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Acquisitions

Most IT due diligence misses two of the three surprises, leading to high CIO turnover. 3 pages
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How will an acquisition affect your organization? This white paper explains why companies acquire, and how it affects you. 3 pages
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Careers

3 Things Your CEO Wants to Know

Ever wonder what a CEO asks a CIO? Here's the answer.

15 Career Mistakes

Here are fifteen popular ways to screw up your career in IT. How many of them have you tried?

Information Technology is Like the Stock Market

The stock market is in the news a lot lately. Here are some lessons from the stock market that we can apply to IT.

How Do you Talk to a CIO?

It's an interesting question, partly because of the answer and partly because of the question itself.

You've Got to Specialize

Being well-rounded is a sure path to mediocrity. That's not what you want, is it?

How to Fail as a CIO

The awful truth about being a CIO is that there are a lot more ways to fail than to succeed.

10 Rules for IT Job Success

Career advice for lower- and mid-level IT people (although the advice applies to executives as well).

How to Become a CIO

Eight skills you'll need, and some practical advice

Information Overload: Why You Won't Read This Newsletter

Are you being selective with your time?  Or are you drowning in the incoming waves of information?

Don't get stuck in a learning stage

There are four stages of learning, but you can get stuck at any one of them.

Use their terminology – not yours

Your communication ability can be more important to your career than your technical ability.

IT is Moving toward Property Management

The role of the IT person is changing, and real estate property management offers some clues on what the future may hold.

Experience, Knowledge, Wisdom, and Better

Making things better is what it's all about.

Leadership

No Programmer Left Behind?

What's the price of oversimplification and measurement of the wrong things?

Achievement is Not the Absence of Failure

You have to make things better for your business.

You Don't Have to Measure It to Lead It

I’m sick of people telling me, “If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it.” This article explains why.

The Blind Men and Information Technology

When opposing voices disagree, sometimes all of them are wrong.

User Training is Like a Joke

Humor can be based on misdirection. But it's not funny when we misdirect our system users.

Logic isn't always the Logical Choice

The style you use for persuasion should depend on how someone wants to be persuaded.

IT Doesn't Matter?

If you believe a recent Harvard Business Review article, "IT Doesn't Matter." Here's an alternate view on the subject.

Driving Information Technology — Is the CIO Just a Chauffeur?

Is the CIO in your company just a high-priced chauffeur? Or is the CIO leading strategic use of IT within the business?

How to Get People to Change—the human side of IT projects

What three things are necessary to get people to change? Failure to provide these three things is one of the leading causes of project failure.

Management

Turn Left at the Last Traffic Light

Some classic crazy statements, and how to deal with them

How Does Outsourcing Affect Span of Control?

If you outsource a lot of projects, then your span of control is heavily influenced by the outsourced projects you manage.

9 Ways to Reduce Business IT Expense

Reducing IT expense is a big problem these days. Here are some ways to cut expenses while enhancing your career.

The Right Span of Control Isn't a Number

When cost-cutting consultants attack your managers for having too low a span of control, here's how to fight back.

How to Help Your Help Desk

In the battle for better IT, your Help Desk is fighting on the front lines. Here's how you can help them.

8 Ways to Find IT Talent for an Undesirable Location

It's hard enough to find good IT people these days, but even harder when it's for an undesirable location. Here are some ideas to help you.

Advice for New Managers on How to Avoid Harwell’s Laws

New managers will fail unless they heed this advice.

How to Organize IT

The best answer for your company or organization depends on these factors.

Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Firing People

Firing an employee is a last resort, but you still have to know how to do it.

8 Attributes of an Ideal Boss

How does your own boss rate? How does that rating affect your job performance?

Heroes Don't Scale

Heroism is great, unless it's required on a day-to-day basis.

Interview Performance Doesn’t Equate to Job Performance

Unless you're hiring actors, you should try to see through the act

Preparing for your own Hurricane Katrina

How prepared are you for an unexpected emergency? Do you know the difference between Risk and Hazard?

Hiring like a Jigsaw Puzzle

It's not the way most companies hire, but it gives you a much better result.

IT Lessons from a Waitress

A bad experience in a restaurant can teach us a few things about the way that IT organizations relate to their customers.

Fixing Broken Windows (not the Microsoft kind)

The same approach that cleaned up New York City can be used to improve the relationship between IT and its end-users.

If you're stuck, get a Jiggler

If you've never heard the term, then you probably need one.

Why Middle Managers are Important

The four roles of a middle manager, and where they often go wrong.

Julia Roberts, Training Wheels, and Bureaucracy

What do these three things have in common? They all point to a problem in our organizations.

Hidden Consultants within your Organization

Your employees and customers know far more about your business than an external consultant. Here's how to use that knowledge.

3 Keys to Service Success

Capability, motivation, expectations. Simple to say, but much harder to do.

Get Off the Train, and Join the Fleet

A different approach for motivating employees. It's simple, and it works exceptionally well.

Projects

If you only consider one type of risk, then you're headed toward project failure. 6 pages
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Make ROI really work as a tool for IT project selection. 5 pages
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How to Stop a Runaway Project

A runaway project is like a runaway car on a mountain road – both require drastic action if they're going to be stopped.

To Succeed in Corporate IT, Play Hard to Get

Many corporate IT organizations are hated by employees outside of corporate. Here's how to turn that around.

IT Lessons from a Manufacturing Shop Floor

Multitasking isn't the best approach.

Are You Wasting Your Resources on “Honey Projects”?

A children’s rhyme teaches a valuable lesson.

Creating Wildly Successful Projects

Are your projects removing business limitations? Or are they just fluff?

The world is non-linear—use it to your advantage

Many IT mistakes are caused by people thinking things have linear relationships. But there's an up-side to non-linearity.

The Opposite of “Project Risk” isn’t “No Risk”

It's not enough to plan a project so that it will be on time and on budget; you have to plan for superior performance if you're going to achieve it.

Strategy

You can put together a winning IT strategy, even if you’ve never done one before. 9 pages
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If you're only focused on cost reduction, you'd better learn about the other six ways! How to get maximum benefit from your IT budget. 5 pages
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What criteria should you use for making the outsourcing or offshoring decision? 3 pages
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Questioning IT Realignment

Centralizing IT is often done as a cost-saving measure. Here's an answer to a reader question about consequences.

Thrasher's Hierarchy of Business IT Needs

Businesses have a hierarchy of needs just like human beings, and what's “strategic” for one business isn't necessarily what's strategic for another.

10 Reasons You Need an IT Architect

You wouldn't construct a major office building without an architect, so why do you think that putting together a major system is any different?

5 Approaches to Software Strategy

Which approach are you using? Is it the best one for your situation?

Top 10 Reasons Why Men and CIOs Don't Ask for Directions

Avoid the stereotype, but learn from it

The Best IT Organization in the Country?

How do you answer the CEO's question, "Is our IT organization the best in the country?"

The Politics of Information Technology

You can't avoid politics, but here's how to deal with the associated problems.

5 Reasons Why IT People Love Lists

Lists are a great tool, but not for every situation.

The Information Technology Merry-Go-Round

Stay in IT long enough, and you'll find yourself repeating things like centralization and decentralization.

IT is a lot like Gift Giving

What's the appropriate gift for your business? The same rules apply.

On Time at the Wrong Restaurant

Are your IT decisions like those of a six-year-old kid?

Web Services aren't the Answer...but use them anyway

The industry press loves to talk about Web Services. Learn what they're good for, why you should use them, and why they'll uncover hidden problems in your systems.

What does folding a suit have to do with IT?

Learn the secret of folding a suit, and how it applies to IT.