Beyond Blinking Lights and Acronyms

IT's Business Lesson Wed 28 Oct 09

Learning how the business side works can yield better IT systems and service.

I just returned from a week of vacation in London, which was fun as always. The great thing about being an American in London is that it forces you to rethink a lot of things. This ranges from driving on the other side of the road (I hope my U.K. friends appreciate that I did not say the "wrong" side of the road) to fries being chips and chips being crisps and so on. Many things seem the same--but not quite.

Obviously the British have no difficulty with these things. It's second nature to them, it's their culture. It is only those new to their way of doing things who have to adjust. This is the same feeling many of our users experience whenever we roll out or modify a system. We roll out systems, processes and programs that perform adequately but somehow never feel natural to our users.

CIO magazine - what we're Reading Mon 26 Oct 09

The October 15th print edition of CIO magazine featured this blog in its "what we're Reading" section. This section is about "books, blogs and the latest leadership about IT, management and leadership". It's very flattering to be included. Thank you CIO magazine!

To those of you visiting my blog as a result of reading about it in CIO magazine, welcome! I hope you enjoy it and would love to hear your comments and suggestions.  The best part of running a blog are the conversations it starts. Please leave a comment.

I'd also like to thank Steve Francia  for alerting me to this as I on vacation last week when this came out and would have likely missed this in the crush of catching up. Check out Steve's blog, spf13, where he's "Living at the intersection of Business, Technology and Strategy".

Who's Watching Windows 7? Wed 14 Oct 09

Microsoft has lots of company ahead of the launch.

A lot of people, myself included, are eagerly awaiting Oct. 22, the day Microsoft will launch its new operating system, Windows 7. As the manufacturer, Microsoft is obviously the one most concerned, but they aren't the only ones with an interest in seeing that it is a successful product launch.

Based on their latest latest earnings reports, operating systems are very important for Microsoft. The reports indicate that client systems, which represent all the various PC operating systems, account for roughly 25% of Microsoft's revenue but about 54% of its income. Microsoft does note that "revenue from Windows operating systems declined reflecting PC market weakness, especially PCs sold to businesses, and a decline in the OEM premium mix."