The Sourcing Maniacs 2008 Vendor Tour Part VIII: FieldGlass
In yesterday's installment, we jumped ahead in our story and recounted the Maniacs' failed attempt to infiltrate Empower and find out what Emptoris is really up to, whether or not they're going to go public soon, and what their plans are in their quest to become the largest sourcing provider in the space. In today's installment, we recount the maniacs' visit to FieldGlass.
Today's post is a long post, as it recounts the "rationale" the maniancs used in selecting Fieldglass, a lenghty definition of what contingent workforce manaagement is, as the maniacs apparently had no clue, and then a detailed description of Fieldglass' capabilites. I've broken it into Preamble, Lead-In, CWM Definition*, Technology*, and Epilogue so that you can jump to the part you're most interested in, where * indicates content, if you're short on time (and come back later for the rest).
| Yakko, Wakko, & Dot | Oompa Loompa Doom-pa-dee-do |
| Yakko | I have a great product for you |
| Yakko, Wakko, & Dot | Oompa Loompa Doom-pa-dee-dee |
| Dot | If you are wise you'll take a look-see |
| Yakko, Wakko, & Dot | Oracle's fine when you have lots of cash It stores all your data and caches it fast But when you're cash-strapped, you're hung out to dry To watch the vultures circ'ling high |
| Wakko | Up in the dark'ning skies |
| Yakko, Wakko, & Dot | Oompa Loompa doom-pa-dee-dar But now there's Coupa, you can go far You will buy in happiness too Like the Oompa-Loompa doom-pa-dee-do |
| Dot | the doctor sure knows how to write a catchy tune! |
| Wakko | I could sing it all day long. 'Cause I wanna go to the Coupa Store! |
| Dot | So where are we going next? |
| Yakko | I guess we're on the D's. |
| Wakko | Who do we know who starts with D? |
| Yakko | Demica. |
| Dot | Supply Chain Finance, right? |
| Yakko | Yep. |
| Dot | Well, the innovation there is in the application thereof, and not necessarily in the technology, as the doctor explains nicely in the wiki-paper, so I'll pass this time around, since we're more focused on technology right now. |
| Yakko | No prob. We can always do a services company tour later if we don't find any jobs before this tech tour is over. How about Descartes? |
| Wakko | The "delivery management" company. That's just combining 3PL with VMI and network op-ti-my-za-shun, right? |
| Yakko | I think so, but I'm not 100% sure. |
| Wakko | I'll pass for now. Too complex for me! I still have problems with 5 by 5 ... I run out of fingers and toes ... |
| Yakko | Hmmm ... Denali? |
| Dot | Consulting, market intelligence, and professional placement. Again, services. |
| Yakko | Well, dat does It. I'm out of D's. On to the E's! |
| Dot | I have a sour taste in my mouth for the E's right now. |
| Yakko | And there's a chance we can sneak into Empower in the fall and find out what Emptoris is up to. Ok. On to the F's. Frictionless? |
| Wakko | Aren't they just a bunch of saps? |
| Yakko | Excuse me? |
| Wakko | Didn't SAP buy them? |
| Yakko | Oh, you mean S-A-Ps. Yes, you're right! Fogbreak? |
| Dot | Again, back in California. Too soon to go back. |
| Yakko | FieldGlass? |
| Wakko | What do they do? |
| Yakko | Contingent Workforce Management. |
| Dot | And where are they? |
| Yakko | Chicago. |
| Dot | That's not too far. |
| Wakko | Wind! I like wind! Let's go! |
| Dot | And since we have a mighty hike ahead of us ... the maniacs are still in Pittsburgh, PA, where they were visiting Co-exprise before doing their on-line Coupa research let's sing! |
| Wakko | It was just yesterday, I ran out of feed |
| Dot | A wascally wabbit, it ate all my seed |
| Yakko | Hens were getting restless, I couldn't drink my mead |
| Yakko, Wakko, & Dot | I logged into Coupa, and it met my need |
| Editor's note: the maniacs proceed to sing all of the Coupa songs, repeatedly ... and even though I think they're pretty damn good (after all, I wrote them), they get a little tiring after you've heard them for the tenth time ... in a row ... so I'll save you a few pages and simply point you to Davie and the Coupa Factory, It's Coupa Time, The Coupa Hoedown, The Coupa Drinking Song, and The Coupa Store if you're curious. |
| Wakko | Feel that wind! We must be getting close. |
| Yakko | Pretty darn close, actually! |
| Dot | So why are we here? After all, isn't contingent workforce management simply contractor management? And when you need a contractor, don't you just call up your placement agency and get one? What's so hard about that? And why would you need a software solution? |
| Wakko | Quoting? |
| Dot | e-RFX. |
