Duh! I Coulda Had a V8…I Coulda Had a Raise…

You’ve seen those tv commercials. The ones where someone is doing something ordinary, and suddenly a hand comes into the scene and smacks them on the forehead.

Anyone with a decent long-term memory knows what comes next: I coulda had a V8!. One of the more memorable ad campaigns; certainly one of the best product positionings ever.

I had a V8 moment on the way into work last week.

We were booking a booth at a regional conference. During the discussions, we discovered that a client had saved, oh, about 50,000 hours of data entry time. Simply by automating that work with the Foxtrot solution.

Being the number-nuts we are, we couldn’t help but do the calculations. Annual savings of somewhere between $500,000 and $850,000, wouldn’t you say?  50,000 hours X $17 average hourly rate for a data entry person = $850,000.

So where is the V8 moment?

On my way into work, I recalled sharing that information with the customer. Their response was, “gee, I’ve been too busy to do that kind of savings (or productivity) calculation”.

It took over a day for me to realize that that customer was hiding their light under a bushel basket. They had taken the initiative to purchase Foxtrot, and applied it to their data challenge (which involved moving data from one system to another, making corrections to the data along the way).  With absolutely great results.

Only problem is, their success is a secret. Only that person – and the folks at EnableSoft – know of the payoff.

So why not take 5 minutes to calculate the savings you’ve achieved with Foxtrot. Then put it in a performance document. Add that info to your annual review data.

In fact, why not send an email to the boss AND  the CFO AND the CIO (if that is not politically incorrect in your company). Something along the lines of “hey, I just saved the company half a mill – not just this year, but every year from now on…”

Does it guarantee a raise? A promotion? Nope. But you did the work. You delivered the results. Why not let other important people in on your secret?

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