--On Friday, March 16, 2012 21:28 -0700 Joel jaeggli
<joelja@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> On 3/16/12 20:04 , John C Klensin wrote:
>> Note too that, if the company sends only five technical people
>> and concludes that it doesn't suffer harm from that small a
>> number, the odds of getting back up to 10 if the experiment is
>> terminated and those five sales/market types disappear is just
>> about zero, at least until the economy improves considerable.
>>
>> Scale and juggle the figures as you like, this is not a
>> zero-risk experiment.
>
> You know nothing about marketing budgets.
Sorry, Joel. I have both had to administer those budgets and
policies, been the victim of them, as well as seen it go on in
companies with whom I've done consulting work on organizational
and strategic matters. Companies differ -- I tried to say that
-- but in many companies that are really oriented toward the
bottom line, marketing controls virtually all travel budgets.
In a few, sales and/or controls and perceptions of their needs
control almost all budget categories: Engineering is rarely a
profit center, the money has to come from somewhere, and the
organizational question is how much control the money source and
its needs affect how it is spent.
I didn't mean to suggest that the effects would be felt
immediately -- there are usually budget cycles. But, over the
medium term, even more relaxed organizations in tight budget
situations do tend to eventually notice "total number of people
attending from company", and push back. If the attendees
include both people from cost centers and people from profit
centers, the latter tend to win the battle for slots, or at
least to win less.
But I suppose I should defer to your superior experience in
senior management and corporate finance roles.
john