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December 8, 2003 (Computerworld) -- I have deduced why Neil Montgomery is scowling in the picture accompanying the article "Eyes Everywhere" . As a midmarket CEO, he is receiving daily e-mail reports on the activity of individual sales representatives and the timely delivery of individual orders. This is an outstanding example of an information system providing the wrong individual with an overabundance of irrelevant information. Are decisions being made on a daily basis by the CEO at Davis Controls that require this data? Are the outcomes achieved by the activity at Davis sparked by these decisions enhanced by the consideration of this data? These daily management reports do provide valuable updates on the performance of the organization, but they should be provided only to those who are responsible for the management of that particular facet of operations -- a sales manager, for example.

Of course, if this implementation of the Macola Enterprise Suite enabled Davis to eliminate its sales manager, transfer sales management responsibility to the CEO, and in doing so improve both sales force efficiency and executive leadership effectiveness, please ignore my previous paragraph.

Nate Brandstater

Assistant vice president

La Sierra University

Riverside, Calif.

nbrandst@lasierra.edu

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