OT: Who's who at PLCTalk? Do we have any WW representation? - Rockwell's here

It just occured to me, I can't think of a single Wonderware tech support agent or distributer here. What set this off was a simple Intouch pricing question, and an easy InSQL question, to which users provided good advice, but never a good (authoritative) answer. In retrospect, this always seems to be the case. Not good representation for our fearless industry leader.

My hat's off to the Rockwell guys - Ken Roach and Ken Moore. Admittedly, my opinion of their support and software quality was jaded from 8 year old experiences as a Rockwell Certified Solution Provider. These guys have gone above and beyond to convince me otherwise. Thank you!

Most of you know that I'm here most often representing Inductive Automation. Less of you know that I'm active duty Navy stationed in Korea. I'm so confident that the good folks at IA have the best products and service out there that I continue to spread the word in my free time. My background is unique in that I did IT work for years before working for an integrator for a few years before working for Inductive for a few years - and that my degree is in computer science not engineering. Sorry, I'm not a PE and I can't tell you much about shunt windings or retro encabulators. I'd like to think that I can bring a slightly different perspective to the table in accomplishing the same goal. In any event, I appreciate reading everyone elses posts to stay current, and get satisfaction from helping out when I can.

So the real question - who here works for a vendor? Don't be shy, you won't get accused of jumping topicality or advertising. I asked. A strong multi-vendor support network is an invaluable service to the members here. I'm sure they appreciate the free support!

To Phil... and the integrators with 5000 and 6000 posts - we all know who you are.

Just for clarification, I am not a Rockwell person, never have been, I'm just an end user.
You will notice that I chime in a lot on the old TI-505 "stuff" as well.

My mistake. Ken Roach definately is. I'm sure there's at least one other, but I'm not sure.

Ken Moore said:

Just for clarification, I am not a Rockwell person, never have been, I'm just an end user.
You will notice that I chime in a lot on the old TI-505 "stuff" as well.

Click to expand...

surferb said:

My mistake. Ken Roach definately is. I'm sure there's at least one other, but I'm not sure.

Click to expand...

Are you sure?

surferb said:

A strong multi-vendor support network is an invaluable service to the members here. I'm sure they appreciate the free support!

Click to expand...

I'm not sure about that. Typically, if I run into a tough problem, the last place I would call is the vendor. I could post the question here and get an answer quicker (not to mention it will be a better answer). For insntance, I ran into a problem with a Siemens 840D recently, and the Siemens Rep, after looking at it for 2 hours, told me that my Version 5.4 was not supported in that plant, so that was probably the problem. Gee, thanks, I guess I'll just fix it myself.

Your company and others like it are the exception, because there just isn't a large enough network of users yet. But companies like Siemens, AB, Mitsi, etc, are just so darn big that it is more likely that the users know more about their products than they do.

edit: I didn't mean I don't appreciate their appearance here, but rather I think the free support the users offer is much more valuable as a rule.

That depends some companies do provide quick service, I've never had any problems with AB or Omron for example but Avery Denison (they produce a variety of products) dealing with this company is a real trial and a lot of phone tag. The knowledge of personnel on this site more than helps make up for the lacks in technical support offered by some companies.

I think you misunderstood my point - or I wasn't clear. I meant that having technical (undercover) guys from multiple vendors here answering posts is really valuable. I was implying that I find that users and integrators don't quickly contact their actual vendor/distributor. That's unfortunate, but I don't blame them. Again, I hate to dog Rockwell, but that's who my experience was with, I would also get fed up on the slow response times that yielded eventual results like, "reinstall Windows".

S7Guy said:

I'm not sure about that. Typically, if I run into a tough problem, the last place I would call is the vendor. I could post the question here and get an answer quicker (not to mention it will be a better answer). For insntance, I ran into a problem with a Siemens 840D recently, and the Siemens Rep, after looking at it for 2 hours, told me that my Version 5.4 was not supported in that plant, so that was probably the problem. Gee, thanks, I guess I'll just fix it myself.

Your company and others like it are the exception, because there just isn't a large enough network of users yet. But companies like Siemens, AB, Mitsi, etc, are just so darn big that it is more likely that the users know more about their products than they do.

edit: I didn't mean I don't appreciate their appearance here, but rather I think the free support the users offer is much more valuable as a rule.

Click to expand...

I appreciate the compliment. We at (Inductive Automation) strive to be a service oriented organization from the top down. Obviously at some point this becomes challenging to scale.

It's interesting that you should mention this. I just sat on an outstanding presentation on "The power of alignment" from Dr. George Labovitz. He's an MBA professor at Boston college and the author of a book of the same title. He described a scenario where he was representing his company, Organizational Dynamics, in consulting Federal Express maybe a decade ago. In an executive meeting George went around the room asking what their corporate priorities were: "Profit", "Service", "People", came up pretty much in that order without confidence. We're talking about the response from their senior leadership. At that point, the founder, Frederick Smith, passionately jumped up and said, "NO! Not at Federal Express!", which got everyone's attention, FAST. Keep in mind that this is the same man who, as a Marine Corps Captain flew 200 combat missions in Vietnam, earned a silver star, a bronze star, and 2 purple hearts (thanks Wikipedia). Frederick demanded that their priorities be "People", "Service", "Profit" - in that order! The message was clear and worked its way all the way down! We all know how well Fed Ex has been doing. George's point was that the difference between a "satisfied customer" and, ugh, "very satisfied customer" is incredibly valuable in terms of: repeat business, referrals, and that most of us are happy to pay a price premium to deal with companies that we like to work with.

