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100-day plan for a new IT job

Judi Hasson — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 12:54:51 -0400

If you are starting a new IT job, there will be a learning curve in terms of what you are expected to do and how your new office operates. It may be prudent to have a plan--or in this case, a 100-day plan--for a successful transition. Computerworld.com suggests five action items for anyone getting ready to start a new IT position.

The first bit of advice is to assess the situation, keeping in mind that companies want new talent to bring something to the table. If IT is running smoothly, they want you to help move the organization forward. If something's wrong, they want you to help fix it.

On the tactical level, the article suggests scheduling action items for your to-do list on a week-by-week basis, and consulting with peers, team members, supervisors and any other stakeholders to help develop the most complete assessment of what you would be doing. You will also need to determine expectations and know how your boss defines success for your position. But to find out, you need to both ask and observe. Computerworld.com also recommends that you identify stakeholders and build alliances. Most of all, identify the individuals who will directly and indirectly affect your ability to get the job done.

Other tips include the need to understand the corporate culture and office politics, and target an early win to establish your credibility quickly. If you screw up, admit your mistake, apologize and quickly fix what you broke.

For more on this strategic plan:
- check out this Computerworld.com article

Is your web project over budget?

Thu, 29 May 2008 06:59:58 -0400

CIOs beware: If you are developing new web projects in-house or outsourcing the work, be ready to deal with cost overruns and delays. A new study conducted by software developer New Bamboo found a quarter of web projects do not meet their budgets, and 31 percent are delivered late. The reason: Frequently changing requirements, too many stakeholders with conflicting visions and not enough money or time allocated to the projects.

For more insight into web project problems:
- see this CIO.com article

Once spurned, Microsoft presses on

Tue, 12 Feb 2008 06:59:58 -0500

Yahoo's board may have rejected Microsoft's offer of $44.6 billion over the weekend but that doesn't mean the Redmond giant is going to take "no" for an answer. In a statement, the company finds it "unfortunate" that the "superior value" offered to Yahoo shareholders was rejected by the board. "Based on conversations with stakeholders of both companies, we are confident that moving forward promptly to consummate a transaction is in the best interests of all parties," Microsoft said. What exactly does that mean? According to Ars Technica, Microsoft essentially has two options at this point: either drive out the current board at Yahoo or convince shareholders to push the board to reconsider. Considering that the former option is likely to alienate current Yahoo employees, it seems more likely that Microsoft will choose to pursue the second method instead. Regardless, it seems unlikely that Microsoft will be able to complete this deal, unless it's willing to risk causing a serious shake up at Yahoo.

For more on the current state of the proposed deal:
- see this Ars Technica article

Survey: ITIL challenges start with staff

Tue, 22 May 2007 20:01:39 -0400

A new survey from G2G3, a communication and gaming solutions vendor, finds that of all of the challenges IT directors face in adopting the new version of the IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL), the largest are people-related. More than half of those surveyed plan to adopt ITIL V3, but more than 80 percent believe their biggest barriers will include achieving buy-in and gaining support from important stakeholders within the organization. Other concerns include resource issues and time. Only 17 percent believed that the financial implications of adopting the new ITIL V3 framework would pose a barrier to success.

Read more about the challenges in adopting ITIL V3:
- read the press release at ClickPress

ALSO:
- read this on the ROI of ITIL
- and this on making the most of ITIL

Launching successful projects

Mon, 14 May 2007 20:01:39 -0400

The most successful projects deliver tangible business value in the first 30 days. By quickly delivering value business people can immediately use, stakeholders can see clear evidence that the project is headed in the right direction and will live up to expectations. Another way to ensure that stakeholders see value immediately is to keep the scope narrow by delivering 20 percent of the capabilities that provide 80 percent of the value. And keep it really simple; it's often better to build systems where the user interface is composed of common office productivity tools like spreadsheets, web browsers, word processing, and personal databases. People already know how to use these tools so there is much less of a learning curve. IT agility like this delivers major business benefits at a fraction of the time and cost otherwise incurred if companies go the conventional route of buying and installing large, complex, all-in-one packages.

