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How to Get Real About Strategic Planning 04 February, 2008 12:50:59
Everyone agrees that having a strategic plan for IT is a good thing but most CIOs approach the process with fear and loathing. In fact, the majority of CIOs (and the enterprises they work for) are faking it when it comes to strategic planning. Isn't it time we all got real?Oh, it must be nice to be the CIO of a FedEx or a GE or a Credit Suisse. Places where IT and the business are so tightly aligned you can barely tell the two apart. Where corporate leaders understand that IT is a strategic asset and support it as such - +
Process Trip 04 February, 2008 13:07:03
Why Maritz Travel revamped key business processes — and how business and IT came together to make it workWhen Rich Phillips became COO OF Maritz Travel about two and-a-half years ago, he sat down and took a hard look at the big industry picture - +
Ticked Off at Tick the Box Mentality 04 February, 2008 13:01:15
Does your executive search firm know the difference between an MIS manager and a CIO, and if it does, can it explain that difference to its corporate clients?Does your executive search firm know its MIS managers from its elbow? Does it even know the difference between an MIS manager and a CIO, and if it does, can it explain that difference to its corporate clients? - +
Toxic Mix or Bit of a Mixed Blessing? 31 December, 2007 10:36:30
“Eye of newt, and toe of frog, Wool of bat, and tongue of dog . . . ” The inter-generational office brew of Boomer, Gen X and Gen Y may not be quite as odious as that of the three witches in Shakespeare’s Macbeth, but even so it makes “for a charm of powerful trouble”"Eye of newt, and toe of frog, Wool of bat, and tongue of dog . . . " The inter-generational office brew of Boomer, Gen X and Gen Y may not be quite as odious as that of the three witches in Shakespeare's Macbeth, but even so it makes "for a charm of powerful trouble" - +
Ebb and Workflow 04 February, 2008 12:44:54
Workflow isn't rocket science, but it isn't magic either. It can improve the way your organization runs only if you apply its principles correctlyFrom a business perspective, workflow is a way to make people, information and computers work together consistently and efficiently to produce the results the business needs. In effect, workflow applies the equivalent of systems analysis to the entire process, not just to the part done on a machine
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Bill Gates: A New Approach to Capitalism in the 21st Century 28 January, 2008 07:12:19
Transcript of Gates speech, and a Q&A at World Economic Forum in Davos, SwitzerlandAs you all may know, in July I'll make a big career change. I'm not worried; I believe I'm still marketable. I'm a self-starter, I'm proficient in Microsoft Office. I guess that's it. Also I'm learning how to give money away. - +
Can Macs conquer the enterprise? 11 January, 2008 10:55:53
The field is wide open for a Macintosh insurrection on the business desktop. It could happen, but probably won't. Here's why.If Apple were a football team, the New England Patriots would have had some serious competition this year. - +
Are You Obsolete? 29 January, 2008 11:49:49
How to stay relevant in the world of Web 2.0, Wii and other wonders.Vince Kellen has had a successful IT career. Currently CIO at DePaul University, he is also an international speaker on customer relationship management and the Internet. He has written four books on database technology and is completing a Ph.D. in computer science at DePaul. - +
Mob wisdom means business 04 January, 2008 07:14:47
So-called 'crowdsourcing' lets companies create massive focus groups, garner fresh ideas, and even predict the futureCrowdsourcing, mob wisdom, interactive ideation, artificial AI -- call it what you will, but the idea of tapping external collaborators to develop or enhance products and services is far from revolutionary.
Read up on the latest ideas and technologies from companies that sell hardware, software and services. Why Security SaaS Makes Sense Today
The CIO Executive Council Guide to Success
Revolutionising Back-up and Recovery
Dude! You Say I Need an Application-Layer Firewall?!
Still Sneaking In: The Threats Your Security Tools Aren't Telling You About
Enterprise Wireless WLAN Security
Optimized Back-up and Recovery for VMWare for VMWare Infrastructure with EMC Avamar
How to Beef Up Your Sales Pipeline
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Do IT leaders struggle with innovation because they're too analytical? A new study suggests that leading too much with one's head might have something to do with why many companies struggle with innovation.