So I went way off topic! I'm usually a skeptic of "soft" management-y type ideas. Dr. Labovitz was fascinating and captivating. Guess I'll have to buy and read his book.

I have been a Rockwell employee but I am not now. I didn't advertise my employer primarily to avoid the Ken Roach trap (my co-worker). I come here when I can and if people addressed questions to me specifically and I didn't get here in a timely fashion then Rockwell would get the blame. So, better to remain anonymous and respond to questions when I can.

I know several other Rockwell people that have posted on here. None of us have ever tried to be a cheerleader, just answering questions. It is not a corporate decision. Just fun and interesting like it is for everyone else here.

But I must correct a previous statement relating to company size. Here is a quick summary I put together of each companies # of employees:

• Siemens - 475,000
• GE - 300,000 (85,000 in Industrial)
• Schneider Electric - 112,000
• Honeywell - 100,000
• Eaton - 61,000
• Mitsubishi - 54,000
• Omron - 32,000
• Invensys - 27,000
• Rockwell - 19,000

Rockwell is a small company compared to the other names out there. Everyone thinks Rockwell is a big company but they are actually smaller than almost all of their competition.

OG

Operaghost said:

Rockwell is a small company compared to the other names out there. Everyone thinks Rockwell is a big company but they are actually smaller than almost all of their competition.

Click to expand...

It is size and focus. Some of the bigger companies are not as focused on PLCs. Smaller companies like ours can compete with the biggest out there but we must be focused on what we do best.
Our tech support has only a few products to support unlike the big guys. Big companies will never be best at everything. Small companies must concentrate their efforts until they are better at one niche. There are times when this doesn't work. In some cases the customer want to buy from just one supplier instead of buying best in class.

I was undercover for a year or two then Terry Woods and a few other more recent customers made it known what I do. This is good place for gathering marketing info. For instance I look for names of competing products that are be used, how often they are being used and where they are being used. I learn about the difficulties that customers have with their products vs ours. I find our what you guys like and don't like. I haven't forgot about CharlesM request for "inching" or slowing down time. The thread about passwords was helpful too. I learn the general skill level of my customers.

Dan Yost from Red Lion provides company-direct support in a very timely fashion.

The time is coming soon when I'll have to drop off entirely from the Forum. Not only does it give my boss direct timestamps of when I'm goofing off (Hi, Jon !), but there have been some new rules come down from the Legal department that insist that employees not attempt to "represent the Company" in Internet forums for liability reasons.

It never occurred to me to hide my identity as a person, or as an RA employee. I don't work in Tech Support, or in Engineering. I'm just a consultant in a field sales office.

One of the things that strikes me about PLCTalk is that most of the participants are from relatively small companies. You don't see anyone from GM, or Toyota, or Boeing, or General Mills, or Procter & Gamble looking for PLC troubleshooting help here.

Maybe it's a matter of lawyers on that level, too. I certainly wouldn't want to expose my professional, paid support exchanges on the Internet.

The threads that I like are not the support and troubleshooting threads, or the "I don't know anything and have no time to read books" threads, but the ones about technique, and algorithms, and control theory. Discussions among professionals and journeymen, not just troubleshooting Q&As.

I haven't forgot about CharlesM request for "inching" or slowing down time.

Click to expand...

Does anyone think me asking Peter to slow down time was a little much? I know if anyone can do he can.

On the other side of things when I see Peter is online I check to see what he is looking at. Even if its not something that I work with I know I can learn from him. Their are a few others that I look for as well. I think that is one of the reasons this forum is so good.

Ken Roach said:

The time is coming soon when I'll have to drop off entirely from the Forum. Not only does it give my boss direct timestamps of when I'm goofing off (Hi, Jon !), but there have been some new rules come down from the Legal department that insist that employees not attempt to "represent the Company" in Internet forums for liability reasons..

Click to expand...

It will be a very sad day ... just change your ID come back as GiT the 2nd

Ken said:

One of the things that strikes me about PLCTalk is that most of the participants are from relatively small companies. You don't see anyone from GM, or Toyota, or Boeing, or General Mills, or Procter & Gamble looking for PLC troubleshooting help here.

Click to expand...

They are here... they just lurk

I have worked for a couple vendors and distributors, but will not disclose who. Been posting since long before I got here (or mrplc.com).

I don't say who I work for with the intent that I will not allow my statements based on experience and testing to be interpreted as the corporate answer or as my employer policing the forums. This is something I entirely do on my own outside of business hours. I enjoy sharing my knowledge with others.

At one point in the past something I said on a forum was used by a vendor to take a pot shot at my employer and try to get them in trouble. Of course it was because the morons at the vendor didn't read or understand my post. So for now I must remain anonymous.

I will say I have years of experience with Modicon, Omron, Siemens S7-200, and Mitsubishi. Also a bit of small Micrologix and Idec peppered in there too.

One of the things that strikes me about PLCTalk is that most of the participants are from relatively small companies. You don't see anyone from GM, or Toyota, or Boeing, or General Mills, or Procter & Gamble looking for PLC troubleshooting help here.

I can tell you that I work for a tier 1 supplier for one of those companies and a lot of my friends work for them. They are not allowed access to these types of forums. There is very little latitude for venturing out on your own to do investigative work on a process from Japan. OOOOPs.☯ I on the other hand use this tool almost daily and appreciate all of the potential rewards that come with surrounding yourself with teachers.