Goebel: I think that one of the more relevant things about my background is that I am not American. I am one of the few Europeans in the valley and one of my strengths is that I have worked on both sides of the Atlantic. I have a degree in Economics and most of my career has been in software and sales. I have gone back and forth between small and large software companies. I've spent time at Siemens, Unisys, and Software AG, but also worked for smaller companies like BridgePointe, Usoft, and now I am with nSite Software. I think my background allows me to have several perspectives, from very entrepreneurial to building large companies.

Most of my career has been focused around the world of tools, middleware, and databases. You could say that I know the "plumbing" side of enterprise software.

OV: What was your path toward nSite Software and what prompted you to join the company?

Goebel: At Software AG we were looking closely at BPM vendors for acquisition or partnership purposes. I was well-versed in this market when I received a call from nSite's executive recruiter. My findings were that all these vendors had enormous implementation cycles. My experience told me that customers were really tired of 12-month implementation cycles and wanted something quick and flexible. Yet for BPM to be part of an enterprise solution it needs to be fully implemented. After meeting with nSite's founder, Paul Tabet, I realized that he and his team had built a platform with these characteristics. It was really intriguing because implementation of the solution happened in real-time. I was attracted also by Paul's background, which was from the customer's perspective since he had been a CIO for a long time. I became convinced that nSite was solving real problems for the real world and not a technology looking for a home. At that point I decided to join.

OV: Tell us about your role at nSite Software?

Goebel: My role at nSite is to lead the transition to a sales and marketing mode. I think the company has developed a great solution, but now it needs to shift gears to capitalize on that technology through sales and marketing. I need to bring a customer focus to the company and ensure that our value proposition makes sense to our target market. The company needs to refine its understanding of the customer's need so that customers are compelled to buy our products. I can leverage my strengths to make nSite a customer and sales-driven company.

Our product will continue to evolve and be refined over time; but we feel, and our customers tell us, that it is ready for wide deployment in its current version.

OV: What were some of the challenges nSite Software faced before you joined? How have the challenges changed from the beginning until now?

Goebel: As I mentioned, the company was very focused on the technology side, mainly features and functions. Features and functions are important, but they must come from customer feedback. The focus needs to be on what customers tell you they need. So the challenge was to change from an internal focus to an external focus. I think we have done that from the perspective of product features and empowering everyone in the company to sell.

OV: What should the audience of our newsletter be looking for in the near term from nSite and Alf Goebel?

Goebel: The audience must first realize that we are tapping into one of the next incremental IP markets in the enterprise software space. The Business Process Management (BPM) space is truly huge. We are going to be identifying our position in this market and forming our niche to expand from. Your audience will be able to see us become a very serious BPM player, solving real problems with a very short and significant ROI.

In the next few years we will be an established player in the BPM space with significant growth potential. We will do this by striking major partnerships, because software companies cannot live in an isolated world - partnerships are crucial. We will enhance our technology so that it can be embedded in larger solutions, enabling additional channels and partnerships with system integrators. There are large players in the market that own large accounts and channels, and we need to learn how to work with them in order to succeed. In this industry, implementing and integrating systems together is more crucial now than ever.

OV: What are some of the trends that are happening in your area?

Goebel: I just came back from a European conference that included very important CEOs from our industry and a couple of relevant points were made. First, the consensus was that enterprise software continues to be an area of investment and innovation because improvements in productivity will not stop. Secondly, companies that want to be successful in selling enterprise software need to show ROI in less than 6 months, integrate with all systems in place, and be very flexible so that they can adjust to the realities of business. Software customers are less focused on features or platforms, and more focused on value and ownership cost.

OV: With the market being so difficult, are there any business trends that you're seeing with your customers?

Goebel: The obvious one is the situation with IT spending. People aren't spending much at the moment and I think this is likely to continue until mid 2003. The buying cycles have changed so that they now require pilots and proof-of-concepts that show the benefits and return before the customer buys anything. We simply do not expect to see seven-figure purchases for the next 2 years. We are going to have to sell incrementally, showing value and return and going from there.

OV: Anything else that you think would be of interest to our audience?

Goebel: Yes, I think that your audience would really benefit from looking at and learning about the BPM space. To date, a lot of money has been spent, and still only about 25% of business processes are automated. Within this automated segment, emphasizing business rules to control processes is still a major trend in the industry. All the spending that went to packaged applications (mainly ERP packages) for automation of processes over the last 20 years actually solves 80% of the process management problems they were purchased for. The challenge now is twofold: to solve the remaining 20% of the problems that packaged applications didn't solve, and to automate the 75% of the processes that are too variable for the packaged applications to even begin to manage. Solving these two unaddressed areas of BPM has enormous potential to increase productivity in businesses. People looking to buy or invest in this space should look for alternatives that truly solve these very real problems, and provide real productivity gains.

About nSite Software: nSite Software specializes in the integration of manual business process with enterprise automated workflow. The reality of business is constant change, resulting in inevitable variances in any standard operating procedure. Variances give rise to manual process, leaving enterprise workflow systems on-hold. nSite Process Server was specifically designed to bring efficiency, order, and consistency to the management of everyday variance processes, returning process outcomes promptly to enterprise workflow systems and restarting standard operating processes. nSite Process Server is the only platform explicitly designed to fill this crucial need, and is a critical component of any BPM strategy.

For more about nSite Software, please email info@nsitesoftware.com