I've been thinking about this question since I talked with innovation consultant Gary Hamel in the fall. He observes that modern management is designed to optimize efficiency rather than the execution of new ideas. Last week, I got a copy of a study by Oliver Wyman-Delta Organization & Leadership which in part asked executives to define the leadership skills that were most critical to innovation.
The top three:
- Establishing clarity of purpose for their organization
- Cultivating an open and supportive environment
- Facilitating idea generation.
The study define these skills as encompassing leadership by the "head, heart and guts," It concludes that innovative companies need leaders who can function at all three levels-making decisions using information when it's available, but being open to new ideas and willing to take calculated risks when data is scarce. In general, respondents believed they were failing at innovation, and said their biggest obstacle was creating the right climate for it.
CIO Magazine had the opportunity to ask a question as part of this study: To what extent the IT department at the respondent's company was involved in supporting innovation. Slightly more than half of the respondents (53 percent) said their IT departments were only "somewhat" involved. Barely one-third (35 percent), said IT was very involved. Ten percent said IT wasn't involved, and 2 percent didn't know.
Here's what I think this means:
It's been drilled into most IT leaders that they can't provide enough metrics to show how technology contributes to the bottom line. IT decisions hinge on having enough data to prove that an investment is worthwhile, or that it doesn't cost too much (however much that is).
Managers, schooled to focus on efficiency, have become champions of business process improvement, and favor IT projects that support such improvements.
Therefore, IT leaders are stuck in a box-hostage to data, and without support or encouragement to take risks with technology.
Effective leadership.
In American culture, we tend to equate leadership with yapping. There is no correlation. Lead Well and Prosper, by Nick McCormick.
That is why effective leadership is critical - Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.
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2008 CIO Summit
19th August, 2008 Four Seasons Hotel, Sydney Developed in partnership with CIO Magazine, IDC, INTEP and the CIO Executive Council.
The world of the CIO is extremely complex and diverse. Multiple priorities demand attention and decisions are needed instantly. Individual teams need to be driven towards common goals, and businesses strive to become more mobile, agile and responsive. For CIOs, the challenge never ends.
Every year the CIO Summit identifies what is top of mind for CIOs across Australia and New Zealand, and offers insight for CIO benchmarking and vendor strategic planning alike.
Recent IDC research shows that over 59% of CIO's believe that 'to achieve their business strategies, technology should be used more aggressively than today.'
Join us on August 19th to discover how this is possible with the latest technologies including Virtualisation, Web 2.0, IP Surveillance and Software as a Service (Saas).
Click here for more information.
Please email Denyse_Robertson@idg.com.au for further information.
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CIO Live Podcast #79: Brent D Taylor, author of The Outsider's Edge: The Making of Self-Made Billionaires Part II 05 October, 2007 06:00:00
For his new book, The Outsider's Edge: The Making of Self-Made Billionaires, social researcher Brent D Taylor spent four years of intensive research investigating the psychological make-up and backgrounds of some of the world's richest men and women, including IT luminaries Bill Gates, Larry Ellison and Steve Jobs. Taylor discovered that, despite working in different industries and coming from different upbringings, they all have one thing in common -- they are all outsiders. - +
CIO Live Podcast #78: Brent D Taylor, author of The Outsider's Edge: The Making of Self-Made Billionaires 28 September, 2007 17:34:25
For his new book, The Outsider's Edge: The Making of Self-Made Billionaires, social researcher Brent D Taylor spent four years of intensive research investigating the psychological make-up and backgrounds of some of the world's richest men and women, including IT luminaries Bill Gates, Larry Ellison and Steve Jobs. Taylor discovered that, despite working in different industries and coming from different upbringings, they all have one thing in common -- they are all outsiders. - +
CIO Live Podcast #77: Panasonic Speeds Up Trans-Pacific File Transfers, Part III 21 September, 2007 07:00:00
