Past Meetings

Date	Topic	Speakers / Format	Location	Time	Cost
May 25	Managing the Renewal Process Sponsored by Encover	Neil Baron, Brooks Automation; Sue Nemetz, ThermoElectron	Papa Razzi, Burlington	Dinner meeting; 5:30 to 8	$25 for members; $40 for non-members
April 21	Warranty Policies	Steve Morandi, ServiceEdge Bob Brown, WPI	Kronos, Chelmsford	4:00 -6:00	$10 non-members Free for local chapter members
March 16	Sarbanes-Oxley Impact on Support Organizations	Joint meeting with local HDI chapter. Dinner meeting.	Verizon (Harrison) Learning Center, Marlboro	6 - 8	$30 members, $40 non-members
February 23	Measuring and Maximizing the Effectiveness of Self-Services	Tom Sweeny, ServiceXRG	Novell, Waltham	4:30 - 6:00	$10 non-members Free for members
October 19	Quick Hits: Using Service & Support to Drive Corporate Wide Process Improvement	Kelvin Cross, Corporate Renaissance	Novell, Waltham	4:30 PM	Free for members. $10 for nonmembers.
September 21	Remote Servicing Technologies	Tom Ellwood, EMC Dale Calder, Axeda Mark Annati, Fast Channel	Harrison Learning Center, Marlboro	5:00 PM to 8:00 PM	$20 for members, $35 for non-members
June 22	Cookout Social	None!	Bolton MA	4:00 to ?	None.
May 11	Call Center Outsourcing	Wendy Holman, Segue Software Don Montabana, Director of Global Customer Care, Akamai Brian Daniell, VP Client Services, Deltek	Papa Razzi, Burlington	Dinner Meeting	$30 members. $40 non-members. (tent.)
April 21	Becoming a Services-Led Company	Anne Mulcahy, CEO Xerox (on DVD) with facilitated discussion	Bose Corporation	4:30 to 6:30 PM	Members free. Non-members $10.
March 9	High Performance Support Management	Jay Rao, Associate Professor, Babson College	Deltek, Alewife area, Cambridge	4:30 to 6:30 PM	Members free. Non-members $10.
Feb. 10	International Support Issues	Al DaSilva,VP WW Sales & Service, GSI Lumonics Peter Bolers, Waters Corp	Kronos, Chelmsford, MA	4:30 to 6:30 PM	Members free. Non-members $10.

September 13, 2006 - Dinner Meeting

Stop the Crazy Dance! Get customers to Stop Dragging Out Negotiations & Asking for Discounts.

Sid Saleh, Editor, ServiceRevenue™

Pitch after pitch, sales or service reps' best efforts are frustrated by endless objections customers and prospects raise. Buyers tend to drag on the sales cycle. They negotiate more. They are likely to demand unrealistic discounts. But why should you settle for the mindless way things have been done – this crazy dance - if you can help the buyer accelerate the buy decision?

For the past several years, ServicesRevenue's Sid Saleh has been interviewing buyers together with their service or sales reps using "forced-choice interviews." The results have been dramatic. Prior to an interview, a buyer is reluctant. After the interview, a buyer places an order without uttering the word “discount”. Why? The interviews help buyers prioritize their needs and wants for various service deliverables. Moreover, the interviews help buyers understand the value of your services and, therefore, are more willing to pay your asking price.

Do your customers and service reps a huge favor... come and learn about these innovative interviewing techniques. At the very least, you reps will close orders faster. You have revenue goals to meet. You don’t have time for crazy dances. Bring your most challenging sales situation. We'll share with you specific case studies and tools.

Speaker:	Sid Saleh, Editor of ServiceRevenue™. Biography below.
Topic:	Stop the Crazy Dance! Get Customers To Stop Dragging Out Negotiations & Asking For Discounts
Where:	Verizon Learning Center, Marlboro. This venue has received high marks in our previous meetings. This is a dinner meeting.
When:	Wednesday, September 13, 5:00 to 8:00 PM

About Sid Hanna Saleh

Sid is editor and publisher of ServicesRevenue™. He writes about his peers’ experiences in services marketing and selling – what they’re doing and what seems to be effective. Working with the ServicesRevenue team, he designs and publishes tools to simplify tactical marketing and sales tasks. Sid developed, priced, launched and sold services at Apple’s Claris Corp, Gateway and others.

May 9, 2006

Service Delivery in a Flat World

Phil Verghis, The Verghis Group

* Meeting Sponsored by Amdocs *

In an increasingly flat world -- as coined by writer Tom Friedman -- deeply held assumptions and beliefs, whether at a societal level or an organizational level, can clash painfully with globally diverse sets of

customers, co-workers and partners. Each culture may have its own deeply held assumptions and beliefs about how business should be transacted, and these beliefs can conflict. At best, the conflicts can be irritants, but at worst the conflicts could cause failure of multi-million dollar implementations of customer support operational systems. The very things that made you successful as an organization could backfire as you try to 'do more with less' and extend your services infrastructure and processes around the world. With so much to do already, how do we begin to think about how different cultures work and tweak what works 'here' over 'there'?

Phil Verghis, the author of The Ultimate Customer Support Executive, will present fascinating research on different cultural frameworks, vividly illustrated by practical examples that will enable you to understand the differences between cultures around the world and how this can impact the design of your service systems. Whether you manage a culturally diverse team, an outsourced team or have culturally diverse customers, this provocative talk will enable you to immediately apply key concepts in your office and gain sensitivity to the issues in play.

Note: This is a dinner meeting. Amdocs' sponsorship allows us to offer a lower registration price as shown below.

Speaker:	Phil Verghis, The Verghis Group. Biography below.
Topic:	Service Delivery in a Flat World
Where:	The Chateau, 195 School Street, Waltham, MA 02451. The Chateau is less than 2 miles off Route 128. We held our last meeting at the Chateau and it was well received.
When:	Tuesday, May 9, 5:00 to 8:00 PM

Biography of Phil Verghis. A preeminent authority on global service delivery, Phil Verghis is both an experienced practitioner and a knowledgeable observer. An expert in people, processes and technology, Phil combines hands-on experience from his time working in the trenches with keen insights from his tenure as Vice President of Support at Akamai Technologies. Call Center Magazine says he is "among the best minds in his field."

As head of The Verghis Group, he designs and implements customer-centric support strategies that enable organizations to get and keep profitable customers for life. Bottom line. In addition to serving clients internationally, Phil is the author of The Ultimate Customer Support Executive, a groundbreaking book cited by members of the Association of Support Professionals as "by far the most intelligent book on managing support organizations..." and reviewed by many media outlets including Harvard Business School's Working Knowledge magazine.

Phil is a past chairperson of the Strategic Advisory Board of the HDI, the world's largest membership association for the service and support industry. Among his numerous industry accolades, Phil is the only two-time winner of the Service 25 award, presented to those who have made a significant impact in the field of service and support. He was also named a Leader and Legend of the support industry.

