About the Author

Harwell Thrasher is the founder of MakingITclear, Inc. You can contact Harwell by email at info@makingITclear.com, or by phone at +1 770 331-6979.

Harwell's Background

Harwell Thrasher is an author, speaker and coach specializing in the human side of Information Technology. He sometimes describes himself as a "jiggler" because he helps "unstick" companies and IT organizations who are "stuck" in their old ways of doing things (see the March 2005 MakingITclear Newsletter). Harwell founded MakingITclear, Inc. in 2002 after more than thirty years of previous experience in Information Technology.

Harwell specializes in improving IT effectiveness by helping IT and business people understand each other's issues and needs. He’s been a speaker at Microsoft’s CIO Summit, at the University of Georgia Executive MBA program, and for meetings of various technical and non-technical societies. In October, 2005 he was the keynote speaker for the Annual Computing Conference of the University System of Georgia. In 2007 he published his first book, Boiling the IT Frog: How to Make Your Business Information Technology Wildly Successful Without Having to Learn Anything Technical, which explains IT issues to a business audience, and gives business people advice on how to improve the effectiveness of their IT organizations. Harwell has been writing and publishing a monthly email newsletters for CIO's since April, 2003.

As Vice-President of Technology Architecture & Strategy at Ceridian Corporation, Harwell performed technology due diligence for over twenty prospective Ceridian acquisitions in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., and Switzerland, and helped the acquired companies integrate their IT strategy with the strategy of the parent company. Harwell’s experience at Ceridian included a number of business process reengineering efforts. He led a major effort to automate a financial services business, and he led the creation of Ceridian’s first Internet payroll product.

Prior to Ceridian, Harwell worked at the headquarters for Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC), where he developed and managed MRP (Material Requirements Planning) systems for DEC's 29 manufacturing plants around the world, and then moved on to become MIS Manager for DEC's U.S. Field Service.

A graduate of M.I.T.'s Sloan School of Management, Harwell is an Atlanta native.

Seven ways Harwell can help your company

1. Providing educational information:
   
   White Papers and Articles
   
   A free monthly email newsletter
   
   Presentations and Speaking Engagements
2. Running a workshop in your company to improve communication between IT people and business people

3. Providing advice, clarification, and facilitated communication for technical and non-technical people

4. IT Strategic planning

5. Information Technology (IT) Due Diligence for mergers and acquisitions (M&A)

6. Evaluation and Audit of existing IT systems

7. Evaluation of new proposed IT systems

In addition to his services as a consultant, Harwell is also available for speaking engagements and to write articles. Most business/IT alignment problems are caused by miscommunication and unnecessary complexity, and Harwell is the ideal candidate for bringing the problems to light and then helping a company deal with the key issues causing the problems.

For answers to some frequently asked questions, click here.

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