CSC’s chief technology information officer, Bob Hayward, talks mobility, BYOD, virtual desktops, enterprise app stores and project management.

The customer always comes first. Except when it comes to HCL, the $6 billion Indian outsourcing -- make that co-sourcing -- giant led by CEO Vineet Nayar, who literally wrote the book on a philosophy known as 'employees first, customer second.' In this latest installment of our CEO Interview Series, Nayar spoke with IDG Enterprise Chief Content Officer John Gallant about how that philosophy is fueling HCL's rapid growth and why more CIOs ought to consider adopting it. Nayar also discussed how HCL has set its sights beyond competing with other Indian outsourcers like Infosys and Wipro and is squarely targeting what he believes are the many unhappy customers of services giants like IBM, Accenture and CSC. The outspoken Nayar took shots at the 'fear psychosis' created by services firms in trying to peddle their offerings and used a barnyard epithet to describe public cloud computing, which he claims isn't ready for prime time. He also outlined HCL's aggressive plans for hiring locally in the U.S. and Europe, and defended the company's use of the controversial H-1B visa program. In addition, Nayar talked about the new goals for IT departments in 2012 and beyond, and explained why treating mobile as a technology 'misses the point.'

Mobile devices will soon be driving cloud computing -- and vice versa. Here's why: It's very sensible to use a private cloud for security, management and other aspects of mobile applications. But getting there will require planning and investment by IT.

Depending on which survey or story you read, the Cloud can be either a good thing for IT workers and their job security, or it can be terrifying.

CSC ended four months of speculation about the identity of its next CEO late Tuesday, announcing that Mike Lawrie, currently CEO of British IT service company Misys, will become CEO of CSC by the end of March. He has already taken a seat on CSC's board.

They were once ubiquitous in the workplace, as much a symbol of executive status as the gold standard in enterprise mobile communications. Research in Motion’s (RIM) BlackBerry devices held all the corporate aces and with unrivalled high-end security features, their appeal to and grip on the enterprise sector seemed impregnable.

CIOs are finding that getting printing under control not only saves money, it opens the door to thinking about their printing requirements more strategically