Prior to founding the Verghis Group, Phil was Vice President of Infrastructure & Support at Akamai Technologies (an MIT spin-off) and a member of the senior executive operations group that turned the company around in 2003. Phil's leadership of an interdisciplinary team saved the company $33M (annualized) in Cost of Goods Sold during a period when network traffic tripled, to tens of billions of hits per day. Akamai grew from $4M in annual revenue in 1999 to $161M in 2003. Among his responsibilities, Phil managed all aspects the world's largest distributed IP network with 15,000 servers in over 60 countries.

Prior to Akamai, Phil worked at Duke University and the University of New Hampshire. Phil is an adjunct faculty member at the University of New Hampshire, where he teaches an MBA course in Information Systems.

February 1, 2006

My Tech Support staff keeps transferring

..... and it's great!

For the last 5 years, the MathWorks has evolved a remarkably successful transfer program within the Technical Support Department (which they call the Engineering Development Group). Historically, the technical support group at MathWorks transferred Engineers (unintentionally) at the rate of 2-3 a year. Today, the technical support group transfers 20-30 Engineers per year.

Technical support has become a reliable source of new hires for several groups within the MathWorks-Technical Marketing, Consulting, Applications Engineering, Customer Training Services, Quality Engineering, Product Development, and Documentation. Managers around the MathWorks look forward to internal hiring from the Technical Support group, and the Technical Support group partners with Human Resources to maintain a steady inflow and reserve of technical talent. In this session, you will hear the best practices that the MathWorks has deployed in creating a successful transfer program for Technical Support.

Allison will cover:

1. Embracing the reality of transfers

2. Building a foundation of Internal and External Partnerships

3. The nuts and bolts of how the program works

4. Inherent Challenges

5. Company-wide benefits

Biography of Allison Babb. Allison is a Senior Manager, Engineering Development Group (EDG) at The MathWorks Inc. in Natick, MA. The Engineering Development Group (EDG) hires entry level Engineers and helps them to identify and develop their technical, professional, and personal skills for a successful technical career at the MathWorks. As senior Manager, Allison is responsible for managing the Technical Support and Career Development goals of a 70-person group. She has been with The MathWorks for the past 16 years, starting out as a Technical Support Rep, and growing into a Senior Management role. Allison has a degree in Business Administration and also owns a Life and Business Coaching practice.

She is a member of the Association of Support Professionals, SSPA, and the International Coach Federation. Published works include an article in Diversity Careers, Management tips from the Experts--ASP, and she was also interviewed for The Leadership Challenge Workshop, and the book called Encouraging the Heart where MathWorks is highlighted as "A Culture of Celebration."

November 9, 2005

Blue Cross Blue Shield's Concierge Service Model

The (Verizon) Learning Center, Marlboro MA

Non-Members are always welcome to attend!

Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts with its strong brand for service quality developed a "concierge" service model. In this model, the service associate or agent plays the role of a "concierge," making certain the customer is connected with the necessary service providers both within the BCBSMA and outside BCBSMA. Julianne Bride, Director of Member Centric Analysis and Service Delivery, will describe the concierge service philosophy, how BCBS developed the service environment, its impact on customer satisfaction and how it is evolving into a Member Centric Service Model.

If you have a direct-to-tech or tiered service model, you should find this presentation interesting since it presents a different service model.

Note: This is a dinner meeting and the food at the Learning Center is excellent! Eat a light lunch.

Speaker: Julianne Bride, Director, Member Centric Analysis and Service Delivery,

Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts

Topic: Concierge Service Delivery Model

Where: Verizon (Harrison) Learning Center, Marlboro, MA

When: Wednesday, November 9, 5:00 to 8:00 PM

Cost: $35 for members of AFSMI, ASP, & CCI

$45 for non-members and any registrations after November 4

To Register: Use our secure registration form:

We cannot guarantee registrations after November 4 since we have to commit to a

headcount to the restaurant on that date. But usually we can accommodate a small number.

Also, cancellations must be done by November 4 as well. We're not trying to be nasty;

it's just that we pay for all headcounts we've confirmed.

***** If paying by credit card, please note that we ask for the billing address for your credit card.

***** Please tell your admin person about this charge, which will be show on your card statement

as "Great Brook Consulting." We like to avoid unnecessary challenges!

Biography of Julianne Bride. Julianne Bride is the Director of Member Centric Analysis and Service Delivery at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts. She is responsible for the development of Member Service strategies and manages the testing of new ideas for service within the service operations. She has been with Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts for over twelve years in various capacities including Sales and Corporate Planning & Development. Julianne earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Business from Bryant University and an MBA from Northeastern University.

September 15, 2005

Performance Management for Service Organizations

Verizon Learning Center, Marlboro MA

Service organizations constantly face new challenges that result from overall industry trends. Foreseeing these trends and reacting to them is difficult, especially with complex delivery and organization models typical in Service. Performance Management provides a structured approach for focusing on strategic plans, goals and performance driven down to the operational level by applying a Balance Scorecard methodology combined with Business Intelligence tools. Service professionals can use this approach to enable their organizations to meet current and future challenges. This one-hour presentation describes Performance Management for Service.

This is a dinner meeting and the food at the Learning Center is excellent!

Speaker: John Wild, LPA Systems

Topic: Performance Management

Where: Verizon (Harrison) Learning Center, Marlboro, MA

When: Thursday, September 15, 5:00 to 8:00 PM

Biography of John Wild. John is a Principal Consultant and director of the service consulting organization for LPA Systems and has over 25 years experience in the space. Following careers in the service operations of Xerox Corporation and Nortel, Mr. Wild helped define service solutions for Xelus, Inc and Manugistics, Inc and managed implementations of s-business process improvement and software solutions for large and small corporations worldwide.

May 25, 2005

Papa Razzi, Burlington MA

Contract Renewal Practices

** Sponsored by Encover **

Our May 25 meeting will address Managing the Contract Renewal Process. Sue Nemetz of Thermo Electron and Neil Baron of Brooks Automation will be our panelists to discuss the lessons they've learned on how to increase top-line revenue by effective management of contract renewals. This promises to be a topic that will generate some good discussion. Please come join us for the last meeting of the spring.

Panelists: Sue Nemetz, ThermoElectron and Neil Baron, Brooks Automation

Topics: Contract Renewal Practices

Where: Papa Razzi, Burlington, MA

When: Wednesday May 25, 5:00 to 8:00 PM

Biography for Neil Baron

Neil Baron leads the inside sales, maintenance renewal and the strategic alliances teams at Brooks Software as the Director of Sales and Strategic Alliances. Brooks Software, a division of Brooks Automation, is a $120M provider of manufacturing application of Brooks Automation. Before assuming his current responsibilities at Brooks Software, he directed the software support organization. Prior to joining Brooks Software in 2002, he led the services marketing effort at ATG where he grew services margins from 11% to 39%. While at Sybase, he directed the services marketing team which contributed to Sybase Professional Services's growth from 400 to 1400 employees. At Digital Equipment Corporation, he envisioned and launched a start-up global solutions business which grew to $100M in four years.

