Why Big Companies Don’t Contribute

Have you noticed that the big companies in our industry are least likely to contribute to conversations on-line in our industry? Do you wonder why? Do you think it’s because they just don’t care about everyone else?

I occasionally have this conversation with people I know who are from or are tightly related to the big companies and had one of these conversations just a couple days ago, as a matter of fact. Here are a few reasons why I know they often don’t participate:

• For one, people from large companies are busy just like the rest of us are. They don’t necessarily have more time just because they have more people.
• Big companies have big controls on their people. Thus, people from large companies are more likely to think twice about whether they’re allowed by their company to post.
• With regard to the large software vendors, I know some of them don’t post because they don’t want to look like they’re ganging-up on the rest of us with their big-establishment mentality. A lot of them are worried about how it will look if too many of their people post too often on various topics because they worry that it could end up looking like spam or bullying if they have too many posts in their favour.

It's frustrating for me that I can't get more of the big companies such as the big LIMS vendors and big customers to more actively participate in things like the LIMS/Laboratory Informatics group. When they participate, they have interesting things to say just as many of the rest of us do and having them so strenuously avoiding participation leaves a big gap  in any effort that would be industry-wide. On the other hand, it's probably the rest of us that need these tools more than the large companies. Large companies have their own networks and resources. It's the rest of us that need these things, which is why the rest of us are more likely to be active in them.

Gloria Metrick
GeoMetrick Enterprises
http://www.GeoMetrick.com/