Stories about: BT

Agile methodologies for software projects can help organizations create better software faster. Yeah, yeah, you've heard that before. Here, experienced programmers explain the key ingredients to make those goals achievable

When we went through a redesign of ComputerWorld Canada last year we decided to call our feature section IT Business. This was in part because a Web site I launched some years ago, ITBusiness.ca, had never had its own print component, and in part because I thought IT Business was a good way to describe what the in-depth stories we write are really about.

I'm beginning a new venture today - a blog. It's not that I've never posted anything before, but those sporadic posts were the equivalent of me standing on the bank of the river, tossing a few sticks into the current to see where they'd end up - if they'd get swept into the main flow or snag on the rest of the flotsam cluttering up the stream. I didn't care a whole lot about the fate of the sticks. This has been a completely insufficient way to become part of the many interesting conversations taking place - about stuff I care a lot about -- or to learn how communication itself is changing. So I figure I'd better just go ahead and commit to full-body immersion, even though I'm not exactly sure where I'll end up or what lies beneath.

Service-oriented architecture promises many positives: resource reuse, application integration, business agility and infrastructure flexibility, among others. But never do SOA proponents claim ease of management as one of the technology's glories.

Completely contrary to what many have preached for awhile now, the naked truth is that educating the CEO about technology is a waste of time and we need to stop. Why? We've just run out of time. Digitization has just met globalization and CEOs of companies that say no to customer demands will lose to those who just say yes-whether the latter can truly deliver to those needs or not.

When it comes to cleaning up their act, many CIOs are recognizing data centres as among the lowest hanging fruit. IDC estimates companies spent $US26.1 billion to power and cool servers worldwide in 2005, with a monstrous $14 billion of that being spent in the US alone. In fact, data centres account for between 1.5 and 3 percent of all electricity consumed in the US. Should current trends persist, the research organization projects, that bill will soar to $US50 billion by the end of the decade

The health-care company had been planning to install a state-of-the-art system, which would have been all but guaranteed to slash operational costs. It had completed the preliminary research, selected a system and begun the implementation process

CIOs get bombarded with requests; everything from vendor cold calls to staff needing project approval to board members digging for cost-cutting ideas. And despite the deluge, IT execs must learn to keep their staff, executives and customers happy. Keeping smiles on all those groups requires that good CIOs know every role in the business, but how many people really know the role of the CIO?

Any chief security officer can tell you there's a fine line between managing risk and fostering innovation. And the CSO's relationship with the company's CIO largely determines where that line is drawn.

CIOs who want to succeed as business partners and strategists can't do it alone. Success requires unshackling the leaders within your IT organization and letting them run.

When all hell is breaking loose, when the network is crashing and the servers are smoking, what CIO hasn't imagined himself or herself as Superman or Wonder Woman, bravely reaching into the fire to save the business's bacon? Admit it: The fantasy of being the irreplaceable figure to whom everyone turns for leadership is enthralling, even thrilling.