| Wakko | Billing? |
| Dot | e-Invoicing. |
| Wakko | Payment? |
| Dot | e-Payment. |
| Yakko | Firing? |
| Wakko | Donald Trump! |
| Yakko | Were we too hasty in selecting FieldGlass as our next target? Were we swayed by the possibility of an excuse to visit the windy city |
| Wakko | so I could fly my kite |
| Yakko | and not by whether or not the technology might have something to offer, making the company viable, and, thus, increasing the chances that there might be a job for us? |
| Dot | Maybe. I'm starting to wonder about this decision. |
| Yakko | Well, we're here ... so we might as well give them a shot! |
| Wakko | On it! Out comes Wakko's mini mallet. Tap. Tap. Tap. See, no dings! |
| A man in a blue suit and dark jacket opens the door. | |
| Dark Jacket | Can I help you? |
| Wakko | I'm Wakko! |
| Yakko | I'm Yakko! |
| Dot | And I'm Dot! |
| Yakko, Wakko, & Dot | And we want to know why we're here! |
| Dark Jacket | Now that's a very difficult question, and one I leave to the philosophers. I'm a technology guy myself. |
| Yakko | What we mean is, why is FieldGlass here? |
| Dark Jacket | To provide a unified, best-of-breed, contingent workforce solution. |
| Dot | But why? Isn't contingent workforce management simply contractor management? And when you need a contractor, don't you just call up your placement agency and get one? What's so hard about that? And why would you need a software solution? |
| Dark Jacket | No, and no. Why are you here? |
| Yakko | We're seeking enlightenment. We're trying to find out what various solution providers offer the sourcing world. |
| Dark Jacket | To what end? |
| Wakko | Well, we're trying to map the new sourcing world to find our place in it |
| Dot | and help the doctor in his quest to educate the masses. |
| Dark Jacket | The Doctor? I'm sorry, but you've lost me. |
| Yakko | the doctor of Sourcing Innovation informed us that the best way to find our place in the sourcing world was to understand it, and the best way to understand it was to go and talk to the innovative vendors and find out what they were doing. And if we did that, we could help him in his mission to educate the sourcing world, which he says is a win-win for everybody. |
| Dark Jacket | Sourcing Innovation ... I think I've heard of it. It's one of those upstart blogs, isn't it? |
| Wakko | It's not just any blog ... it's the best blog if you want to learn about innovation in your supply chain. |
| Dot | And it publishes our stories! How can you beat that! |
| Dark Jacket | So you want me to explain what FieldGlass does? |
| Yakko | And why anyone would need a contingent workforce management solution. Especially in supply chain. It really sounds like a simple HR tool to me. |
| Dark Jacket | Well, it sounds to me like you don't understand the problem. Would you like to? |
| Yakko, Wakko, & Dot | Yes, please! |
| Dark Jacket | OK ... give me a few minutes. |
| Dark Jacket disappears back inside and re-emerges a few minutes later. | |
| Dark Jacket | Since you say you're familiar with Sourcing Innovation, we'll start there. I did a bit of research, and found a number of informative articles on the site that frame the problem quite well, and which should allow me to convey the purpose of the FieldGlass solution to you in a manner that will be easy for you to understand. We're at the beginning of a talent crunch that will surpass anything the world has ever seen. Over one quarter of America's population, and well over one third of America's workforce, is eligible, or will soon be eligible, for retirement. The vast majority do necessary jobs. Where are their replacements going to come from? |
| Yakko | New Graduates? |
| Dot | Other countries? |
| Wakko | Robots? |
| Dark Jacket | Nope. Nope. And Nope. There aren't near enough graduates to fill all those empty positions as American's youth is declining. Remember, it's the boomer generation that is retiring and birth rates have decreased since then. There are strict limits on how many people can enter the US each year to work. If we are lucky, and the incoming administration doesn't lock down the borders even more, over the next five years, the government might permit 1% of those jobs to be filled with foreign workers. And that might be an optimistic scenario, especially since most countries around the globe are suffering talent crunches as well, and some are worse off than we are! Finally, although Disney's Imagineering leads us to believe that it won't be long before Robo can do all of our jobs for us, the AI that would be needed is likely still decades off so robots won't save us either. |
