RE: Are we missed?

[david -dot- locke -at- amd -dot- com]

The answer depends on what kind of product we are talking about. 

If the product is infrastructural software then, no we are not missed, but
then neither are any other user support functions. The consumers of these
products have to install them. They are not given a choice. Later, at
upgrade time, they are not given a choice either. They install the upgrade.
Companies that sell this kind of software don't have to pay attention to
their customers. 

Plenty of companies are like that. They sold an industry standard product
that had few alternatives, and they didn't care about customers anymore than
trying to figure out how to derive more income from them. The doc was
inadequate. Tech support went downhill. They didn't even try to capture
their increasing return. 

If the product is not infrastructural, then it is up to the management of
the company to determine the role of TWs. If the company wants to be
efficient, wants to generate customer loyalty, tries to minimize negative
use costs, and tries to capture its increasing return, then we matter. If
the company only does doc, because the reviews in the tech press have a
checkbox for doc, then its likely that we don't matter. 

The companies with the best and largest doc operations are actually
infrastructural software companies like Microsoft, Oracle, NetWare. These
companies set high standards for their doc. Other vendors follow their
examples. Those standards increase the cost of doing business for these
other vendors. As such they represent a market barrier. Vendors have to do
doc to play in the market. The customers expect them to do that. But,
customers complain about doc more often than not. The customers have no
accounting framework for the cost of docs, so there is nothing more than a
checkbox in product reviews to base decisions on. 

As long as we see our role as a means to reduce the production costs
involved in product development and support, we are expendable. Startups
typically use other people's money and defer product development costs.
There is little or no need to reduce production costs. 

David Locke 


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