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Suppose a psychotherapist could actually put a company’s software on the couch. What neuroses, manias and phobias might she diagnose? How does the software psyche of an organization shape its productivity potential?
If that company is Cypress Semiconductor Corp.--one of Silicon Valley’s most innovative chip firms--the software diagnosis could be “very disciplined, organized, methodical and goal-oriented,” Cypress’ Rick Foreman says. “But perhaps a bit too compulsive and obsessive.”
A bit too compulsive and obsessive? This is a company that designs and implements “killer software from hell” (now just affectionately known as “killer software”) that can literally shut down a manufacturing or purchasing operation independent of any human intervention. In fact, most of Cypress’ key operations are now actively supervised by specially designed software. Is inventory running high? Killer software will shut down the line until the humans fix the situation.
A lot of companies are now wondering whether Cypress knows something about the future of software that they don’t.
If a picture is worth a thousand words, then an organization’s software systems are surely worth a thousand interviews for revealing business priorities. The software culture of Cypress practically begs for a digital Freud to create a new theory of the organizational mind. In fact, the Cypress experience makes you wonder if the future will see the rise of corporate cultures where technology manages people as much as people manage technology. As director of strategic systems and administration for Cypress, Foreman oversees the strategic software systems that both embody and manage Cypress’ priorities and values. “If it’s not part of the corporate culture, it won’t work,” he says.
While thousands of companies use software as a tool, Cypress has grown its entire culture around it. Driven by its outspoken chief executive, T. J. Rodgers, the company rigorously and relentlessly measures everything it considers important--and then translates it into software that literally governs workplace activities. Indeed, Rodgers and Foreman both credit the company’s software with helping fuel Cypress’ growth into a $300-million-a-year company in eight years.
In addition to killer software from hell, a “goal management system” tracks the performance of nearly 1,100 employees; employees in groups where the goal-delinquency rate exceeds 20% are targeted for special attention. Employee evaluation, compensation and inventory management are all driven by software. Cypress’ software--as much as people--has become the company’s medium for management.
The technology has become so pervasive that the Cypress culture tacitly acknowledges that if something isn’t expressed in software, it’s probably not important. “Two or three years ago,” Foreman recalls, “we were constantly late with deliveries. We had poor credibility with our customers. . . . It was an area that was not taken as seriously as it should have been.”
Why? Because, at that time, customer service issues weren’t a part of Cypress’ strategic software systems. So at Rodgers’ direction and under Foreman’s supervision, Cypress built software that was empowered to shut down the manufacturing line if inventory remained longer than six days.
“We modeled it after the big red levers that can stop the lines in Japanese auto factories,” says Foreman--except that at Toyota and Honda, humans, not machines, pull the lever.
Killer software that can shut down the departmental computers now exist in Cypress’ purchasing, engineering, finance and marketing departments (although not yet at Foreman’s computer group).
“It really is companywide, it affects everybody,” he observes. “The fundamental cultural change is that people know that there is a deadline and that they have to meet it. . . . The overall cultural effect is that Cypress is in business to serve customers, not internally generate manufacturing units.”
However, as Foreman and several Cypress employees quietly acknowledge, killer software doesn’t generate a lot of internal enthusiasm. While many people love the software that clarifies goals and commitments, they resent the software that can step in and shut down their operations. Yes, there are “early warning systems,” but, fundamentally, most of Cypress’ software is designed around sticks, not carrots. Given that the company just suffered its first down quarter in several years, how enthusiastic will people be about such systems when they don’t seem to deliver the savings and profits?
According to Foreman, well over 100 companies have expressed interest in importing Cypressware into their own organizations. But where do you draw the line between software culture and software cult? Cypress has clearly made its software a core value of the organization. Just how easily can a company that has always viewed software as a tool now assimilate software as a managerial way of life? Just how much self-selection is required to make these kinds of systems work in complex, growing companies?
Because of its intense commitment to management-by-software, Cypress serves as one of the most provocative experiments going on in American industry today. The company has implemented technologies that redefine the role of management and worker as surely as did Henry Ford’s full-scale introduction of the assembly line.
Cypress’ killer software culture may not be a place where most intelligent and innovative people want to work--but for companies looking for clues on how to create systems that can govern productivity, this experiment more than matches anything going on at General Electric, IBM or Intel.