| Yakko | So we're doomed? |
| Dark Jacket | Only if we continue with the traditional mentality that all workers must be full time employees. The fact of the matter is that, at least to a limited extent, the vast majority of the American population, almost 80% in fact, is able to contribute to the economy in some way, shape, or form. Furthermore, if we add up all the available capacity that is going unused in the traditional employment model, we find that, at the very least, we can make a major dent in the talent crunch ... and maybe even halt it altogether (at least for the time being). |
| Dot | So how should we be thinking? |
| Dark Jacket | Part-time. Flux-time. As needed. As available. Pre-graduate. Retiree. Disabled. Telecommute. Many people retire because they are forced into it (because of organizational policies, especially in the public sector), because they don't want to work full time anymore, or because they are unable to do the job they were doing, be it due to failing health or lack of education and training, and not because they want to sit on their porch and stare into space. Many of these people want to keep being productive, they just want to do it less, and maybe do it from home. And they're great resources. Their valuable experience can be used to mentor junior employees, which helps them become better, more productive employees, faster; to improve processes, which will help the organization do more with less; and to guide management around pitfalls and traps that they know are there in the market, which can prevent the current generation from repeating the mistakes of its predecessors. And with the high and steadily rising costs of education these days, as well as the desire to be part of the consumer economy, more and more high-school and college students are seeking part time work. Not only are they a great resource to help you with the escalating amounts of tactical work many business face in today's economy, but utilizing them in positions that correspond to their course of study helps prepare them for full time work when they graduate. |
| Yakko | And that's why we need contingent workforce management? |
| Dark Jacket | It's one of the reasons. As I have just described, organizations can not rely on full time labor alone. In addition, the need for temporary contract labor in the services industry is going to increase as lack of talent and market forces dictate less full time employees and more contract labor. And from a business perspective, without a contingent workforce management solution, you can't have an effective talent management program, and this costs your business money. Lots of money. |
| Dot | How much? |
| Dark Jacket | It depends on the company. But if you look at our Verizon Case Study, readily available on our website, you'll see that Verizon achieved a four-month payback, 9M in savings in the first year, and a 2 year ROI of 77% after implementation of our InSite solution. |
| Yakko | That's a lot of cash! |
| Wakko | So how come my wireless bill is so bloody expensive? |
| Dark Jacket | You'll have to take that up with Verizon, I can only tell you how contingent workforce management saves you money. |
| Dot | So how does it do that? |
| Dark Jacket | Simply put, it streamlines the contingent labor requisition process, simplifies the identification of resources, automates the distribution of requests, standardizes resource rates, automates the collection of quotes, tracks awards, and insures that companies always bill at the approved rate and only for approved hours on approved projects. This reduces recruitment costs, reduces processing and payment costs, and, most importantly, prevents overcharges and overpayments, which often total 20% or more at companies without contingent workforce management solutions. |
| Yakko | And how does your InSite solution enable Contingent Workforce Management? |
