MOT Lab / Masa33 Blog

CEOのSteve Ballmerが全従業員あてに流したメモが 業務効率化によるコストカット を促すものだったそうです：
The 24-year-old company is now a sprawling organization with dozens of businesses, modest revenue growth, and a flat stock price. Instead of being driven to change the world -- the mission its best employees signed up for -- a key focus now for Ballmer is "process excellence," which seems unlikely to inspire Microsoftees to stay up all night creating the Next Big Thing.

クスマノ先生がこのメモについて「まるで成熟産業の企業の通達のようで、ちょっとわびしい」というニュアンスのコメントをしています：
"It sounds like a memo that maybe Procter & Gamble would send to its employees -- not the kind of thing you'd expect from a dynamic software company," says Michael A. Cusumano, a professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Sloan School of Management.

記事は「コストカットもやるべきだ。ついでに、そろそろ株主に配当も出せ！　だけど、昔の成長を取り戻すためにはそれだけで不十分だ！！」と熱く論じています：
What the company needs is a new vision of itself -- one that motivates employees, excites investors, and places it once again in the vanguard of an industry on the march. Sure, with $300,000 in annual expenses per employee, it could use some cost-cutting. And it's about time Microsoft distributed a chunk of its cash to shareholders. But neither of those moves would do anything to restore the company's vitality -- the excitement that pushed its stock price up more than 10,000% in the 1990s.

新収益源を作るようなイノベーションが望まれるけど、今のマイクロソフトは既存ビジネスにひきづれらており、イノベーションを産み出しずらい状況になってしまっている：　
Yet when it comes to actually delivering jazzy new products, Microsoft is often stuck -- trapped by its legacy. It focuses slavishly on bolstering the Windows and Office monopolies through what it calls "integration innovation." As a result, it fails to deliver breakthrough innovations that might draw buyers into the stores and get the company growing more rapidly again.

まさに、 Innovator's Dilemma !!! マイクロソフトですら、この原理からは逃れられないのでしょうか・・・

関連記事１　The Street.Com 　 Ballmer's Memo Got It Right ：　いわゆる選択と集中的なコメントがたくさんでています。　たしかにどっかの国のビジネス誌みたいですね・・・

関連記事２　Fortune.com Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer's Memo to Employees　　：　メモのコストカット以外に関する話。こんなことも書いてありました。

We have fixed nearly 70 percent of crashes and hangs experienced by customers in our key products this year. 　

1ユーザとして上記にお礼を申し上げます。ついでに、以下のバグの修正もお願いしたいです。
・　PowerPointのスライド中の日本語文字列の最後の文字がいつの間にか消えてしまう
・　Excelのセルの中身が画面では全文表示されているのに印刷すると、一部が切れてしまう