Of course we can pay for that … if it makes business sense

Had a good conversation with a vendor last week. They were looking to increase their business with us, no surprise there, but the rep was actually a bit cynical (in a nice way), and (probably wisely) asked directly what the chances were that we could actually get Project X off the ground? I've seen these great ideas start, but then some manager complains that they have no budget for this kind of thing. In retrospect, it is almost a rude…

Open Source as bargaining chip – driving business value of IT

I had a fun time this week proposing an open source alternative for an aging component of our EAI infrastructure. The reaction was so classic - the instant some IT folks saw the words "open source" in large type on the piece of paper, they smiled, crossed their arms, and tut-tutted the idea away. Oh, I heard all the classic shoot-down arguments ... "... critical piece of our day to day business transactions ..." "... I rarely need to call,…

Subdivide a huge project list to simplify the prioritization process

27 October, 2005
Business Value of IT, PMO
0 Comments

A classic problem for many project-oriented organizations (IT, R&D, Engineering, Operations) ... how can resource prioritization be simplified, yet repeatable? It's a fairly involved topic, but a common approach is to group projects into a workable number of "chunks" ... we'll use the term Initiatives. How will this help? Challenge: Clarify the team's priorities, alignment, and resource levels - without going into the details The CEO asks a question – what Projects are on the to-do list for IT? [Do…

What should “open source” really mean to me? (2/2)

It's difficult for many to understand how open source applies in the business world. Most folks get trapped in the mindset of software as product, yet many folks have built businesses based on Open Source - usually by giving away the software / algorithms, but selling implementation services. The Trolltech story is another (typical) twist - free software for non-commercial use, but licensing the stuff to corporations. Why would the latter work? Because of the other difficulty business has with…

What should “open source” really mean to me? (1/2)

The question of the "erosion" of the term has been posed before (good thread!). Over the past few weeks, I've slogged through web content about ... Open Source Software (aka FOSS): Projects and products are becoming commonplace; as evidence, I submit articles such as this (1 of 2), that take the airline magazine approach of chatting up basic ideas like "ROI is often soft" and applying to the Current Topic. There's nothing really stunningly insightful here, just talking about the…

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly of Powerpoint

Author's Note: This is by far the most popular post on my weblog - I've even been cited in Wikipedia! I appreciate all the traffic, and invite you to check out my other posts on presentations - including ... Five Under-Emphasized PowerPoint Best Practices Project Status Dashboards Best Practice (and a PowerPoint trick) Lighten Up, Francis - Loosen Up That PowerPoint Other popular categories on this site include Web 2.0 (wikis, blogs, and other things), the Business Value of IT,…

You can run but you can’t hide

I sent out notes to folks talking about my new situation, and some came back with interesting comments. Here's one from W, a brilliant guy with Big-6 background and plenty of business acumen. However, he (like me) is a coder at heart, and really wants to focus on the technology (not like me). More power to him - but his eMail had a telling statement ... ... this is my 5th month at [BigCo] and all is going well so…

Free as in … the Open Source Refrain – Improved!

I'm not going to recount the history and foundations of open source software, just point out that the word "free" has long been a point of contention when folks talk about "free" software. For clarity, the open-source crowd will refer to ... Free (as in Speech), meaning the user's freedom to run, copy, distribute a piece of software Free (as in Beer), meaning the software is available at no cost BTW, the world is really into their free beer -…

Your Outlook schedule looks like a game of Tetris

Interesting meetings, discussions from last week; as a former consulting partner once noticed, my calendar in Outlook usually looks like a game of Tetris, with back-to-back meetings, double bookings, etc. It was actually quite energizing for me last week, because the meetings were on wildly divergent topics covering lots of areas. Side note: This scheduling style means I seem to be a few minutes late for each meeting - but then again, so are the other folks, so I guess…

Components, IT Responsiveness, and the Rosemont Horizon

Technical people are often engineers at heart, and really want to see controlled processes in and around their computer systems. We see source code control, configuration management, and process documentation as ways to manage long term maintenance costs and deliver repeatable, reliable results from our systems. In the realm of ERP systems, this would seem to be a common and well-regarded mind set; however, the businesses supported by these systems often demand information transparency, process flexibility, and quick turnaround of…