| Dark Jacket | Simply put, we enable the end-to-end contingent worker life-cycle, from acquisition, through onboarding, through management and payment, to offboarding, with complete historical data storage to allow you to repeat the process in the future for the same employee, same position, or same department as needed. We do this with an application that has fully customizable workflows that support the hiring manager, approvers, HR coordinators, suppliers, and workers in each step of the procure-engage-pay-offboard cycle, to whatever level of support and detail they need. Our application simplifies the definition and setup of a requisition, which, when driven off of a pre-configured template, will automatically populate the job title, description, department, job site, travel requirements, full position description, desired skills, approved rates, default suppliers to issues the requisition to, job status, and any other detail that is relevant to the job posting. All a hiring manager has to do is define the desired start-and-end dates and, if she desires, modify default settings and requirements if the position requires some customization. Once the requisition is completed, pre-configured rules route it to the appropriate approvers, and once it is approved, it is delivered to the appropriate suppliers using multi-tiered supply based rules that can give preferred suppliers or minority suppliers of contingent labor the ability to bid first. Once the supplier submit candidates, the hiring manager can then use the tool to shortlist candidates (or block them from consideration), select candidates for interviews, record the interview results, select a candidate for hire, send a work-order to a supplier, and then, when the supplier accepts the work-order, "hire" the candidate. |
| Dot | Well, that's kind of what we'd expect a workforce management tool to do. But what's so special about it? How does it help procurement? Why can't we just use Word, Excel, e-Mail, and a File Server. |
| Dark Jacket | That's a mouthful! Let's start with the last question. Theoretically, you could create your template job descriptions in Word and your rate-cards in Excel, store them on a Central File Server, and then, every time you need to fill a new job, create a copy, send it out through e-mail, and store the specific instance somewhere else on a file server. And maybe if you're a small company who only hires a few contingent workers a year, and you were very methodical, you could make that work for you. But what if you hire 100 contingent workers a year in 20 different positions. How easy do you think it would be to keep track of all the different paperwork? Let me ask it this way, you used to do Contract Management right? |
| Yakko | Right. |
| Dark Jacket | And for your average company with more than 500 active contracts without a contract management solution, what was the average level of contract management maturity. |
| Dot | The average company couldn't even find its contracts! |
| Dark Jacket | So how well do you think the average company who has to hire hundreds, or thousands, of contingent workers a year, where each worker has her own contract, fares? |
| Dot | Not very well. |
| Dark Jacket | And that's fundamentally why you need a contingent workforce management solution if you have to hire a lot of contingent workers each year. Now, the reason it helps procurement is that it stores all of the information, including rate information, billed hours, and budgetary information in one place. This allows procurement to get up to date information at any time as to how many contingent workers in each category are hired each year, on average, and how much is being paid, on average, for each position. Procurement can use this information to initiate fact-based negotiations with contingent labor-suppliers to get better rates. Then, procurement can turn around and compare invoices versus approved rates, hours, and expenses and make sure that each worker is being paid at agreed upon rates, and no more, and that unapproved expenses are never paid. Furthermore, they can configure rules that will prevent managers from approving payments that are outside of approved rate or expense bands or that would cause a budget to be exceeded. It gives them the insight into contingent workfoce spend that they've never had before without this type of tool. |
| Dot | I get it now. So what's so special about your tool. We know other companies offer workforce solutions, and we're wondering what sets yours apart. |
| Dark Jacket | As you can see, it's very easy to use and guides a user through the process. |
| Wakko | Even I can use it, so I'll give you that. But most tools are getting easier to use every year. Why should I use yours? |
| Dark Jacket | I could tell you about the hundreds of little usability features we've crammed into this tool that make it as easy to use as Google for our average user, but instead I'll tell you about how we think we're really different. Our tool, which supports over 80 Fortune 2000 Global Multi-nationals, was built to be a global tool. That means that we've localized it for over 30 countries ... |
| Dot | But isn't that just changing the unit of currency and supporting different languages? If you use Java, that's easy to code these days. |
