never admit it. Here are some reasons that vendors have been known to drastically discount the price of certain products:
If you are upgrading to another one of their systems and trade in the old system
If you trade in another vendor's system for a new system
At the end of the month so they can meet or beat their quota
At the end of the quarter, so the company can meet its quota
At the year's end so they can push out all the old models and look good for their shareholders
When their system goes out to bid against other competing UNIX vendors and systems
When their system goes out to bid against an NT server (There is special pricing for competing against Microsoft and NT.)
After the quotation for the configuration of the product you want to buy is properly figured, you must make sure you get the proper maintenance support for your purchase. This is handled by a separate department at the vendor and not by the sales department. There are different levels of support depending on how critical the system is. The various support agreements are all different between the vendors, each providing a unique level of service.
Before you present any purchase requisitions or try to obtain approval for the purchase, make sure you get all the pricing. The maintenance pricing often gets left out because in many cases, basic one-year support of parts is included. This typically means that if there is a parts failure, you will not get a replacement right away. You will have to send the part in and wait for it to be repaired.
I stepped back one day and noticed that I had a wardrobe filled with 35 T-shirts from vendors all over. They had been collected in under a year. I was feeling like a walking advertising billboard. When I stopped to think about how I got all the shirts, it came to me. I can reveal this now because I am sick of all the shirts and have enough to last me a lifetime. It is actually very simple.
You always know a few days ahead of time when you will be meeting with a vendor. When you go into the meeting, all you have to do is wear a shirt from their biggest competitor. They always come back with a statement such as, "You know you should get rid of that shirt." To which you simply reply truthfully, "I would wear one of yours, but you guys never give me one." Within a couple days there will be one sitting in your mail box.
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UNIX Hints & Hacks |
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Chapter 10: System Administration: The Occupation |
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