He has spoken at executive education programs sponsored by Ohio State University, Babson College, and Infomation Technology Services Marketing Association (ITSMA). Dataquest/Gartner Group recognized his team for developing and executing one of the IT services industry's most effective marketing programs.

Neil received his MBA from Harvard University and MS Chemical Engineering from Tufts University. Neil is an avid Boston sports fan and a tennis player who enjoys coaching youth sports.

Biography for Susan Nemetz

Susan joined Thermo Electron's Environmental Instruments Division (EID) in 2004, as the Services Marketing Leader for EID's four primary business units: Air Quality, Water Analysis, Radiation, Measurement & Protection, and Explosives Detection. In this position, Susan is responsible for leading the development and marketing efforts for a comprehensive service, support, and training portfolio to enhance the EID instrument product set and for creating and delivering upon the value proposition in the markets we serve.

Susan has previously held positions as Director of Marketing for Enterasys, a senior consultant and director of professional events for the Information Technology Services Marketing Association (ITSMA), Director of Professional Services Marketing for Data General Corporation, Director of Worldwide Services Marketing for Stratus Computer, and held several business development and marketing positions with Digital Equipment Corporation.

Susan has served on both the International and America's Board of Directors for the Association For Services Management International (AFSMI) and the Editorial Board for the Services Revenue newsletter from the Center of Services Marketing.

Susan brings a wealth of knowledge and direct experience in creating and implementing sales and marketing programs in customer support as well as professional services. She has considerable expertise in managing business development efforts to grow revenue and margin. She has also managed the complete marketing mix from service creation to marketing communications, including e-marketing, direct marketing, sales tool development, collateral creation, and client communications.

April 21 Meeting

Kronos, Chelmsford

Warranty Management Practices

The warranty period for a product is both a resource drain and an opportunity for support organizations. It's an opportunity to introduce the customer to the quality service that can later be provided under contract, but it can also consume considerable resources if not managed properly. Our speakers have considerable experience with large-scale warranty programs and will discuss practices they found effective to achieve reduce the burden of warranties while achieving its strategic objectives.

Panelists: Bob Brown, WPI, Steve Morandi, ServiceEdge Consulting, and

Lincoln Hanscom, Thermo Electron. Biographies below.

WHERE: Kronos, Chelmsford, MA

WHEN: Thursday April 21, 4:00 to 6:00 PM

Steve Morandi, Director, ServiceEdge

Steve has over 20 years of practical industry experience delivering results for several leading companies. Prior to joining ServiceEdge ConsultingSM, Steve was Vice President and General Manager of Design & Project Collaboration Solutions at Parametric Technology Corporation (PTC), a $950 million provider of product lifecycle management (PLM) software. He launched a new software product and grew it to over $20 million in annual revenue in 2 years.

Steve was Director of Product Support at GE Aircraft Engines, a $10 billion provider of aircraft engines. He led worldwide product and customer support activities for the $1 billion Regional Airline and Business Aviation Business.

Steve received a Six-Sigma Master Black Belt Certification, as a participant in GE's Leadership Development Program at GE Aircraft Engines, a provider of military and commercial aircraft engines. He led a staff of Six Sigma Black Belts and senior leaders in re-engineering many of the organization's product and after-market service processes.

Steve was Manager of International Programs at GE Aircraft Engines, responsible for product definition, production schedules, delivery, customer support and logistics with Airframe Original Equipment Manufacturers in Sweden, Spain and Indonesia.

Steve received a Bachelor of Science degree in Aerospace Engineering from Syracuse University and received an MBA from Boston University. He is also a member of AFSM International.

Bob Brown, Computer Facilities Manager, WPI

Bob has over 25 years experience in the service industry. As a maintainability engineer at Digital Equipment, Bob developed methods for measuring and reducing maintenance costs in both hardware and software products.

After receiving an MBA, he became a senior product manager responsible for a $50M portfolio of services on Digital’s small disk products. At the time Digital merged with Compaq Computer, Bob was the Service Division’s Warranty Manager. After the merger, Bob recalled his IT skills and became the Warranty Information Systems Manager. During his career, Bob held both technical and business positions where he designed and developed product warranties and services for Digital and Compaq’s products.

Currently Bob is the Computer Facilities Manager for the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at WPI in Worcester.

Lincoln Hanscom, Director, Global Services, Thermo Electron

Lincoln M. Hanscom III leads the Global Service programs and initiatives for the Temperature Control business of Thermo Electron Corporation's Process Instruments Division. In his role as Director, Global Services, Lincoln drives the strategic direction of the services business and acts as the leader of the day-to-day execution and delivery activities. He works to ensure all customer commitments are met with quality service and on-time response, while aggressively driving revenue growth in this very important segment of Thermo's business. Under his leadership, the revenue of the services business has grown 20% YOY and has transitioned from transactional to annuity based.

Lincoln joined Thermo with 8 years of technical customer and product support experience. Prior to joining Thermo, Lincoln held the position of Director of Customer Service and Support at Convergent Networks, Inc. Lincoln led a team of service professionals, managing all aspects of customer service including internal and external training, customer support, call center and escalation teams, project management, technical publications and service portfolio development. During this time Lincoln was also responsible for developing service portfolio content and execution strategy that led to service contract sales worth over $4 million.

Prior to Convergent, Lincoln held several progressive positions in customer service & support for Cabletron Systems, Inc., later Enterasys Networks, Inc., including Project Manager, Resident Service Engineer, Director of Worldwide Product Support, and Director of Technical Operations overseeing the worldwide delivery of services.

Lincoln holds an Associates Degree in Electrical Engineering Technology from New Hampshire Technical Institute and is certified as an ISO 9000 Auditor. Lincoln has completed the Program for Manager Development sponsored by the University of North Carolina, through the Keenan-Flagler Business School at Chapel Hill.

March 16 Meeting

Verizon Learning Center, Marlboro

The Impact of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002

on the IT Service and Support Professions

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 has presented some challenges to corporations operating in the United States. A significant piece of the act is Section 404 which governs IT General Controls. This presentation will include a discussion of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act Section 404, how audit firms are applying CobiT Controls to measure compliance, and how ITIL processes can be leveraged to create a quality service delivery organization while ensuring compliance. There will also be a discussion about how Hannaford Bros. is taking advantage of this opportunity to redesign their change management process and the challenges involved with implementing process changes.

SPEAKER: Tom Witwicki, Director of Technology Services at Hannaford Bros.

