SAP Wins an Award
December 8, 2009
This is the season for awards. I receive dozens of announcements about companies that are on someone’s Fast 50, Hot 100, and Top 10 list. The lust for awards is linked to sales. I don’t think a company that is generating significant revenue gets too excited when a real, imagined, bogus, or hackneyed award plops on their doorstep. I have received a few awards in my time, and I don’t think I did much marketing around them. I enjoyed the recognition, but I was busy. I took my check, ribbon, or trophy and went back to Kentucky. I used one award to hold ties. When my father in law said, “That is a good idea,” I gave him the trophy. He used it as a tie rack until his death.
You can test my hypothesis that companies in trouble make a big deal out of certifications, awards, and honors. Navigate to “SAP Earns Palladium Kaplan-Norton Balanced Scorecard Certified Software Designation”. With SAP’s revenues drifting south and TREX (SAP’s search system) nearly invisible, I think the award puffery tells more about the SAP need to have something—anything—to make the company relevant again.
The era of big, expensive, and overly complex software is drawing to a close. Bad news for SAP, but it is good news for the sponsors of the Palladium Kaplan-Norton Balanced Scorecard. The more revenue pressure, the greater the need to embrace this type of honor. Just my opinion. I would prefer surging revenues, happy customers, and a revivification of TREX. Maybe the certification comes with a trophy that can hold ties?
Stephen Arnold, December 8, 2009
I wish to disclose to the Marine Mammal Commission that I was not paid to write about what may become an endangered species of enterprise software vendor.
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