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The Big Announcement

Let’s get right to the point.  The big announcement is not that I’m joining Microsoft, but I did decide to take a full time position (gasp!).  I’ve decided to join GalaxeSolutions as a .Net Solutions Architect.  I’m not going to lie to you, this is a big change in mindset for me, and I’m not going to start spouting off that GalaxeSolutions is the “be all end all” of consulting firms.  But, I’ve worked with their parent firm, Galaxy Systems on a previous long term assignment, and became friendly with their staff and president during my time on that assignment.  We went are separate ways after the assignment, and then the dot com bust happened, and we sort of lost contact.  But, while I was looking for some work recently I bumped back into them again.  They have recently added Michael Wagner (former CTO of Approach.com) to help build the Microsoft side of the practice, and we hit it off right away.  But before I go into what I’m going to try to do with Galaxy, let’s get to why I’ve done what was considered almost impossible, taking a FTE (full time employee) position. 

Back in Sept. 2005 I blogged, Perfect Time to Start an IT Consulting Firm?, where I mentioned that with the demise of so many consulting firms after the dot com bust, and the current upswing in market it makes it a good time to start up an IT consulting firm.  I also mentioned that I previously had my own boutique consulting firm, and that running a business is not something that I really enjoyed.  But, as Julie Lerman and Larry O’Brien talked about back in Dec. 2005, as an independent consultant, your earning potential is based on a very limited resource, your own time.  I’ve done the indie consulting thing for over 12 years, and although I have begun to branch out to create additional revenue streams (like advertising on my blog), there are still lots of things that I want to do, but can’t because it impacts my billable hours.  Most of these things have the potential to bring in money some time in the future, but the odds that an independent consultant will have the time to utilize that revenue potential is very small.  So, I was stuck.  I could, continue doing the independent thing (and continue dabbling in other things like training), start a new firm, or join an existing firm and help them kick their business up a couple notches.  Well, I’ve done the independent thing a long time and can always go back to it if the other options didn’t work out.  I’ve already done the owning a consulting firm and didn’t like that, so the only other option is to join an existing firm.  Microsoft was/is always an option, but I know that I can do more to help them on the outside (and I have never been impressed by the base salaries for the positions I’ve been approached about).  So, I was down to continue what I’ve been doing or join an existing firm, and the opportunity with Galaxy popped up.

With this new position with Galaxy, (and I hate the GalaxESolutions name, so I’m going to have to work at fixing that), I’ll be able to continue architecting .Net solutions, but also focus on growing the business via all the things that I already do, user group presentations, Code Camps, conferences, and helping with the local Microsoft Developer & Platform Evangelism team.  One of my big pet peeves is the current state of the Information Technology Consulting industry, so I want to also try to implement some brand new business models/ideas.  I think that the 20th century IT Consulting model is dead (or at least on life support and is brain dead), and we need a new model if this industry is going to survive.  Anyone that has read my career tips posts has a pretty good idea of some of the things I see as defective in this field.  I’m not saying that I’ve got the answers, but I feel the need to see if I can fix (or at the least, influence) this industry.  I’m tired about complaining of the problems of this industry to my friends, and it is time to try to do something about it.  The other thing I’ve always talked about doing is trying to grow the New Jersey Developer community (especially the Microsoft and .Net communities), and make Northern New Jersey into Redmond East.  I think that this new position at Galaxy will help me work towards accomplishing both of these goals.  I’m a realist, and know that what I want to do is a tall task, but I feel the need to try some new ideas and figure out what works (or doesn’t work).

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Published Monday, March 20, 2006 3:10 PM by donxml
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Daniel Moth said:

Hey Don, good luck! :-)

Question: What makes you think that a consultancy can have *any* benefit by one of their consultants speaking in public or supporting the development community or generally doing the evangelism thing? The target market for a consultancy is business people and the closer to the CEO/CTO you can get the better. Having developers know and love your brand does absolutely nothing for your consultancy business (other than recruitment of course).

So I am *genuinely* curious: What business arguments are there for a consultant to be doing "user group presentations, Code Camps, conferences, and helping with the local Microsoft Developer & Platform Evangelism team"?
March 21, 2006 3:57 AM

EMDoc said:

Best of luck to you in this next phase of your career. talk to you soon.
EMDoc
March 22, 2006 11:29 AM

--chaz said:

First of all Don, all the best! Regarding Daniel's post I'd ask isn't there inherent value in being closer to Microsoft for your clients? I think your involvement in the community and tight knit relationship with Microsoft is a marketable attribute that you bring to your new organization.

It proves that your company isn't just throwing a warm body on a project, but a true expert in the industry.
March 22, 2006 1:54 PM

Haacked said:

This is surprising indeed! Definitely talk more about what you will be doing and why. Good luck man!
March 23, 2006 2:10 PM

Alex Barnett said:

Hey, good luck Don!!
March 24, 2006 1:40 AM

Sonu Kapoor said:

All the best Don!
March 24, 2006 5:22 PM

Matevz Gacnik said:

Don, congrats!
March 25, 2006 2:56 AM

Haitham said:

Hey, great news Don, good luck. Let me know how it feels to be a FTE again ;)

btw, it was good seeing you down by my neck of the woods. Let me know if you're going to present/speak by central or southern Jerzy...
March 25, 2006 8:26 PM

Daniel Moth said:

Chaz, assuming I read your comment correctly, here is some food for though (Don, I hope you don’t mind such a long comment on your space).

Most consultancies are Microsoft (gold) partners now. That is enough to show a relationship with Microsoft to potential clients. Also most consultancies employ consultants that are Microsoft-certified. That also shows (to the client’s eyes, not necessarily ours) expert employees. Besides, the client cares about the consultancy’s reputation to deliver on time/budget and not who their players’ names are.