TOPIC: The Impact of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 on the IT Service and Support Professions

WHERE: Harrison (Verizon) Learning Center, Marlboro, MA

WHEN: Wednesday, March 16, 5:00 to 8:00 PM

Speaker Biography. Tom Witwicki is the Director of Technology Services at Hannaford Bros. Co., a multi-regional supermarket retailer and part of the Delhaize Group. Tom is responsible for all technology infrastructure at Hannaford which includes Networking and Communications, Data Center Operations, Database and Decision Support, Security, and Systems Management of Z/OS, Unix, Linux and NT platforms. He holds a BA degree from Tufts University and is a certified ITSM Service Manager.

February 23 Meeting

Novell, Waltham

Measuring and Maximizing the Effectiveness of Self-Services

The web is an ideal platform for delivering self-services, yet few companies have realized the full benefits from helping customers help themselves. The success of self-services is tied to the success customers have in quickly and easily finding what they are looking for. The challenge for many service organizations is allocating sufficient resources to generate and maintain self-service systems and content. The potential for significant savings from self-services exists for those companies that can scale self-service offerings to meet growing demands. This presentation will explore strategies for measuring and maximizing the effectiveness of self-services. Topics to be explored include:

What self-service resources are offered today and what do customers find most effective?

What are the key metrics and benchmarks used to measure self-service effectiveness?

What strategies and best practices are required to increase success and deflection rates for self-service?

How do you increase customer use and adoption of self-services?

SPEAKER: Tom Sweeney, ServiceXRG,

WHERE: Novell , Waltham, MA

WHEN: Wednesday, February 23, 4:30 to 6:00 PM

Speaker Biography. Thomas J. Sweeny, Principal and co-founder of ServiceXRG, is a noted expert in IT services and support. Prior to co-founding ServiceXRG he held the position of Director of Software Integration and Support Service with Gartner's IT Services division, and established the research and consulting business unit for the Service and Support Professionals Association. Mr. Sweeny held the position of senior manager for Lotus Development's Worldwide Support organization where he directed many of Lotus' service innovations.

Mr. Sweeny has published extensively about service industry trends, performance measurement strategies and best practices. He has helped leading companies develop and execute service strategies that strengthen customer relationships and optimize financial performance.

October 19

Quick Hits:

Using Service and Support to

Drive Corporate-Wide Process Improvement

Service and Support professionals are in the best position to rapidly lead a company to proven `quick hit' solutions … and get big results without the rigor, delay, and cost of drawn out process improvement methodologies. As Kelvin explains in his new book “Quick Hits,” and will discuss with us on Tuesday the 19th, you can define and deliver `quick hit' opportunities to dramatically improve both productivity and product/service quality - simultaneously.

SPEAKER: Kelvin Cross,

WHERE: Novell , 404 Wyman St., Waltham, MA

WHEN: Tuesday, October 19, 4:30 to 6:00 PM

Speaker Biography

Kelvin Cross is a founding partner at Corporate Renaissance, Inc., a 10-year-old results-driven business process analysis and design firm. Kelvin has worked with nearly 100 companies in nearly all industries (including technology, telecom, healthcare, financial, manufacturing). His projects have encompassed workflow improvements in all core business processes (new product development & introduction, software development/enhancement/support, customer acquisition, service and product order-to-delivery, service/support/customer care, etc.) In these over 100 projects he has helped companies cut costs, cut cycle time, improve quality and delivery performance – simultaneously.

Kelvin has authored over fifty articles and four books on performance measurement and process reengineering, including the just released, Quick Hits: 10 Key Surgical Strike Actions to Improve Business Process Performance, published by AMACOM, 2004.

September 21

Remote Servicing Technologies

Sponsored by Axeda

Our first meeting of the new year focused on remote diagnosis and servicing of hardware and software products. Remote servicing has obvious advantages to the service company in terms of reduced travel, quicker diagnosis, and easier fixes. These benefits also accrue to customers along with less down time if predictive diagnostics are in play. However, customers also have legitimate security concerns. Our panel to discuss the topic are all people with deep experience in addressing the particular design and execution issues in developing remote service access to products at customer sites: Tom Ellwood of EMC, Dale Calder of Axeda Systems, and Mark Annati of Fast Channel.

This dinner meeting, sponsored by Axeda, was held at the Harrison Learning Center (more commonly known as the Verizon Learning Center) in Marlboro. As promised, they had great food!

PANELISTS: Thomas Ellwood, EMC.

Mark Annati, Fast Channel.

Dale Calder, President, Axeda Systems

WHERE: Harrison Learning Center, Marlboro, MA

WHEN: Tuesday, September 21, 5:00 to 8:00 PM

Panelist Biographies

Dale Calder, President and Founder, Axeda Systems

Mr. Calder was named president of Axeda Systems, the world's leading provider of device relationship management (DRM) software and services, in 1998. He is responsible for the day-to-day operations of the company and is a member of its board of directors. With over 18 years experience in technology, Mr. Calder created the vision for DRM, a distributed software solution that lets businesses remotely monitor, manage, and service intelligent devices and systems deployed around the world, allowing them to optimize their service, development, sales, and manufacturing operations. He built the organization to bring that vision to fruition by establishing Axeda's U.S. development center, its operational management team, and its worldwide DRM sales organization.

Thomas Ellwood, EMC

Tom has over 30 years of experience in all facets of Customer Support. He began his career in 1971 as a Customer Engineer with Control Data Corporation and moved to Amdahl Corporation in 1978. During his tenure at Amdahl, Tom held several positions from field technical support to the Director of World-Wide Customer Support. He joined EMC in January, 1999 and is currently responsible for development and deployment of EMC's remote support infrastructure strategy. This includes remote access methods, security and special operations for secure environments.

Mark Annati, Fast Channel

Mark served a number of years in the US Navy Trident submarine fleet, educated in many electronic, mechanical, and systems areas. After departing the military, Mark took his experience, along with discipline and attention to detail, and started his path up the IT tree. He worked a number of years as a field support engineer, often times learning on the fly. Moving from Florida to Massachusetts, he joined a multi-location advertising company, implemented many technologies, and built an IT department over several years. From there he joined FastChannel Network which has 5 locations, 2 major NOC implementations, and a current IT staff of 7. Mark has been with FastChannel for 5 years.

Mark understands that today's IT challenges require engineers to be masters at juggling priorities, able to multi-task many assignments, understand a wide variety of technologies, give excellent customer service, be dedicated to doing the job right, and always keep the human factor in mind. In Mark's spare time (?) he performs in a big band and likes to spend time with his family.