| Dark Jacket | It's much more than that. When I say we've localized it, I mean that we've configure it to take into account all of the standard business practices, taxation requirements, and legal requirements of each country in which our customers have deployed it. For example, workforce management in Europe is considerably different than in the US. When you bid a rate, you have to break it down into base pay, benefits, travel, per-diem, etc. in Europe. Furthermore, you have different taxation requirements to track and different legal issues to watch out for when onboarding and offboarding. Our tool customizes its workflow and data capture to each country it is used in. And to make sure we do it right, we retain over 20 international law-firms around the globe to keep us up to date on changing requirements and ensure we go above and beyond the requirements when we enter a new country on behalf of a customer. |
| Wakko | So I could hire a vinyard worker in France to hand pick grapes for me and be certain I was following all the rules? |
| Dark Jacket | If you wanted to ... |
| Wakko | Awesome! |
| Dark Jacket | That's what we think of our tool, which can be delivered pure SaaS, and which we improve upon every day. In fact, we now not only do contingent workforce management, but we also do direct hires and service management against projects. And we also have a new InSite Visualizer tool that can be used to generate business intelligence on all of the data the tool collects and present the user with trends and patterns that emerge over time. This way they can accurately predict resource costs over the next contract cycle before entering into a negotiation or compare their data against industry average benchmarks to see how well they're doing. This is on top of the dozens of standard reports, as well as the ad-hoc report generator, that is built into the tool and the workflow. |
| Yakko | Contingent workforce management is sure a lot more involved then we ever thought it was! |
| Dark Jacket | It truly is ... and that's why your standard direct goods procurment solution you get off-the-shelf won't work and why you need a customized solution. Now if you'll excuse me, I have a workforce management platform to improve. Good day. |
| Dot | That was a learning experience! |
| Yakko | I guess it is a lot more involved than just telling HR to "get me this resource by Monday". |
| Wakko | I'll say. So where are we going next? |
| Dot | We're on the G's. |
| Wakko | Didn't the doctor recommend someone else? |
| Yakko | I think so. Just a second. Yakko takes out his notebook. GDM ... Global Data Mining. |
| Dot | What do they do? |
| Yakko | BI, maybe? I don't know. So let's go! |
| Wakko | OK. So where are they? |
| Yakko | Just outside of Denver, Colorado I believe. |
| Wakko | All right! We get to see the Rockies! Let's go! |
Michael,
I love innovative approaches and often seek to do things differently for variation's own sake. The information in the posts like this one is very important, especially for those trying to make sense out of the suppliers in the space.
But honestly, I don't have time to read through the dialog format and cute drivel to extract the content. Maybe I'm an old fuddy-duddy, but could we please just get the facts?
That's why the post is indexed, so you can skip straight to the Q&A style content if that's all you want. Some people like my "satirical humor", some people don't. Then there's the younger generation that likes their content in small doses, so posts like these, that break the content up into question and answer format, actually go over quite well!
I know can't please everyone, but this new post format does provide a nice compromise - humor and content in separate sections, with content in Q&A format that sets the context and helps you understand why it's relevant.
And yes, the posts take a little longer to read. But the trade-off is that you get more, and take more away, from them. The format requires you to think a little more and thus insures that you retain more. Anything you can skim you can forget just as fast -- and the content of these posts is just too important to forget.
So give the "innovative approach" another chance and skip the "lead-ins" and "lead-outs" if you're challenged for time. I think you'll thank me for it later when you're reading that next piece of supposedly "fact-based" analyst drivel that's dryer than the Sahara and uytterly devoid of useful content.
Alternatively, you can hop over to Spend Matters and read press releases from Jason's sponsors.
