You can read first 2 parts at :
- 15 Months After Privatization of Turkish Telecom – 1
- Doany; Salaries Will Be Get An Increase In March – 2
Question – 4 : There are some criticisms that newly employed people are from outside the telecom sector, and have limited experience or knowledge in fixed line business. What is your opinion?
Dr.Paul Doany : Lets us evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of management who comes from traditional fixed line business.
Traditionally, such management has strong ‘engineering’ roots, given the extensive work culture of network planning, network design, network implementation and network operations/maintenance needs of such companies.
Their strengths are in ‘least-cost’ network planning. They have strong project management skills, focusing on completing networks on time, within budget, and meeting the specified network quality requirement. This characteristic applies to all such incumbent operators worldwide, including the giant operators of Europe, and Turkey is no different.
However, due to the traditional market positioning of incumbent fixed line operators, the management did not need to focus on sales, marketing and customer care. I say this when we compare with say mobile operators, since mobile is a much more competitive sector, and represent young companies (generally under 15 years old), with very different management dynamism, benefiting from the extensive technological developments in the mobile sector.
It is interesting to note that several mobile operators started up in the early 1990s, and they didn’t recruit much persons from fixed line business in particular. In fact they recruited talent from all sectors, seeking professionals strong in functions such as: radio network planning, IT, product development, marketing, sales, customer care, etc… if you check the top names in the mobile sector internationally, you will find varied backgrounds, and of course they built companies that are today much stronger than fixed line operators, with very much higher enterprise value.
I therefore regret to say to those who are sceptical about management coming from non-telecom sector, that this is very old fashioned way of thinking – but it doesn’t surprise me, as I myself have worked in fixed line business from the very basic network planning functions, and appreciate the work ethic and the camaraderie that develops in such companies. My view is borne out in all European operations, where a blend of new and old management work very well together in such companies.
We have new persons who have joined TT from other sectors, and who have an excellent track record, with remarkable management achievements in Turkey and overseas. I am confident they will succeed, and add much value to the company.
I have also understood that there are some misgivings about the role of Oger Telecom personnel in the company, which is hinted through your question: I would like to explain that Oger Telecom personnel are here to ‘assist’ TT management, and not to manage TT. You will notice that they are mostly in ‘deputy’ positions. They have very extensive experience in many aspects of the business, including fixed line, mobile, and allied areas such as strategy, finance, regulatory, and so on.
In my view, TT management will be working as ONE TEAM in 2007, including the previous management, the new appointees and the Oger Telecom support secondees. I will dedicate more of my own time to make the team work better.
At the Executive Committee level, we are working as one team. Although my background is from network planning and network engineering, I was lucky to have worked in many different countries, and developed experience in strategy development, business planning, commercial and regulatory, that gives me a full understanding of the business.
I would like also to recognize that Turk Telekom achieved tremendous results in the eighties and nineties, and experienced one of the fastest network growths in the world, under the leadership of Mr Emin Baser, and the work ethic he espoused still survives. We are very proud and privileged to have him in the Executive Committee. He represents the leadership in networks and operations.
And we are also proud to have Dr Metin Ercan in the Executive Committee, with strong financial skills, focusing on building shareholder value.
The Committee represents all three elements of the future success of the company, and we will demonstrate this year how successful we will be.
Question – 5 : It seems that the number of engineers at TT has decreased quite a bit. Given that some of the engineers are at managerial positions, can we say that TT needs to recruit engineers? How do you plan to compensate for this lack of technical force?
Dr.Paul Doany : Indeed we have a human resources plan geared to addressing this matter.
However I would like to say that the standard of engineers in the company is very high – I am very impressed with the professionalism and hard work of our management and their personnel. This all stems from the high education standard in this country, and the work ethic instilled through this strong company.
Of course we do need more engineers. However, we have many technicians who can support the company needs, we can deploy training programmes and enable them to fill the required roles.
Following chapter will be read at Doany : 26,000 Job Applications Received for TT in a year – 4
Turkish translation of that part at Doany : Oger Telecom Personeli TT’yi Desteklemek için Burada – 3
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