The next chapter

dodgechargerfan said:
You are the first non-Avaya person I have over heard say that.
Thank you.

There was a rumour that Cisco was poking around our network business. That's the business in which I work.
I don't think that will happen, but who knows.
That's a scary thought for me because they poached almost my entire team during the Nortel swirl.
I talked to the hiring manager there, but didn't jump. If they bought us, I'd be a little fish.
Right now, I'm on a smaller team with specialised skills.

I'm not too worried because our networking technology is leading the industry right now. That tech will go somewhere. I can go with it or I can go to a reseller that sells and supports that tech.
But the process and dealing with uncertainty with customers is a bear. We already have an uphill battle to win deals, and we keep putting teflon on the soles of our own shoes.
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When I lived in Florida, I worked for the county school district. While I was there we upgraded the entire district to Avaya IP phones. I was the networking guy, so I had to upgrade the network to handle them and help out with the phone conversions. Our phone guys always said how great the phone system was and when they went to training they said it was huge.
 
Chad said:
When I lived in Florida, I worked for the county school district. While I was there we upgraded the entire district to Avaya IP phones. I was the networking guy, so I had to upgrade the network to handle them and help out with the phone conversions. Our phone guys always said how great the phone system was and when they went to training they said it was huge.
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One of our divisions at my last job was Avaya & we were Cisco, as were the guys we hired at the site after we merged. There weren't many fans of IP Office but that's kinda expected if you've already know UCM.
The new CIO despises Avaya for whatever reason and wants it out of the enterprise by end of 2017.
 
Chad said:
When I lived in Florida, I worked for the county school district. While I was there we upgraded the entire district to Avaya IP phones. I was the networking guy, so I had to upgrade the network to handle them and help out with the phone conversions. Our phone guys always said how great the phone system was and when they went to training they said it was huge.
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Cool.
The IP Office solution is really taking off. It's scaled up to be able cover what we used to use Nortel Meridian 1 (big iron, refrigerator sized) to cover.
As the Nortel stuff ages out, we've got a great migration fro our customers because we allow them to transfer the licensing over. The majority of the cost of a telephony solution is sets and licenses. Depending on the set, we allow them to migrate too, but with limited functionality compared to a new set developed specifically for SIP.
 
My biggest concern: Does this mean that the sponsorship of the Earthquakes' stadium will be rescinded?


Seriously, though -- mojo. There's a huge Avaya building on Great America Blvd in Santa Clara about a half-mile from my house.
 
Lerxst said:
One of our divisions at my last job was Avaya & we were Cisco, as were the guys we hired at the site after we merged. There weren't many fans of IP Office but that's kinda expected if you've already know UCM.
The new CIO despises Avaya for whatever reason and wants it out of the enterprise by end of 2017.
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Yeah, there's always been a real division between our companies. We're competitors.

As an ex-Cisco reseller and an ex-Cisco technical lead at a distributor, I don't get why that is the case.
I didn't have any problem transitioning over to Nortel technology when I got hired. Sure there was a period of time where the Kool-Aid had to make it's way out of my system, but the influx of new information helped quicken that.

Having experience with Cisco and Avaya listed on your resume is a fantastic thing.
It's been my experience that anyone with Cisco credentials don't see it that way. It's Cisco or nothing. I've been able to change a few minds over the years, but the sentiment is very prevalent throughout I.T.
 
bsman said:
My biggest concern: Does this mean that the sponsorship of the Earthquakes' stadium will be rescinded?


Seriously, though -- mojo. There's a huge Avaya building on Great America Blvd in Santa Clara about a half-mile from my house.
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I haven't heard. That's a big flagship for us because it's loaded with our technology and has been a reference for us to get a bunch more stadiums accounts. See the Mets reference above for the latest.

That building is our world headquarters. It used to be Nortel offices. I love that place. I've been there for many training sessions and customer meetings.
After Avaya acquired the Nortel Enterprise business unit, Avaya moved it's HQ from Basking Ridge, New Jersey to Santa Clara, California.
 
dodgechargerfan said:
I haven't heard. That's a big flagship for us because it's loaded with our technology and has been a reference for us to get a bunch more stadiums accounts. See the Mets reference above for the latest.

That building is our world headquarters. It used to be Nortel offices. I love that place. I've been there for many training sessions and customer meetings.
After Avaya acquired the Nortel Enterprise business unit, Avaya moved it's HQ from Basking Ridge, New Jersey to Santa Clara, California.
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Every time I've been in the job market, including now, I'm always blown away by the concept may places have that you have to experience with their vendor platform or they won't consider you as a candidate. Oh we have an EMC NAS and you are a NetApp guy so you're not qualified. Yeah, I get that interfaces, commands, and other subtle things are going to be different but the underlying concepts are the same but I think there's some truth to 'if you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball' in many of these cases :wink:
 
A good friend of mine was a long time US Lucent/Avaya employee. An engineer on the telecom side. He got laid off after about 25 + years with the company last September. Glad to hear there is a lot more stability on your side of the border for the company.
 
Denverdave said:
A good friend of mine was a long time US Lucent/Avaya employee. An engineer on the telecom side. He got laid off after about 25 + years with the company last September. Glad to hear there is a lot more stability on your side of the border for the company.
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I probably know him by name.
 
Lerxst said:
Every time I've been in the job market, including now, I'm always blown away by the concept may places have that you have to experience with their vendor platform or they won't consider you as a candidate. Oh we have an EMC NAS and you are a NetApp guy so you're not qualified. Yeah, I get that interfaces, commands, and other subtle things are going to be different but the underlying concepts are the same but I think there's some truth to 'if you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball' in many of these cases :wink:
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Yep. Once I get the chance to show the command line to a detractor/denier they either shut up or get excited about our technology. There's not a lot of difference any more.

I think one of the scariest things for a CCIE is that we can pretty much negate a large portion of their knowledge and training with our Fabric Connect based on Shortest Path Bridging. The technology is just that simple.

I do a one day knowledge transfer where I take people from zero SPB knowledge to building a network with an example of every available service type.
I have customers that rolled out their entire network, on their own, based on that training alone and me answering a few questions along the way.

But they SHOULD be embracing that new technology and adding it their resume. Too often I see people that won't.
 
Best of luck. I hope it all works out for the best.

My company is merging with another. We won't know our fate until the end of this calendar year. That's a long wait.
The only thing that allows me to sleep at night is the 10 months of severance I would get if let go.
 
Dudeman1967 said:
Best of luck. I hope it all works out for the best.

My company is merging with another. We won't know our fate until the end of this calendar year. That's a long wait.
The only thing that allows me to sleep at night is the 10 months of severance I would get if let go.
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Having lived through that, it's not a lot of fun waiting.
It got to the point where I woke every day wishing they'd cut me loose with a severance package.
Right up until the bankruptcy was announced. Then all bets were off.

Your situation sounds different. So hopefully it works out good for you.
 
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