"Or" ... whomever you are. Let's get real. I have a lot of respect for Michael's opinion, but like him, we are are individuals and our body of work has to stand up overtime. All we have is our objectivity if that is to be the case. Mine does and Michael's does as well, in my book, even when the sourcing maniac's tour seems to like to stop at his consulting clients and sponsors as well as others who he does not have a commercial relationships with -- just like my blog.
I'm not going to get in the middle of this debate, but simply add, in the interest of full disclosure, of the 17 Sourcing Maniacs 2008 Vendor Tour posts that I have posted and / or am in the process of editing for future posting, here is the breakdown:
Sponsors : 1 6.0%
(Past) Clients : 4 23.5%
Others : 12 70.5%
Thus, although my complete client and sponsor list, as it pertains to the sourcing, procurement, supply management, spend management, and supply chain vendor space is fully disclosed from a link on the sidebar, as Jason's is on his blog, the maniacs don't seem to be doing too good a job when it comes to visiting them! (They have a mind of their own!)
But Michael, to be fair if you go down the numbers path, of all of your past clients and sponsors in the space (who are still independently operating and in business operating under the same name), what percentage of those do you plan to cover in the maniac's tours who sell technology directly tied to sourcing innovation (let's leave out the services providers). That is a more interesting number rather than saying 70% are not ... Listen, I think you are 100% objective in our writing. But there are those who would call into question -- as they have here again -- the objectivity of bloggers. It's worth getting all of this on the table.
The Sourcing Maniacs started the year with a goal: to visit at least 25 vendors on their quest to find jobs and enlightenment. With regards to the vendors who have not yet been written up, but who they have visited, or have indicated that they plan to visit in their current tour, not a single one is a Sourcing Innovation Sponsor or Client!
When all is said and done, I expect the numbers will look like:
Sponsors : 1 4%
(Past) Clients: 4 16%
Others: 20 80%
In other words, for every one of my sponsors and (past) clients that they happen to visit in this tour, they will be visiting four companies who are not. (As I said, they have a mind of their own!)
Michael,
OK, but by my calculation, of the technology providers that you have worked with in the specific sourcing innovation sector that are technology providers that are still operating, you are covering approximately half in this series. And of the blog sponsors, only one of which is a technology provider, you are covering 100%. So while 80% of the providers that you are covering are those that you are not commercially affiliated, you are covering roughly 50% of current/past clients who are directly related and 100% of blog sponsors that have a technology solution.
BTW ... I commend this effort. I LOVE THE SOURCING MANIACS!!! I just want all of us to be clear about the numbers and not twist them around. Enough from me. I get crap on this stuff all the time so I thought it fair to call this out here. I, too, like you, am making an effort to cover providers that are new and that we don't work with. Hopefully we can cross-post our write-ups on these new innovators ...
Well, if you want to derive statistics against blog post subsets that make little (or no) sense, then you can derive whatever statistics you want, and claim that they are 100% accurate. A sample set of 1 is not statistically relevant, and is, by definition, 0% or 100%.
To respond to your point, I have three sponsors, one would be labelled technology under your categorization, and it was covered. Of my ten past/present clients in the "space", eight are also "technology", and four are being covered in this particular series. But the sample set in question is the series, not an arbitrarily chosen subset, and series wise, I'm doing my damndest to make sure every non-client vendor the maniacs visited gets covered!
And if you want to really be accurate on the grand scale, you should take all of the vendor posts (which I now index annually) and calculate what percentage of them are clients/sponsors and what percentage aren't. The percentage of non-clients increases to 85% (or more).
This blog makes an effort to fairly cover every relevant vendor who will give me, or the maniacs, the time of day -- client or not -- and that last statistic is the only statistic I'm going to report, and argue, because I think it's the only one that makes sense. You are, of course, welcome to your views, just as I am welcome not to agree with them.
This Jason-doctor debate make Yakko and Wakko seem like the sane ones. Here are a few thoughts...
1. This conversation seems to be suggesting that non-clients DESERVE more coverage than clients/sponsors. If I were a prospective sponsor, I must just be thinking "Hell, I'll never sponsor a blog. I'll get better coverage that way."