May 11, 2004

Call Center Offshoring & Outsourcing

TOPIC: Call Center Offshoring & Outsourcing

PANELISTS: Wendy Holman, VP of Customer Service and Tech Support, Segue Software

Don Montabana, Director of Global Customer Care, Akamai

Brian Daniell, VP Client Services at Deltek

WHERE: Papa Razzi, Burlington, (directions provided with registration)

WHEN: Tuesday, May 11, 5:15 to 8:00 PM

COST: $30 for members. $40 for non-members. Pre-payment is required by May 6.

On May 11 we'll turn to a hot topic this season: call center outsourcing and offshoring. A panel of three local support managers will talk about their experiences in this area focusing on the factors that drove their decisions and lessons learned. What should be a vigorous Q&A session will follow.

This will our second dinner meeting in Burlington, building on the successful dinner meeting last September. This is sure to be a popular meeting, so register early.

Payment Policy. Pre-payment is required to secure a seat at the meeting. We have to commit to the restaurant on May 6, so we need your commitment by then.

Cancellation policy. Cancellations by May 6 will be refunded in full. Cancellations made after May 6 will receive a partial refund if we are able to fill the seats guaranteed to the restaurant.

Panelist Biographies

Wendy R. Holman, Segue’s Senior Vice President of Customer Support and Sales Operations, is responsible for maintaining a high quality of customer satisfaction. She also oversees the company’s Technical Support operations located in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Ms. Holman joined Segue in 1998 to lead the company’s Professional Services Organization. Prior to Segue, she was Manager of International Marketing and Global Field Support for Sybase, Inc., an integration and application development software company. Earlier in her career, she held several management positions at Powersoft Corporation. Ms. Holman holds a BS in Business Administration from Framingham State College.

Brian E. Daniell, Vice President of Client Services for Deltek Systems, the number five ranked provider of enterprise resource planning solutions and the leader for professional services automation. Brian has served for more than 6 years in a variety of roles at Deltek. Today he leads the client support activities at Deltek to ensure that all of our clients receive the highest level of support and customer care from each of our product groups. Prior to Deltek, Brian was Director of Client Services at Harper and Shuman, Inc., a leading enterprise software vendor for A/E firms. Brian holds a BS in Accountancy from Bentley College.

Don Montabana. Don has been the Director for Global Customer Care at Akamai Technologies for nearly four years. Prior to coming to Akamai he worked at the University of Pennsylvania with dual careers in biomedical research and computing. He spends his time developing Akamai's global support team into an energetic troupe who provide fanatical levels of support from five centers worldwide located in Cambridge, San Mateo, Munich, Paris, and Tokyo.

April 21, 2004

Becoming a Services Led Company

TOPIC: Becoming a Services Led Company

SPEAKER: Anne Mulcahy, CEO Xerox (recorded on DVD)

with facilitated discussion to follow

WHERE: Bose Corporation, Framingham

(directions provided with registration)

WHEN: Wednesday, April 21, 5:15 to 6:30 PM

Our April meeting examined the strategic role that product support services can play in corporate strategy. Anne Mulcahy, CEO of Xerox, gave a keynote address on “Becoming a Services Led Company” at the AFSM conference in Reno last fall. We viewed her speech on DVD and then Jerry Ouellette from the Xerox Northeast service team talked about how CEO Mulcahy's efforts have changed his organization.

March 9

TOPIC: High Performance Management for High Performance

Call Centers: Managing the Forest

SPEAKER: Jay Rao, Associate Professor, Babson College

Paul Tumolo, Principal, Edusult Performance Systems

WHERE: Deltek Corporation, Alewife area of West Cambridge -- walking distance from the T

(directions provided with registration confirmation)

WHEN: Tuesday, March 9, 4:30 to 6 PM

Presentation Description

Call centers are high traffic transaction based environments. The management of these call centers becomes even more complex when they are customer facing and the firm is growing rapidly and introducing new products. In such situations, the supervisors, managers and directors of these facilities not only have to manage the day-to-day high levels of performance, but also spend considerable amount of time on planning for growth and new product introductions. In such situations, the management teams have to be in pristine levels of performance in terms of service delivery, project planning, project coordination and training front-line people for new products and services. This presentation describes the experiences of the management team in one such situation at a large medical devices firm in the Boston area, and how the management team learned how to focus on the truly important factors.

Presenter Biographies

Jay Rao is an associate professor of Management at Babson College. He teaches extensively in the Executive, MBA and Undergraduate business programs. His areas of expertise include: Aligning Strategy within firms, Service Strategy and Innovation, Service Excellence and Design of Service Systems. His research has appeared in Sloan Management Review, Academy of Management Executive, Production and Operations Management Journal, Quality Management in Health Care, Journal of Innovative Management and the Cornell Hotel and Restaurant Administration Quarterly. He has lead and delivered executive education programs for Boston Scientific, HEC-CPA (France), Stockholm School of Economics, France Telecom, EMC, and Cambridge Technology Partners. He is also a consultant for Edusult Performance Systems and BFA Conseil (France).

Paul Tumolo is a 30 year veteran of high technology and academia. He has held senior management positions in Data General, Millipore, Waters, and Solectron. His expertise is in the total life cycle management of people, products and processes, with over eight billion dollars of new products commercialized worldwide. Paul has taught in the MBA programs at Babson College, Bently College and Northeastern University and is currently on the faculty of Harvard Extension School where he instructs in the Certificate of Advanced Graduate Studies programs. He has developed executive education programs for Boston Scientific, Allmerica Financial, and UPC (Peru).

February 10, 2004

Peter Bolers Presenting

Al DaSilva Presenting

Our first meeting of the new year discussed a topic increasingly important in our global workplace: Supporting products across an international landscape. As companies expand their customer base across the globe, new challenges are confronted from needing `round the clock support operations, fluency in local languages, localization of web-based support, to having a physical presence local to the customers. We had two panelists present their experiences in this area. Click here to see notes from the meeting.

TOPIC: International Support Issues

PANELISTS: Peter Boler, Waters Corporation,

Al Da Silva, GSI Lumonics

Al da Silva is Vice President of World Wide Sales and Service for GSI Lumonics, Laser Systems Group that manufactures capital equipment for the semiconductor and electronics industries. In his role, he is responsible for Sales & Service operations in Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Singapore, Germany and North America. While at GSI Lumonics, Al has been responsible for downsizing world wide operations and increasing revenue and profitable. Before, GSI Lumonics, Al worked at Concord Communications, Avid Technology, BTU International and GenRad. Al holds a BA from UMass, Amherst and a Masters degree in Business from Cambridge College.

December 11, 2003

TOPIC: Food, merriment, and pool

SPEAKER: None!

WHERE: Rack & Roll, 19 Weed Street, Marlboro MA

WHEN: Thursday, December 11, 5:30 to ??

November 18, 2003

TOPIC: Selling and Delivering Quantifiable Value via Services

SPEAKER: Dan Merriman, President, Chapin Consulting Group, Inc.

