How EDS Got Its Groove Back

7-Eleven Sees Red

Despite the massive reorg, there was still one practical problem: customers. EDS's once-a-year customer-satisfaction surveys offered little in the way of urgency or transparency. When Brown asked, "How are we doing on the Continental account?" no one had a good answer.

The solution: the "Service Excellence Dashboard," a Web-based tool that measures and tracks service quality in every EDS business at all times. The Dashboard displays a color-coded rating system -- green, yellow, and red -- for critical customer-service benchmarks, including value, timeliness, and delivery.

But the Dashboard is more than a display of cold, hard facts. It's also another force for transparency and cooperation. The status of 90% of EDS's accounts is displayed on the desktops of the company's worldwide leaders. If you're responsible for Continental, and your client executive has put up a "code yellow" for the account, your peers will know about it. The Dashboard also fuels collaboration, because many of those executives will quickly contact you with offers to help. Such was the case with EDS's 7-Eleven account.

EDS supports the network, hardware, and applications for 7-Eleven's retail-information systems, which link up all 5,200 of the franchise's stores. In August 2000, the system flatlined. Servers crashed. Applications failed to work correctly. Stores tried to place product orders but couldn't dial into the host system. When they did manage to dial in, the system sometimes couldn't connect with 7-Eleven's suppliers. "If we can't process our orders, we can't get product into the stores," says Jimmy Pitts, 7-Eleven's point man for coordinating with EDS. "And if we don't have product in the stores, we don't have sales."

7-Eleven CEO Jim Keyes put in a direct call to Frank DeGise, EDS's client executive for the franchise. Shortly thereafter, DeGise put up a red light for the entire account. Within 24 hours, EDS had mobilized.

Don Uzzi, EDS's executive sponsor for the 7-Eleven account, quickly assembled a SWAT team of senior leaders. The team brought in the company's top network guru and handpicked an A team of systems administrators. More significantly, it partnered with 7-Eleven's top IT troubleshooters and formed a joint-company project -- "Going for the Green" -- to fix the network. Working together, the two companies did an architecture review that revealed design flaws in the network's structure. It took 60 days to reconfigure the network and streamline the hardware. After an additional month of testing, all systems were go. The 7-Eleven account flashed green.

"At the old EDS," says DeGise, "the culture was, 'Fix the problem yourself. And while you're fixing it, make sure you're signing new business.' " The new EDS is sharing information internally -- and the next EDS will extend that reach to its clients. By the end of the year, all of the color codes, metrics, and comments from the client executive and other leaders from within EDS will be pushed to the client's desktop.

"We're taking the original design intent behind the Dashboard -- which is to create new relationships that are based on trust and collaboration -- and we're bringing it right to the client," says Charley Kiser, who leads the Dashboard team. "Clients will see the good, the bad, and the ugly. They will truly be part of the team."

When Eagles Flock

Walk into the fifth-floor reception area at EDS headquarters in Plano, Texas, and you can't miss it: a great bronze sculpture of a screaming eagle, its wings unfurled and its talons flashing. It's a legacy of the Perot era, a symbol of the qualities that Perot valued. The eagle is courageous. It is predatory. But eagles don't flock.

There are signs that the old culture still reigns at EDS. Despite the downsizing, there are still multiple layers of hierarchy. Despite the reorg, there are still instances where salespeople from different business practices call on the same client. Despite efforts to increase the cool factor, blue suits still prevail at corporate headquarters.

There is also abundant evidence that the company that was wired to compete has learned to collaborate. Consider how Brad Rucker and Robb Rasmussen work together. Both are leaders in the E Solutions business, both are EDS veterans, and both are leading the company's push into the digital economy.

At the old EDS, Rucker and Rasmussen would have been competitors, fighting toe to toe to win new business. They are still competitors, but now their energy is directed against EDS's competition. "People are motivated by how they get paid," says Rucker. "I'm compensated based on how my organization performs against its financial goals. I'm also compensated according to how we do at E Solutions. If Robb is having a problem, I need to help him solve it."

"And let's be honest," interrupts Rasmussen, eager to make a point. "This year he's the one who is carrying me."