2. Jason seems to be often bullied by the peanut gallery into intentionally not writing about sponsors for fear of being called "subjective" (gasp)! Here's news for you fellas: we don't read your blogs for objectivity. We read them because we are entertained and/or engaged by your unique perspectives and opinions - your subjectivity. If you want to be truly objective (i.e., write only factual articles), then submit your applications to Purchasing mag, 'cause we're not gonna read your blog anymore.
3. You are both targeting smart readers. They know BS when they see it. You can write about a client and you don't have to be so defensive about doing so with your "Look at me - I write about more non-clients than clients!" or "Look at me - I didn't cover this client at all, aren't you impressed?" or "Look at me - I complimented a client's competitor!" That's where bloggers look more shallow, not when they are actually covering a client, despite the words of the trivial few anonymous commenters who post their little digs.
4. As I read it, Jason is essentially saying "Shame on you, Michael, for having the Sourcing Maniacs visit BIQ. Don't you know that you and the rest of us will appear more objective (i.e., better) if you intentionally ignore clients?" Perhaps, just perhaps, BIQ deserved to be included. If clients are at least as newsworthy as non-clients then shouldn't they get covered, even if 100% of clients end up being covered?
5. I'm posting this anonymously because it is clear that anonymous commenters like "Or..." above have a lot of influence over some blogs - in some cases, more influence than the bloggers themselves. C'mon guys, don't be pansies and pander to a few malcontents (or even other bloggers). Write what the hell you want, honestly, openly, and with your own voice. Your readers will keep coming back.
(1) My fundamental belief is that everyone open to a free exchange of information deserves coverage. However, as I am only one person, my clients account for less than 10% of companies relevant to SI. Thus, it is only logical that, if I am truly endeavoring to be fair and impartial, non-clients and sponsors will account for more total "coverage" than clients.
As for non-sponsors getting better coverage! Ha! One or two posts a year is better than a logo being seen on every page load? Then being mentioned regularly when I talk about related solutions because you're at the front of my mind? Than coming up more in countless coversations with decision makers I have daily? Dream on, pal. Dream on.
(2) You'd be surprised at some of the reasons I've heard why people read blogs. For every person that likes an objective post, I can find one that dislikes it and wants a subjective one, and vice versa. For every person that likes facts, there's one that wants to be entertained and vice versa. For every person that thinks advertising is okay, one is offended. And to be honest, I care more about writing the best blog I can than about why any particular person reads it. There's no perfect answer. I just try to be balanced.
(3) I'm not defensive, I'm p*ssed that ridiculous client vs. non-client stats matter so damn much -- and that they keep being calculated in non-sensical ways. And I'm definitely not apologizing for whom I do and don't write about.
My #1 requirement for coverage is openness. If I don't get to see your solution, no post. My #2 is innovation. Don't show me the same-old sh*t I saw last year. If I don't get new content, you don't get covered. This applies whether you're a client, a non-client, a sponsor, a non-sponsor or headquartered on Ursa Minor Beta.
(4) I don't know what Jason is saying, and I sure hope it's not what you're implying. As to your question, I have no qualms with covering 100% of clients and sponsors as long as my requirements are met -- i.e. they keep the lines of communication open and give me something worth blogging about.
(5) I wouldn't say anons have a lot of influence ... I've already decided on most of my posts for the next two weeks, and most of my topics for the next two months, and nothing said by a squeaky malcontent is going to change those posts, topics, or viewpoints.
However, i've noticed that it's only the anonymous commenters that are willing to either (a) ask the pointed questions or (b) do their best to stir up shit (which includes continuing to do so until they get the response their fragile egos need to get up in the morning).
Thus, I have two choices, respond to you, stroke your ego (and let you feel that you matter), and gently nudge you on your way, or spend a few minutes every day for the next week deleting all the spam you'll invariably post if I ignore you.
And since some companies need to be reminded of the coverage rules anyway ...