Is there anything you can do to turn things around at SAS?
I love this company. SAS is a great company, and has been over the years.
It makes me think …. What can I do to save the company?
Or should I give up, and work for Broadcom, IBM, SAP, etc. ?
I don’t think so,….. this company is worth fighting for. Anyone agree?
Thumbs Up or Thumbs down…
What can we do to help redirect our company to progress?
Support people who do good work at SAS and advocate for them.
Insane. And thanks for following up!
@bumt+1rDqt5jw
I can't recall specific examples word for word, but it was when Viya was launched and all the spin SAS put around Viya's Cloud credentials.
By 2016 (when Viya was released), Cloud software was generally expected to involve automated provisioning, breath-in / breath-out scalability, high availability/redundancy, and evergreening (automated updates). Viya did none of this.
SAS talked about Viya being "Cloud-ready" as if it was some massive breakthrough when in practical reality it was no more "Cloud-ready" than SAS9 was. Sure, Viya could be containerized using Kubernetes (which got drilled into us as a major selling point) but that was all completely meaningless because SAS had no clue how to leverage this architecture to create a true SaaS offering.
Instead, a Viya customer having spent around $100k to $200k on licenses for say a 4 node, 256 CPU cluster, would then typically have to pay at least another $100k to $200k of services and wait for at least another 3 months for what was then known as "SAS Solutions on Demand" to just install the software! Then when a new release came around, the same thing all over again! Cloud-computing? ...like he-l it was!
Would love to hear specific examples regarding marketing myths VS reality.
From where I sat in presales, SAS didn't seem to genuinely care about it's customers since the mid 2000's. It was all about extracting as much $ as possible. I felt like I was constantly having to advocate on behalf of my customers, battle against the machinery of the SAS organization, to do what my customers were asking for. This was particularly evident when it came to customer's expectations around cloud vs what SAS's marketing department claimed, vs the actual reality.
Historically SAS had the philosophy: Happy employees -> happy customers -> $$.
I always thought it was really happy customers -> happy employees, and the $$ just naturally followed.
The new philosophy seems to be : $$$. Leaving out the happy customers or employees part. Which actually leads to negative $.
Sadly without changing that now embedded philosophy by those at high levels, I doubt there is a turnaround.
If you really care. Or if you were a difference maker in building SAS. Or if you truely have an interest in the future of SAS…. Or if you are interested in investing in or buying SAS….
Who are you who gives such crazy ideas?
Are you a supporter?
Are you a coward?
Are you a criminal?
Are you a competitor?
Are you a computer?
If you think SAS has no value say it.
I believe that this company has legs.
And I believe in it.
Its leadership may be flawed or aging. But the people are good.
Anyone agree? Thumbs up.
This is one of our best threads, a current employee honestly asking what they can do.
The responses are generally constructive, even though most of them advise the OP to take care of themselves.
@5mss+1rDqt5jw “Believe me”, “I promise you”…. Two phrases that tell me you are neither believable or trustworthy.
@5mss+1rDqt5jw
Couldn't agree more.
SAS is the most cultish organization I've ever known.
And certain personality types are vulnerable to cults.
They got su-ked into the vortex and somehow end up believing there is something special and unique about SAS, and that it really is some sort of "family".
It's all self-serving BS on the part of JG and others who fostered that culture.
These types of threads are lame on so many levels. Why would "you or I" feel the need to "save" a company that isn't ours, and that we no longer benefit from? We just worked there, much like any other factory worker at any other company. It's like giving advice on Sports Talk Radio to a host, hoping that the coach or team owner is listening. I promise you, the coaches and owner are not listening, and they don't care about your advice.
Once a company has tossed us aside, why would "you or I" care about what the organization does now or in the future? At that point, it's no longer our problem. We no longer have a stake in it.
Please don't say you care because of past friends you've worked with or because the company was "so great". That's disingenuous. Believe me, if the places were switched, those folks wouldn't be wringing their hands and worrying about you or your family's fate. They'd simply be glad that it wasn't them, praying that they are spared the axe, for just a little longer.
Whoever creates these threads may want to seek help for codependency.
“I'm a 50+ year old white heteros-xual male and I left SAS 2 years ago and now work for Microsoft.”
I’m also an older white heteros-xual male, who left SAS at a similar time.
Your resume may be stronger than mine, but we each had good timing. We left SAS during the pandemic stimulus, before Microsoft and others started doing layoffs.