WHERE: Mathworks, Natick

WHEN: Tuesday, November 18, 4:30 to 6 PM

To see the Powerpoint slides from the meeting, click here.

To see a paper by the presenter on the topic of the meeting, click here.

Customers want to see quantifiable results from their investment in services. A great pitch and high quality delivery are no longer enough. Proposal success rates, margin, and retention are increasingly dependent on demonstrating impact on the bottom line. Further, many managers face the added challenge of selling the value generated by services internally to their management. Those responsible for services need to credibly estimate expected value during the sales process and then measure and continually improve the actual value delivered. Using a facilitated interactive format, this session will help attendees to understand the opportunities, challenges, and best practices for quantifying the business value of services.

Our meeting will be lead by Dan Merriman, who is a recognized expert in maximizing the business value of technology. During his 20+ year career he has help clients achieve significant business results from investments in a broad range of service areas including systems integration, outsourcing, wireless voice/data, and computer hardware/software. In addition to his current role, Dan has worked for Giga Information Group, EDS, HP, and Digital in sales, marketing, product management, consulting, and implementation roles.

October 16, 2003 Meeting

TOPIC: The Art of Services Marketing

SPEAKER: Jeff Tarter, Executive Director, Association of Support Professionals

WHEN: Thursday, October 16, 5:15 p.m. - 6:45 p.m.

WHERE: Westboro Marriott Courtyard (junction of Route 9 and 495)

Consulting, custom development, maintenance, training, fee-based support, and other services are one of the fastest-growing sources of revenue for most software companies these days. But many companies haven't learned to "cross the chasm" from product and license marketing to an effective services-oriented style of marketing. In our next meeting, ASP executive director Jeffrey Tarter will discuss how you can become a services marketing superstar by knowing about four key topics:

Services positioning

Pricing

Relationship building

Lead generation

This will be a very interactive session, so bring specific questions and examples for discussion.

Biography of Jeffrey Tarter

Jeffrey Tarter is executive director of the Association of Support Professionals (ASP), an international research and membership organization for customer support managers and other professionals. He is responsible for the ASP's publications on such topics as call center operations, services pricing and marketing, support salaries, and online support metrics. In addition, he oversees the ASP's annual "Ten Best Web Support Sites" competition.

September 16, 2003 Meeting

PANEL DISCUSSION TOPIC: Strategic Challenges for Support Organizations

PANELISTS:

Marty Halpin, Sr. Director World Wide Customer Care Operations, Macromedia

Walter Reitz, Vice President, Service Operations, EMC

Deborah Wenger, Director, America's Service and Training, Bose

WHEN: Tuesday, September 16, 5:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.

WHERE: Papa Razzi's, Burlington, MA.

Our first meeting of the year -- and our first dinner meeting in a long while -- was very well received. About 60 people attended representing many of our companies, and we saw some new faces. Each panelist spoke for about 20 minutes and then we had a lively Q&A session that lasted until 8:45!

Tim Bailey and Melissa Fandel of Deltek Systems wrote some good notes from the meeting. Click here for the PDF.

Thanks to all -- especially our speakers! -- for making this such a successful event!

Panelist Biographies

Deborah Wenger is the Director of the Americas Home Entertainment Products Services division at Bose Corporation, a privately held manufacturer and retailer of sound solutions for home, automobile, business, and professional applications. Bose's worldwide corporate headquarters is in Framingham, MA. Deborah has been with Bose in a variety of sales and service positions since 1991. In her current role, she is responsible for a team of about 180 employees spanning customer contact centers for product and technical support, product repair operations, and in-home solutions.

Walter Reitz is Vice President of Services Operations at EMC Corporation. In his role, Reitz oversees service program management, logistics, EMC Services Global Partners and Alliances programs and EMC's Customer Satisfaction and Customer Loyalty research and assessment programs. A ten year veteran at EMC, Reitz has held a number of key positions within Global Services including Vice President of Services Marketing; Vice President of International Operations and Vice President of Customer Service in EMC's Open Storage Division. Reitz is responsible for helping fulfill EMC's marketing initiatives and business strategy to accelerate the worldwide adoption of automated networked storage solutions and advance EMC's market leadership. EMC Customer Service continuously achieves the highest customer satisfaction ratings and has consistently ranked at the top of independent satisfaction surveys.

Prior to joining EMC in 1993, Reitz held executive and senior management positions in customer support, operations, marketing and finance at Epoch Systems, DMC Services, Inc, and Prime Computer. Reitz has been a frequent speaker at industry conferences and before press and industry analyst groups. Reitz holds a BA from Bowdoin College and an MBA from Northeastern University.

Marty Halpin is currently the Senior Director for Macromedia's Worldwide Customer Care Operations. In this capacity he is responsible for System, Processes, QA, Training, Survey and Reporting. Prior positions held at Macromedia include the management of Premier Support, Customer Service and Server Product Support. Before Macromedia, Marty was employed with Intergraph Corporation where over 11 years he held a wide variety of call center and field operations positions as well as positions in the pre-sales/demonstration arena for Intergraph's hardware and software products.

June 2003 Meeting

TOPIC: Social Interaction & Networking

SPEAKER: None!

WHEN: Tuesday, June 12, 4:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.

WHERE: Our President's Estate...

We ended our season with a social event. Fred Van Bennekom, President of the Minuteman Chapter and Boston ASP Chapter, hosted an outing at his house in Bolton once again. This year it didn't rain! About 25-30 folks enjoyed interacting in an informal setting, learning about each others' companies and the challenges of their respective support organizations. Some good natured ribbing also occurred.

May 20, 2003 Meeting

TOPIC: Next-Generation Self-Service: Enabling the Customer Economy

SPEAKER: Chris Selland, President, Reservoir Partners

WHEN: Tuesday, May 20, 5:30 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.

WHERE: Enterasys, Andover, MA

The Minuteman Chapter along with the ASP Boston Chapter held another successful meeting on May 20. This was our first meeting in the Andover, Route 495 North, area, and we drew a solid crowd of about 25 people from both Minuteman and ASP members with folks from Bose, Pegasystems, Putnam Investments, Agilent, Stratus, Bentley College, and of course, Enterasys, which hosted the event and provided the beverages. Chris Selland, President of Reservoir Partners spoke about Self-Service, Trends and Technologies.

The presentation incorporated findings

from a recent study Chris and his team conducted to discover what strategies companies plan to implement in the next generation of self service.

Key areas discussed were:

* Defining "Self-Service"

* Survey Results

* Economics of self-service

* Key Enabling Technologies

The slides included information on such topics as:

* Sources of future service requests

* Integration with CRM, Knowledge Management and Call Centers

* Cost and Economics of service requests

* Future trends

Meeting Description

In today's customer-driven economy, demands for customer service are increasingly made on a 24x7 basis. Many companies view this as a challenge, but it is also a tremendous opportunity. While it is often true that the 'human touch' is a critical element of customer service, more and more companies are finding that many of their customers are saying 'help me help myself'. Moving to Self-Service offers companies an opportunity to both increase the quality and accessibility of service while at the same time dramatically lowering its cost.