Read more about successful IT projects:
- read the blog at CIO

ALSO:
- read this on why too many software projects invite trouble
- and this for tales of projects that crashed and burned

Picking up the pieces after a data breach

Mon, 07 May 2007 20:01:38 -0400

The way that you follow up in the immediate aftermath of a crisis can affect not only how the event is perceived, but also how successfully you'll avoid trouble in the future. As CIO, you can't leave crisis management to other executives; you need to both lead the IT work and play a key role in the business's efforts to cope with the aftermath. First, put your existing incident response plan into action. Hopefully, that plan lays out your business responses, your key contacts, and your public and regulatory obligations. Reach out quickly to the non-technical people who can help you, including human resources staffers, public relations people and legal staffers. You also might need the CFO to authorize emergency spending, accountants to track spending for insurance claims, or operations people to work overtime to make adjustments as IT gets everything back up and running. Once you identify the problem, dig deeper through a root-cause analysis. Look around at the environment and ask what other scenarios or situations could happen. Also, examine why the crisis wasn't averted in the first place by your early-warning processes and systems. And communicate with all stakeholders, connect with affected colleagues, support your overworked staff, push through the changes that will prevent a repeat incident, and hold a postmortem.

Learn more about recovering from a crisis:
- read the article at ComputerWorld

ALSO:
- read this on how honesty and openness can limit data breach damage
- and this on recovering from a cyber-attack

ALSO NOTED: IT professionals want flexibility; Evaluating managed services;

Tue, 01 May 2007 20:01:38 -0400

> Study: IT professionals want flexible work options. Article

> Is managed services right for your organization? Article

> Study: IT managers fear security breaches could cost them their jobs. Article

> Solving real-world issues through client virtualization. Article

> Is it time to put Outlook in the trash? Article

> Sun mulls deeper open-source ties. Article

> Sober worm makes a comeback. Article

> Top 3 things to secure within an SOA. Blog

And Finally… Is your IT strategy the reason why your business stakeholders distrust you? Blog

Getting started with SOA

Tue, 10 Apr 2007 20:01:36 -0400

SOA has plenty of promise for companies, but it can seem daunting to get started. First, take a step back and rethink your fundamental approach to application building and management. Figure out how you're going to make the cultural transition toward a more holistic business perspective and focus on the reuse of both business process and corporate data. One way to make it easier is to buy a bundled set of SOA infrastructure components, such as IBM's, which includes WebSphere, Tivoli and IBM information management software. Each of the five configurations IBM offers includes a reference architecture, guides and supporting information.

To learn more about jumping into SOA:
- read the article at IT-Director.com

Related Articles:
Success with SOA means showing stakeholders the benefits. Report
Will SOA will work in your environment? Report
The basics of SOA. Report
The four stages of successful SOA. Report
Will SOA help or hinder the alignment of business and IT? Report
Taking it slow with SOA deployments. Report

The business impact of IT investments

Sun, 08 Apr 2007 20:01:39 -0400

Determining whether your company is getting enough value from its IT investments is one of the most difficult things to measure. Making sure that you're measuring accurately means taking advantage of benefit realization--the proactive forecasting, management and measurement of the financial, operational and strategic benefits being realized. For effective benefit realization, start by building selectively, piloting with a particular business unit and setting initiatives. Next, secure business co-ownership by ensuring that senior leaders collaborate in choosing IT measurements and soliciting input from corporate finance. Regularly review and adjust performance measurements to prevent them from getting stale or obsolete. Demand business accountability for funding and delivering IT results. Be selective with benefit realization metrics, focusing on a few performance measures instead of a long list. And make sure you know what results really matter. Also, use metrics that are business-relevant and matter to stakeholders, and make sure to measure the benefits of the benefit realization process itself.

Read more about benefit realization:
- read the article at Optimize

Survey: No time for business continuity planning

Wed, 28 Mar 2007 20:01:39 -0400

Although all CIOs know the importance of a structured business continuity plan to aid in the event that data, networks or employees are compromised, more than half of CIOs admit to having no plan, according to a survey sponsored by Hewlett-Packard. Reasons for failing to develop such an important plan ranged from a lack of time and a lack of experienced internal resources to lack of data needed to make a business case for implementation or a failure for stakeholders to agree on a technology solution for business continuity. The importance of business continuity requires overcoming these obstacles, something that many companies can do by hiring vendors and other external experts to help the process along.

Read more about why some companies don't have business continuity plans:
- read the article at SearchCIO

ALSO: read this on why IT isn't the final word in business continuity