I was out at Interop the last few days and I thought I would just throw a few of my impressions out into the ether.
There is something very disturbing about how rude people are when you try and talk to them. Not everyone at Interop was rude but there were some folks that were just straight up jerks. I know everyone working in a booth is just trying to do their job but aren’t we all there to inter-operate or what not? To communicate and show how we can work together?
It is similar at most shows I have been to. People working the booth don’t want to discuss what they are doing or even just how the current show is going. I stopped by the Foundry booth and the lady that greeted me turned into a stone cold bitch when she found out I was a partner and actually already used Foundry gear. That is the way to keep partners or keep me recommending your gear. Not that I have amazing say in what people purchase but I talk to a lot of folks and I make sure to mention other companies that have gear or software I like. Maybe the person buys, maybe they don’t but they have heard a positive reference to the company.
The issue is the people that are sent to shows. The company I went with sent the right people, a good mix of marketing, sales and engineers. I didn’t notice anyone at our booth blowing folks off or being like “You’re a vendor, go away!” The booth staff even lent some of our gear to other booths just because.
In contrast to the Foundry witch the Solar Winds folks were great. I chatted with them for a bit and have a customer of mine looking into using them to monitor system utilization. Having a positive outlook on a company greatly increases my desire to recommend their product or even just work harder to make it work well with ours.
All in all Interop was a good show. I just think companies need to stop hiring folks to work the booths that A) aren’t really employees of the company and B) don’t have any idea what the company does.
