Earlier this week I had the opportunity to sit down and enjoy coffee with a colleague dealing with a daunting business process re-engineering task. She’s working with a client that has not leveraged technology well in their current business processes. Management recently hired a new…
A couple weeks ago I finished on a renovation project at the Ki Society with my step father, John. John is a recently-retired trades-person. It’s interesting to listen to him talk about the difference in trades-work between the professionals today, and those from a generation…
To all Vancouver-based technology managers and leaders! There’s a new peer and networking group developing on LinkedIn. The Vancouver Technology Leaders group is being assembled as a peer group for technology leaders. Apart from the standard discussions and the like, the plan is to have…
Knowing my love for great leadership fables, one of my clients recently passed me a copy of Lencioni’s The Four Obsessions of an Extraordinary Executive. As with his other books, this one is full of great insights and provides a great real-world example of how…
Recently I was reading an interesting article called Outsourcing: 10 Crippling Mistakes IT Departments Make and found myself scratching my head. At first, I was unsure why – all 10 things they point out are definitely key issues that can seriously harm or cripple your…
I’m working with an IT team to help each of them develop their professional development plans. For most of the team, it’s really easy. Help desk, server admins and network guys have clear technical course work and simple-to-acheive certifications to collect along the way. It’s…
I’ve been reviewing help desk products for a client the past couple weeks and it (continues to) surprise me that vendors don’t recognize a difference between asset management and license management. A couple years ago, when evaluating MSP software, I went through the same frustration…
The IT department is in chaos. There’s so much to do that it doesn’t seem like anyone is getting anything done, much less staying ahead. Balls are being dropped and nobody is showing leadership to the company. Welcome to the sad state of many IT…
Imagine you’re going on a road trip. So you go out and buy a car, load it up with stuff, and head east. Fantastic! Some of us enjoy a simple vacation this way. I did that once (I ended up in Disneyland, but that’s another…
Dr Jim Anderson, of The Accidental IT Leader recently posted an article talking about the growing trend of high turnover in IT, and the realities that IT leaders need to face with it. While I agree that specialization needs to reduce in IT departments, and…