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In any event, I was quite happy to take the 100 K salary and drooled over the comp plan that paid some handsome bonuses PLUS incentives for certain applications and certain sales quarters- and let’s not forget the generous car allowance too. Heck when you came from the Land of “Not” (Lawson) Oracle seemed like the tier 1 software vender you had heard about in the trenches. Seemed fair to me!

Fast forward a year or two and Oracle’s application’s took a nose dive and the compensation plans weren’t going in the right direction which naturally made dealing with the “Oracle machine” less tolerable. People began to leave (me too) and the tech market in general took a turn for the worse, and as such my Oracle stock was nothing more than “Ellison wallpaper”.

As we all know so much has changed; Ellison’s buying spree has boosted those “damp applications” from my tenure and fortified them with the exact apps we were challenging back in the late 90’s- Peoplesoft, JD Edwards and Seibel. The “Machine” has taken some hits in the last 6 years; aggressive sales tactics were outlined in the loss of a government bid a few years past and the behaviour of the sales team was highlighted more than the loss of the bid. Oracle needed to become “kinder and gentler” but still drive in the revenue and make Wall Street happy.

Trouble is Oracle is a marketing machine where market share comes first and technology comes second. Ellison is the “Madonna” of the software world- re-inventing his company (or so he thinks) and splashing it out in the press using his “brash” Barnum style commentary- making outrageous claims for his products and attacking his competition.

As I write this, I realize this has been the plus and minus I experienced personally at Oracle all along. I left the company for the “safe harbor” from that tough economy at the “anti Oracle” – SAS. What a change-there was never “Press” of any sort and the comp plan was developed by our introverted CEO, who also coded the software, with the opposite effect I would later learn; “how much do we have to pay those greedy sales people- after all our software sells itself. “

Technology came first at SAS- and I can tell you as a sales rep- Oracle ain’t a bad place to be if you are in the game for money and respect as a sales person, but SAS had a better customer satisfaction rate because of their commitment to technology. Just look at how much money Oracle spends on marketing VS the dollars SAS spends on R&D.

In a “perfect world” SAS and Oracle would morph and we could have the best of both worlds; great technology and a good sales team- but I digress.

Word on the street is that the Oracle of yesteryear is back (dollar wise). Just as my sales peers at SAS have been diving out of the SAS cesspool of mediocrity and bad compensation and jumping back into the world of lavish comp plans and frankly professional respect, and get this- an improved work environment?

For Fiscal Year 2006- The “new Oracle” is still offering maximum salaries at $100K. With a typical 1.5- 2 million quota; a sales rep can expect to yield $240- $260 K at plan. Now this is for applications reps- the technology “studs’ that were mentioned earlier hold down a larger quota, but subsequently make some serious moola.- over the 300K mark. There is the same generous car allowance and all the other “perks” from working for a top technology organization.

However, there are more “divisions” of sales reps. Oracle has made more acquisitions in the past 18 months that in the prior 18 years. It’s a different Oracle- yet not all of the players are changing and adapting to the new model.

On the application side, the CRM apps are handled by a separate sales rep and is not sold by the Application reps as in the past. The Database/ technology is still sold by the technology side of the house and has more back office offerings than before.

But what a mix of products to handle! The CRM reps sell Siebel, Oracle, PeopleSoft, JDE, PLUS all of the niche CRM acquisitions Oracle has been acquiring along the path. Plus there is no shared revenue with the Application sales rep anymore.

Oracle claims Human Resources and CRM is their #1 growth spots for Oracle and as such they have the biggest sales force to support those offerings.
Oracle also claims to be the #1 CRM and HCM vendor in the world- over SAP.
And as with other technology sectors, the west coast and the east coast are still their hot markets- with the east winning out last year.

Not only that- the new Oracle environment is evolving. When I was there, certain regions were more “aggressive” than others, but overall Oracle is taming the beast, and is trying to make good and attract good sales people to their team. Fancy that- maybe you can teach an old dog new tricks?

Hope Blaythorne
Techslog Editor
hope@techslog.com