The tech job market is much more difficult now. I have friends in their 50s who’ve been looking for months.
Anyone considering leaving should apply to a few jobs to test their marketability. Getting hired is not as easy as it used to be.
You are also Boxer, unless that was meant as sarcasm.
Work harder. If enough do then, soon, with company success, you will be rewarded. It’s just around the corner.
copy paste a little from the other thread.
at least 3 things have to happen, none of which would be solved by more pitching-in or even more "hardcore-ness".
the first two are happening, even if slower than a "cutthroat" owner would do. the third: it's not clear SAS owners/execs/the yes-men and yes-women have any competency in this area beyond building a few products and solutions on a successful-at-the-time platform.
most tech execs probably do not know how to save declining platforms. however, on rare occasion, some can figure out how to "pivot". if you can help figure out #3 or execute on it incredibly well, that would likely be the best way to help (being in #1 or #2 would help but you'd no longer be there)
Yet again, I see the "50+ year old white heteros-xual male" is hard done by, sentiment.
I'm a 50+ year old white heteros-xual male and I left SAS 2 years ago and now work for Microsoft.
Being of that demographic might be a disadvantage in landing a job with a startup run by Gen Zers, but it's not that hard to land a good job in tech if you're in that demographic and you've got good skills, a good attitude, and an open mind.
You can't save SAS by yourself. You have no executive power Only the executives can save SAS if they are capable and willing to change their ways. You can only save yourself!!! Don't wait too late before you jump if you're capable of going somewhere else while still young-ish. Otherwise stay and accept the axe when the time comes.
"Or should I give up, and work for Broadcom, IBM, SAP, etc. ?"
No way! Don't laterally move from SAS. Either stay and enjoy the laid back culture or upgrade for both pay, meaning, and probably work hours.
The problem is that SAS revenues in 2024 were about the same as in 2013. Adjusted for inflation, that’s a decline of about 25%. If the revenue decline continues, the layoffs will continue.
If you have an idea that will make money, you can pitch it to management. But people with such ideas are rare. For most of us, as others have said, the best move is to plan your career:
Saving SAS is best done with your feet.
“If you are one of the lucky ones who had a leadership chain of command that were competent and capable and rewarded the efforts of those who worked hard, consider yourself lucky. that has not been the experience for most of us.”
As much as you wish it to be the case you do not speak for “most of us”.
Vote with your feet. Save yourself.
This company lost its way some time ago and it's too far behind now to ever catch up. Lack of accountability all the way up to the very top has ki-led it from the inside. A technology company should not have to make efforts to "modernize" and it shouldn't have books that are such a mess that they take years to disentangle.
If you are one of the lucky ones who had a leadership chain of command that were competent and capable and rewarded the efforts of those who worked hard, consider yourself lucky. that has not been the experience for most of us.
To those who have toiled here for decades and have watched with broken hearts as know-nothings and do-nothings were pushed ahead thanks to friends in high places, start planning your exit. The painful decline here is obviously accelerating.
You are encouraged to work for Broadcom, IBM, SAP, etc.
I guess it depends on your role.
But for me, I lost the will to fight.
But my fight was with SAS. Fighting to get them to do what their customers were asking for.
I was in pre-sales and all of my customers were asking for SAS as SaaS....i.e. in the Cloud, with easy, automated deployment.
That was the promise of Viya in all of the marketing materials.
But what SAS delivered with Viya, was so far below what our customers were expecting, and what they were getting used to from other vendors...automated deployment, breath-in breath-out scalability, software that actually worked and performed and didn't cost hundreds of thousands of dollars just to install.
I got sick of apologizing to my customers.
I got sick of battling with what was know as SSOD (SAS Solutions on Demand), then Global Hosting.
I got sick of trying to convince customers that yes, SAS did have a plan for migration from V9 to Viya.
I got sick and tired of constant internal battles on behalf of some of SAS's most loyal customers.
I came to the conclusion that nothing was going to change and SAS was in terminal decline.
I left 4 years ago, and I'm so glad I did.
It appears that little has changed and SAS's prospects have gone from bad to worse.
It's sad.
“ What can I do to save the company?”
Work on saving your future. The company has a board and and executive layer to look out for its future and unless they ask for your help, don’t worry about it.
They would have no trouble in laying you off without giving a fk about you.