Being an MVP (having personal close ties with a product team in Redmond) is a saleable asset to bring to any potential *employer* (not client). Claiming that it can be used to gain new business though is a logical jump. Especially since the whole evangelism thing takes time… billable time! There is even the other argument that MVPs have proven specialist knowledge (e.g. XML) but how does that prove you can build an enterprise app and lead a team of other devs and handle the customer relationship? How does speaking in public prove that to the client or has any relevancy?

How many non-developers know what an MVP is? How many of them read blogs or attend conferences? Bottom line is that I have yet to see a consultancy (or any business whose main customers are *not* developers) pay one of their employees for what are, basically, MVP activities that raise an individual’s profile. And if such a company exists, I’d like to hear the business model behind that decision.

Personally, I’d like to see Microsoft give incentives to its partners to support MVPs in that way. An easy first step would be for partners to earn points when they employ an MVP much like, today, they get points for employing an MCP.

So now you heard my random thoughts there is no need to address them but just take them as background. The original question still stands:

**
What business arguments are there for a consultant to be doing "user group presentations, Code Camps, conferences, and helping with the local Microsoft Developer & Platform Evangelism team"?
**
March 30, 2006 4:41 PM

Don Demsak said:

Daniel, I think you are confused because there are 2 types of MVPs. The original MVP was someone that just answered newsgroup posts, the newer model is the community oriented person (speaks or runs user groups, Code Camps, blogs, etc.). The newer model is closer to the Regional Director model, and if you go look at the list of Regional Directors you we see that most of them either own or are a partner in a consulting firm or training company. All the events that they speak at on the behalf of Microsoft are not paid for by Microsoft (and believe me there are lots of local events). None of that time is billable time, but they do it because they know that it helps to bring in clients, which basically shoots holes in your theory that there are no business reasons to do the evangelism stuff. If it didn’t work, then consulting and training firms wouldn't allow their people to be a Regional Director.
March 30, 2006 5:39 PM

Dave Donaldson said:

Sorry I'm a bit late on this, but wow, didn't see that coming. Congrats on the new opportunity!
April 2, 2006 2:01 AM

Daniel Moth said:

Don thanks for responding. I am glad you think I am confused cause if I am not this doesn’t make any sense!

I understand very well the second type of MVP (I would add that there are some of us that belong in both of those camps - e.g. me), so that is not the source of confusion.

Your comment is contradictory (imo) to your blog post. This is not a question of what MVPs do and whether companies would or wouldn’t want MVP/RD employees that contribute *in their own individual time* to the community. That goes without saying and I am not questioning it at all. This is a question of whether the employer would encourage you to do this on *billable* time. <em>By the way, you mentioned independents and trainers – they are very different animals to consultant employees but that is a separate discussion and irrelevant to this thread so I will not contest it</em>

You state in your blog post above that because you are now joining this consultancy, you will evangelise even more (“I think that this new position at Galaxy will help me work towards accomplishing both of these goals.”). I read this to mean that your company will directly/indirectly pay you to do it (if I read that wrong then we have found the point of confusion and I guess you can further clarify your original statements – after all English is not my first language :-)).

So to be clear: You or I doing whatever we do in our own time is one thing. A company paying you or me to do this on the *company’s time* does not make sense to me and I have heard no business justification for it, yet.
April 3, 2006 7:19 PM

Don Demsak said:

Daniel, presenting to an audience is a form of marketing, and so is blogging. More and more consultants and consulting firms have realized that these forms of marketing can be more cost effective then most other forms of advertising (radio ads, newspaper ads, etc.). RDs are expected (and usually required) to present during normal business hours at the request of the local Microsoft office. I’m not talking about every week, but a couple times a quarter, but it does add up (and it does decrease your billable hours). As an independent, it makes little sense to give up billable hours when all your time is already book (i.e. you can’t create more hours in a day). But when working for a consulting firm, the firm can fill these requests with consultants other then you, so it makes sense for them. This way, although you are not billing, you are marketing, which will help drive customers to the firm over time. At this point, you are not only a billable resource, you are also a salesperson for your company.
April 3, 2006 8:23 PM

Daniel Moth said:

Don thanks for confirming that I wasn’t reading your statements incorrectly. These two sentences from your last comment are inline with your original post.
“you are marketing, which will help drive customers to the firm over time”
“you are also a salesperson for your company”

So, again, I see a logical jump: All the community activities we do are aimed at *developers*. Your statements continue to *assert* that connecting[1] with developers will bring you more customers. It is exactly that assertion that I am challenging. It isn’t true in my book (at this point, if you read all of my previous comments you’ll find them inline with this and focusing on precisely this point).

[1] Feel free to interpret “connecting” as whatever you like. Presenting, raising brand awareness, educating, etc. It doesn’t matter; they are still just developers, not potential customers.
April 4, 2006 4:41 AM

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About donxml

I’m an independent consultant, specializing in .Net solutions architecture, based out of New Jersey who also doubles as an evangelist for XML, Domain Driven Design, enterprise architecture and .Net. I do not work for Microsoft, the W3C or any other big company that you may know of (at least not yet). I’ve been an indie for over ten years, and although I’ve been tempted a couple times to take a job with companies like Microsoft, I’ve haven’t found something better than my current situation. I work mostly with the large pharmaceuticals that are based here in New Jersey, and usually find myself on long term contracts. Definitely not the prototypical indie consultant, but it lets me dedicate time to my non-income generating activities like the developer community stuff, plus financing open source projects like XPathmania and MVP-XML. If you would like to talk to me about doing some contract work, just contact me via the contact page. My rates vary widely, depending on lots of different variables, but mostly distance from Jersey, and type of work. Plus, I’ve been known to donate some of my code for various projects.

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