Part three in our three-part special report from CIO's sister publication Network World in the US, as Paul Desmond reports from the Network World IT Roadmap Conference in Santa Clara, California. With development teams in the US and Japan, Panasonic needed a more efficient way to move very large files between the two locations. Iben Rodriguez, IT consultant for Panasonic Research and Development, explains how a storage-area network and virtual server technology helped speed up WAN performance. - +
CIO Live Podcast #76: Panasonic Speeds Up Trans-Pacific File Transfers, Part II 14 September, 2007 07:00:00
Part two in our three-part special report from CIO's sister publication Network World in the US, as Paul Desmond reports from the Network World IT Roadmap Conference in Santa Clara, California. With development teams in the US and Japan, Panasonic needed a more efficient way to move very large files between the two locations. Iben Rodriguez, IT consultant for Panasonic Research and Development, explains how a storage-area network and virtual server technology helped speed up WAN performance. - +
CIO Live Podcast #75: Panasonic Speeds Up Trans-Pacific File Transfers, Part I 07 September, 2007 07:00:05
Part one in our three-part special report from CIO's sister publication Network World in the US, as Paul Desmond reports from the Network World IT Roadmap Conference in Santa Clara, California. With development teams in the US and Japan, Panasonic needed a more efficient way to move very large files between the two locations. Iben Rodriguez, IT consultant for Panasonic Research and Development, explains how a storage-area network and virtual server technology helped speed up WAN performance.
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Best Western forced to play defense on data breach disclosure 29 August, 2008 08:08:00
Could hotel chain have done a better job of defusing story about system intrusion?The headline in this week's Glasgow Sunday Herald -- "Revealed: 8 million victims in the world's biggest cyber heist" -- was a grabber. - +
US Terror threat system crippled by technical flaws 28 August, 2008 09:53:00
US Congress charges that US$500m project to prevent another 9/11 is a complete failure.A US House subcommittee is charging that a US$500 million IT project intended to "connect the dots" on terrorists and help prevent another 9/11 is a failure; it can't even handle basic Boolean search terms, such as "and, or and not." - +
Malware infects space station laptops 28 August, 2008 08:15:00
Not the first time, says NASA; astronauts load up Norton AntiVirusMalware has managed to get off the planet and onto the International Space Station, NASA confirmed yesterday. And it's not the first time that a worm or virus has stowed away on a trip into orbit. - +
Separation of duties and IT security 28 August, 2008 09:40:00
Muddied responsibilities create unwanted risk. Kevin Coleman says auditors may start labeling poorly defined IT duties as a material deficiency.Separation of duties is a key concept of internal controls and is the most difficult and sometimes the most costly one to achieve. This objective is achieved by disseminating the tasks and associated privileges for a specific security process among multiple people. - +
How to recruit and retain the best young security employees 27 August, 2008 08:32:00
Today's youngest generation of workers, known as Generation Y, have different career goals than their parents did. What do you need to know to get them to work for you?The final installment in a series of articles about generational differences and security. Part one looked at managing workers in different age groups. Part two examined the types of security concerns that are most commonly associated with different generations in the general workforce. This article provides recruiting and retention advice for security employees.
Tumbleweed appoints O2 Networks to its Australian Channel Partner Program 29 August, 2008 12:31:00
HP ProCurve Brings Big Business Gigabit Switching Features to Small Businesses 29 August, 2008 12:00:00
GlobalConnect Provides Treatment for Healthcare Provider’s Contact Support Requirements 29 August, 2008 09:59:00
Sybase and Logica Partner To Mobilise The Supply Chain 29 August, 2008 09:47:00
New global landscape for qualitative researchers with Spanish and Chinese software releases 29 August, 2008 09:34:00
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Web Security SaaS: The Next Generation of Web Security
Discover the latest web security SaaS solutions. Learn how to increase overall security effectiveness and reduce the burden on your IT department. Uncover the security challenges facing SMB environments today and identify the critical elements that can provide you with lower-cost and easier-to-manage web security solutions.
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