This presentation will look at the key technologies and business issues surrounding Next-Generation Self-Service. It will explore these issues in detail, and provide perspectives and answers that companies can use to benchmark and enhance their own customer support initiatives. It will also focus on strategies for integrating Self-Service with other channels of Customer Service, in turn creating a consistent and cohesive support infrastructure and optimizing relationships with companies' most critical assets.

Biography of Chris Selland

Chris Selland founded Reservoir Partners, a strategic Relationship Management research and consulting firm, in October 2001. Just before founding Reservoir Partners, Mr. Selland served as Vice President of Marketing at eSupportNow, a venture-funded eCRM service provider. Prior to eSupportNow, he was Vice President of e-Business Strategies at the Yankee Group, a technology research and consulting firm and subsidiary of Reuters, where he became a leading market authority in the areas of customer-facing e-Business strategies. Mr. Selland has also held senior marketing positions at Primix Solutions, ON Technology, Computer Associates and Ingersoll-Rand.

Mr. Selland has been extensively quoted in major business and industry publications, and is a member of the CRM Magazine Editorial Advisory Board. He is also a frequent speaker at industry conferences, and currently serves as Chair of DCI's CRM Leadership Summit.

April 10, 2003 Meeting

** This meeting was the rescheduled February Meeting.**

TOPIC: "Kronos Service Delivery Productivity Technology Three-Year Plan"

SPEAKER: Mark W. Ellis Director of Service Operations, Kronos

WHEN: Thursday, April 10, 4:30 p.m. - 6:30 p.m.

WHERE: Kronos, 297 Billerica Road (Route 129), Billerica, MA

Kronos Service Delivery Productivity Technology Three-Year Plan

We are new group that we have started within Kronos Services that has been chartered to bring in new processes and technologies designed to decrease the cost of service delivery as well as at the same time improve overall customer satisfaction. The focus on the new technologies will be web based with an eye towards full integration between these technologies and existing products we are currently using today.

One of these new technologies is DesktopStreaming (DTS) from ExpertCity (an ASP). DTS is being used to augment PC Anywhere and Carbon Copy. This technology was rolled out worldwide, in three languages, cross functionally within 2 months. The ROI was made in full from line (voice & data) cost savings alone. In addition an estimated 8,500 man-hours were saved within the first 5 months of implementation.

Over the last several months we have been developing a 3-year "Knowledge Strategy" that will integrate DTS to our CRM System and our knowledge architecture that will include our existing knowledge repositories (multiple databases over 100GB) to a new front-end aggregation technology from Autonomy coupled with a new diagnostic engine from Emoxsha.

From a "support" perspective our overall goal at the end of three years will be to have over 50% of our support calls be handled in a "self service" mode using these integrated technologies and new processes. From an implementation perspective we will be looking to revise a major portion of our implementation capability from "onsite" to a "Solution Center" design again leveraging these new technologies and processes. (As part of this discussion we will demo to you at least our DTS implementation and maybe more pending time limitations).

Biography of Mark W. Ellis

Mark has over 25 years experience in Operations Management and Customer Support. As a Senior Principal Consultant at The Bentley Company and Technology Solutions Corporation, Mark helped hundreds of Fortune 500 customers achieve world-class service and accomplish their business goals by creating balanced performance models that worked for each company. Mark's professional focus during this period dealt with the constantly evolving trends in help desk and technical support design and delivery that affected customer satisfaction and productivity.

After several years managing technical support operations in the dot com space Mark has moved back into the more traditional technical support environment as Director of Service Operations at Kronos Inc where he is leveraging his experience to bring their world class technical support operations further along the cutting edge worldwide. Mark has had numerous speaking engagements for Gartner Group, HDI, Service News, and DECUS among others. Mark is a past Vice President of the Boston HDI Chapter and has authored numerous white papers and other publications.

March 11, 2003 Meeting

TOPIC: Device Relationship Management: The New "Killer App" for Service and Support

SPEAKER: Andrew Rodriguez, Alliance Manager, Axeda

WHEN: March 11, 5:15 p.m. - 6:30 p.m.

WHERE: EMC, 42 South St., Hopkinton, MA. Directions below

What to see a PDF file of the slides from the presentation? Click here?

Device relationship management (DRM) is a new enterprise software technology that is dramatically changing the way service and support delivery organizations operate. It allows personnel to access valuable, operational and usage data from "intelligent" devices deployed at customer sites - in real time, using the Internet - enabling proactive, effective remote monitoring, diagnosis and repair. Key benefits and significant ROI are realized across the enterprise from reducing the costs of service and support, growing revenue and market share, and improving customer focus/relationships.

This session will discuss what DRM is, how it delivers value, and why a rapidly growing number of Global 2000 companies in a wide variety of industries are adopting DRM. Key drivers for implementing DRM today will be presented within the context of results from a recent survey of service and business executives, conducted by AFSMI and Strategies for Growth, which conclusively validated the immediate need for DRM to achieve competitive and profitable customer service. DRM experts will also discuss and answer questions about justifying DRM within the organization.

"At AFSMI, we are interested in leading our members into a direction that is good for our customers and ourselves. We are looking for killer applications that will bring us to the next stage that will grow our business as well as our effectiveness, and DRM is offering a fantastic opportunity." Mr. Pim Bonsel, Vice President and Executive Director of Research & Studies, Association for Services Management International

Speaker Biography

Andrew Rodriguez, formerly director of business development at Thinq, Inc, joined Axeda as alliance manager in 2001. In this role, Mr. Rodriguez is responsible for supporting Axeda's strategic alliance accounts, including Siebel, IBM, and SAP, as well as developing new channels for the Axeda DRMTM solution.

Mr. Rodriguez joined Axeda with more than a decade of sales and alliance management in high tech firms such as Bell Labs and Bellcore, Sony and Vignette. Additional previous experiences include his role as director of business development at Thinq, Inc., an e-learning startup, and as business development manager at Sony's wireless division.

His educational background includes a Masters in Electrical Engineering from The Cooper Union and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

November 2002 Meeting

This was another joint meeting with our ASP colleagues where we celebrated the end of the election season.

TOPIC: "Treat and Trick -- Services Marketing After the Bubble Burst"

SPEAKER: Steve Hurley, Vice President, ITSMA

WHEN: Wednesday, November 6, 4:30 p.m. - 6:30 p.m.

WHERE:Mathworks, 3 Apple Hill Drive, Natick, MA 01803 (800) 962-9620.

