Networks in Action

The opportunity to make creative use of personal computers and phone lines is illustrated by an individual who spearheaded innovation in a firm that in 1987 had just one PC in its New York head office. It was not just the only PC; it was the only computer.

The National Cargo Bureau is a private non-profit marine survey with around 100 employees in 17 locations. It surveys cargo traffic unloading and loading and provides reports and calculations ship owners use to charge cargo owners for shipment. Bulk cargo, such as iron ore or wheat, is difficult to weigh directly, so the Bureau's 60 surveyors provide essential data. They look at the weight of the ship before and after loading, how deep it is in the water, and how much fuel, water, and ballast it has used. This has traditionally been done by using hand-held calculators; secretaries typed the figures into standardized survey reports that were sent to New York. An outside contractor was paid $30,000 a year to examine customer invoices to work out how much the Bureau's customers were owed. The reports were three months or more behind events.

The Bureau's surveyors are former ship captains who have no computer knowledge or experience. Sam Sammons, who spearheaded its move to transform its work processes through PCs, had bought a home computer in 1985. In 1987, he showed the Bureau's senior managers how this very limited machine could input data and generate reports. They were impressed and gave him the go-ahead to introduce personal computers in four offices. He bought four standard machines and added software packages for word processing, spreadsheets, and simple database management. Modems and an off-the-shelf communications program made it easy to send activity reports to the head office over the dial-up phone system.

Sammons's main concerns were human, not technical. As Computer Buying World commented in April, 1992, "initially, employees welcomed the equipment as if it were a stack of pink slips." Computers represented bureaucracy, potential layoffs, fears of looking stupid, and simply the unknown. They could easily disrupt a small, effective organization whose surveyors, retired ship captains, understood cargo, and the sea but not the world of "management" and computers.

Sammons relied on a mixture of show and tell, gentle persuasion, and positive reinforcement. He was an insider and did not dismiss wary resistance as technophobia. He sent computer games to the offices where the personal computers were installed, hoping to tempt people to try them out. He focused on how the PC's would save time on secretarial chores, eliminating work that they all saw as drudgery, such as constantly typing the same report with only minor variations in the numbers. The productivity benefits soon became very visible: Up to several hours were saved while on board ship, survey reports were produced in one-third the time, and managers had access to financial reports in minutes instead of months.

In 1989, the pilot PC system was extended to all offices. Sammons's growing concern was lack of support from the retailers. The Bureau did not have any in-house technical staff, nor would it make sense to have them in a company of 100 employees scattered over 17 offices across the country. In addition, the Bureau's purchases were far too small to get volume discounts or for vendors to assume a dedicated sales rep. The retailers lacked in-depth technical knowledge, and their technical support staff always seemed busy.

Sammons contacted several direct companies, which are basically mail-order suppliers except that they compete on support as much as on price. Sammons chose Zeos almost entirely because of that company's technical knowledge and attitude: "If they have a problem, they work with you until it's solved." He kept ahead of the Bureau's PC users by trying out new software, which he then introduced to the 17 offices. For instance, he bought a database management system that enabled him to develop a vessel-tracking system, something badly lacking in the organization.

By mid-1992, the PCs were fully institutionalized. Sammons had added a heavy-duty 486 PC for the head office, where there was a need for number-crunching and generation of many financial reports, surveys, and analyses. The offices got laser jet printers; special software provides a high-resolution print that has enhanced the quality of the Bureau's published surveys. All the PCs have modems, and Sammons plans to add a LAN in the New York office, which will link the PCs and printers used there, provide a file server, and enable other offices to upload and download data to the server. Some surveyors are using laptops and notebook machines; a few are trying out Hewlett-Packard palmtop machines that are calculator size with small screens and keyboards but that can run Lotus 1-2-3 and have a modem included.

Sammons's strategy has rested entirely on using direct sales channels, commenting that "If you've done your research, buying direct is easy and economical, and you get good quality and good support."

Questions for Discussion

1. Discuss some of the coordination and administrative issues associated with managing the National Cargo Bureau's information system with PCs distributed over 17 locations and connected on a dial-up basis using modems.
   
   
2. What are the technical and administrative support implications of installing a LAN in the New York office: Does this move make sense for the company at this time?
   
   
3. Discuss the impact on the LAN-based network system of each of the following:
   
   1. increased use of portable terminals, such as laptop and notebook computers
      
      
   2. the addition of wireless data terminals to the mix of workstations accessing the network