Insight for Current and Future Business Leaders
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In my previous post I described Shadow IT and the problems it causes. In this post I’ll describe some approaches that the formal IT organization can take to deal with Shadow IT, and I’ll give you some recommendations. 5 Approaches to Dealing with Shadow IT Most formal IT organizations take one of five different approaches [...]
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Shadow IT is one of the names for the Information Technology work and expense that’s done outside of the control of the formal IT organization and outside the formal IT budget. It’s more prevalent in some companies than in others, and it often changes over time within a company. I’ve found that the amount of [...]
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A lot of people in the United States are against what they call “big government.” Yet most of those people are in favor of government services that they consider essential. In many cases, the concern about big government is not actually a concern about the size of government — it’s more a concern about a [...]
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The question about the pros and cons of using a business/IT liaison person came up at a meeting I attended last week. I’ve got to admit some bias on this issue. Long ago I tried using a business/IT liaison person for one of my software development groups, and I wasn’t happy with the result. The [...]
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Two months ago I did an article on span of control, pointing out some of the variables that make an IT manager’s span of control so unlikely to conform to any consultant-recommended norm. I received a number of positive emails about the article, but one email in particular asked about a different kind of span [...]
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One of my newsletter readers sent me an interesting question: “I was wondering if you have insights on the attitude of managers on the business side towards the re-alignment of IT. I can imagine that managers at the business side tend to resist giving up (overly) customized IT, since the short-term performance of their individual [...]
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Almost all IT organizations have a Help Desk, and yet it always amazes me how many of those organizations think that the Help Desk has only one purpose: to help system users with problems. In fact the Help Desk also serves a second critical purpose: to tell you what your problems are so that you [...]
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In 2004 I wrote a tongue-in-cheek essay called “Harwell’s Unfortunate Laws of Human Organizational Behavior.” I put it on my web site, but I just sent the link to a few close friends. Frankly, I thought the content of the essay was too different from my normal, more up-beat type of article. But I was [...]
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I’m frequently asked the question, “how should IT be organized?” Let me start by saying there is no right answer, at least no answer that’s right for all situations. There are a lot of different aspects of the IT organization issue, and I address some of them in this article. Where should IT report? Where IT reports [...]
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Ok, admit it. You’re reading this because you want to know the 5 reasons. That means that you’re probably like most IT people and you love lists yourself. Of course it’s not just IT people who love lists; it’s almost anyone who falls into the Myers-Briggs category called “Judging” which describes people who need structure [...]
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More than half of the subscribers who receive this newsletter won’t even open the email. I can understand why: you’ve only got a limited amount of time, and you have to be selective about how you use it. But let’s be honest; are you really being selective? Or are you just randomly reading some things [...]
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The world is full of cycles. There are stock market highs and lows, periods of good weather and bad weather, even apparent cycles of good luck and bad luck. Many of the people-related cycles are caused by basic human nature. The bad part of a cycle starts when we hear bad things about a particular [...]
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What do the three things in the title of this article have in common? Julia Roberts In the movie Mona Lisa Smile, there’s a scene in which a Wellesley instructor played by Julia Roberts shows the class a painting, and asks them whether or not it’s any good. Up until this point all of the [...]
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If you haven’t been involved in an acquisition, then wait a few months; it eventually happens to all of us. In preparation for that event, it’s useful to get an understanding of why companies do acquisitions, so that you can anticipate the effect that an acquisition will have on you. I’ve been lucky enough to [...]
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Last month I had the unique opportunity to help a large university plan its future curricula for its undergraduate and graduate degrees in computer information systems. The university recognizes that Information Technology is changing, and wants to make sure that its students are being prepared for the real world. To this end the university has [...]
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The subject of outsourcing is in the news a lot lately, particularly when the outsourcing is done to a location outside your country. Based on my experience, a company should consider outsourcing when one of the following criteria is met: The vendor can do the job better than your company, at a reasonable cost. The [...]
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