What's new in the IT services marketing space? What are companies doing these days to build their brand, create new opportunities, and generally keep the revenue engine warm during this extended down cycle? Steve Hurley, Vice President of ITSMA's Learning & Performance Excellence, will present findings from several of ITSMA's recent studies that reveal what some of the best IT companies are doing these days to survive -- and, heaven forbid -- grow during the downturn. He will touch upon how buyer behavior has changed, what new marketing techniques are being applied, and the changing role of marketing in today's new economic environment".

STEPHEN'S BIO

Mr. Hurley is Vice President of ITSMA's Learning & Performance Excellence activities. His

primary responsibilities in this capacity are to manage and expand ITSMA's educational and

consulting offerings.

Since joining ITSMA in 1998, Steve has worked with over 50 member companies on their

services and solutions programs. In collaboration with his colleagues, he has been involved

in activities such as solutions strategies, services selling programs, acquisition

initiatives, organization analysis, and marketing effectiveness measurement programs.

Steve is often asked to speak at services marketing conferences and internal corporate sales

and marketing meetings. He has also given presentations to channel partners of many of

ITSMA's member companies.

In addition to speaking at conferences and meetings, Steve has been either a full-time or

guest faculty member at a number of academic institutions, including the Arthur D. Little

School of Management, the University of New Hampshire, the University of Bordeaux, Boston

College and Babson College.

Prior to joining ITSMA, Steve worked for Arthur D. Little, Inc., (ADL) a global management

consulting company that had over 4,000 professional consultants and offices in over 45

countries. During his time with the firm, he held several positions, including:

- Director of Executive Education for the Arthur D. Little School of Management, a fully

accredited graduate school associated within the company.

- Director of the firm's Professional Development Program, its global learning and

development function. As Director, he was responsible for training nearly 3,000 management

consultants worldwide as well as the company's management and administrative staffs.

Prior to joining ADL, Steve was a Peace Corps volunteer, spending nearly 3 years in Tunisia

as a Peace Corps Volunteer. He is fluent in French and has a working knowledge of Arabic.

September 2002 Meeting

TOPIC: "How to Deliver Support & Services On the Web"

SPEAKER: Jeff Tarter, Executive Director, Association of Support Professionals

WHEN: Tuesday, September 10, 4:30 p.m. - 6:30 p.m.

WHERE: eXcelon, 25 Mall Road , Burlington, MA 01803, 800-962-9620. (Directions at

http://www.exceloncorp.com/corporate/directions.shtml)

This presentation is a summary of the findings of the Web Site Support Award Winners, sponsored by the Association of Support Professionals.

PRESENTATION DESCRIPTION - "How to Deliver Support & Services On the Web"

Okay, we've all figured out the Next Big Thing: Web support and services. But if we've learned anything from the e-commerce meltdown, it's that success is not guaranteed just because a market researcher predicts another billion-dollar market. Success (gasp!) comes from getting the business model right, creating a great customer experience, and paying attention to the fits-and-finishes details. And that stuff is hard, which perhaps explains why so many market researchers are out of work.

Still, lots of companies have figured out how to deliver support and services on the Web, often as part of very complex and personal customer relationships. What are these Web service and support developers doing right? What great ideas can we steal from them? How do we keep our CEO from blowing the budget on overpriced Web designers and dubious technology?

If you wake up in the middle of the night worrying about these things (who doesn't?), drop in on the joint September 10th Boston ASP and AFSMI chapter meeting. ASP executive director Jeffrey Tarter will deliver a fascinating presentation on Web-based services and support, drawing from the ASP's annual "Ten Best Web Support Sites" competition. You'll get plenty of useful insights about the Web services trend, plus "best practices" ideas drawn from this year's winning sites. And if things get slow, Jeffrey will tell funny stories about his dog Quincy.

Jeffrey Tarter is executive director of the Association of Support Professionals, a non-elective position that is often compared to the presidency of Turkestan. Unlike Turkestan, however, the ASP is an organization of more than 1,100 tech support managers and professionals. In

addition to providing research and other services to its members, the ASP supports local chapters, offers discounts to its members, and conducts an annual "Best Web Support Sites" competition. Jeffrey Tarter is also editor| of a software industry newsletter called Softletter and is widely quoted by the business and trade press for his deep insights and irresponsible sound

bytes.

June 2002 Event

Cookout Social: On June 6 we revived an old tradition at Minuteman holding an end-of-the-year social gathering at the home of our President. Unfortunately, the rain -- and the horrible traffic problems it created -- kept many people away, but the 20-25 people who came had a good time mingling with fellow support service professionals.

May Event

All day work shop: "Strategies and Tools for Creating S-Business: Leading the Transition from a Product-Centered Organization to a Solutions-Led Enterprise."

Speaker: Jim Alexander, Ed.D. and Mark Hordes

Date/Time: May 22, 9 to 5

Location: Wyndham Summerfield Hotel, 2 Van de Graf Way, Burlington, MA

April 11 Meeting

** Sponsored by MRO Software **

This was be a joint meeting with the Association of Support Professionals

Speaker: Phil Verghis, VP Support, Akamai

Topic: "How to Scale Support, or Die Trying"

March Meeting

** Sponsored by Akibia **

Speaker: Joe Barkai, Diagnostic Strategies

Topic: “"What They Didn't Tell You About Self-Help"

Date/Time: March 11, 4 to 6 PM

Location: Akibia, Westborough

Speaker Topic Summary:

Joe presented a summary of industry research regarding the adoption of self-help technologies spoke. He then presented the potential implications of eliminating these customer problems from call center queues. Because these self-serviced problems are typically short in length, the mathematics of "traffic" modelling could actually lead to a deterioration of service levels for those remaining calls that require agent assistance.

February 2002 Meeting

** Meeting Space and Lunch Sponsored by Click Software.**

Speaker: Michael Blumberg, DF Blumberg Associates

Topic: “Key Approaches to Achieving Field Service Optimization”

Date/Time: February 12, 2002

Michael Blumberg presented an overview of what optimization means in a field service environment. His focus was on optimizing the use of people and the logistics of spare parts management. He presented an overview of research findings from a study of his that showed dramatic improvement opportunities for best practice companies. After the webinar was concluded, we discussed the challenges that two companies were facing, CVS and Creo, represented by people attending our meeting.

January 2002 Meeting

** Meeting Space and Lunch Sponsored by Maconomy.**

Speaker: Fred Van Bennekom, Great Brook Consulting

Topic: “Maximizing Customer Value through Design for Supportability"

Date/Time: January 8, 2002

Our January meeting featured a live presentation by our chapter president, Fred Van Bennekom, which was broadcast by webinar to other chapters. Fred outlined how companies can be more competitive by building supportability into products right from the design stage. He presented a framework and examples of the Design for Supportability concept. We had a good group of 20 people, representing companies from Bose to Honeywell to Teradyne, and our lively local question and answer period ran for almost an hour. Thanks again to Maconomy for hosting the event.