Advancement in technology may increase global travel

Video conferencing and remote collaboration are gradually reducing the need to travel in certain industries or for certain professions but at the same time this same technology is liberating many professionals from the boundaries of their offices and is giving them the freedom to take long vacations without affecting their work. Only with the recent technology people are able to work from homes, hotel rooms, airports and even the beach. This freedom of movement created some extra demands on global travel.

I know a business owner who was able to take a month vacation far away from his home town after working for almost 4 years without time off. He was able to stay in touch with his clients while traveling by using the latest in internet and communications technologies. Millions of people now can leave their offices for extended periods of time without losing productivity this in turn will give them the freedom to travel and move around

This Sector of IT will remain strong

With layoffs affecting each industry, IT is no exception. IT had its share of layoffs, but one sector in IT remains strong. IT services which are directly related to the modern office functionality. Services such as (network setup, hardware repair and setup, phone systems setup, office application support, on-line or on the phone support, etc.)

These types of services are an integral part of any modern office setup; in fact they are part of many home offices setup. Imagine a day of your life where you can not have access to your e-mail or your LAN connection is not giving you access to the internet or to the rest of your office network, can you, as a business, afford it?

Big part of IT services became an integral part of our lives, they became a necessity, just like transportations or health care, we can’t afford a day without them.

I strongly believe that a need for a good technician will remain strong despite the economic ups and downs.

Cloud Computing and the future of hardware

Reading so much about cloud computing these days get me thinking about the future of hardware. Which type of hardware will have sustained demand and which type will gradually become obsolete?

If I can make a small list, I would see it as follows:

1- Demand for large capacity hard drive will start to slow, since many applications will be hosted online
2- Demand for more memory will remain strong, since working in the cloud environment will require great deal of RAM
3- Demand for faster processor will always be strong although some of the processing will be done in the virtual cloud environment
4- Demand for flash drives and other storage devices will start to slow
5- Demand for network equipments will remain strong
6- Demand for printers and copiers will remain strong
7- Demand for larger screens will remain strong

One of the major advantages of cloud computing is to provide a secure data backup location, the demand of storage devices will start to slow. I don’t see any other type of hardware sales will be affected.

Stop Planning and start implementing

One of the hardest challenges to over-come in any project or business plan is the planning stage, many managers and investors with brilliant ideas get stuck in the planning stage, they seem as they will never stop planning. I personally fail victim to this symptom from time to time, your mind is constantly planning but nothing is being materialized.

Planning stage sometimes become the comfort zone, we don’t want to leave the known to the unknown. I have met many successful business people and read many articles on successful people and one thing common to all of them is “they take actions.”

Many difficult problems at the planning stage seem to get resolved as work progress; I have tried this many times. So, “Stop Planning and start implementing.”

Cloud Computing and thin client

Think client concept has been around for many years, not many users are aware of thin client technology, initially thin client was introduced by sun Microsystems to take advantage of the web, sun idea was to give client only the basic hardware to access the net and every application would be accessed over the net.

With Cloud Computing and virtualization becoming the new buzz words in the corporate world, I think thin client concept will take off again. On-line backup and on-line applications access will create less demand on hardware (except for faster processor speed and more memory); this will lead to faster but lighter computers.

Business Community loves to cut cost; Cloud Computing will have a future

Sometime in 1995 I was talking to a small business owner about the importance of the internet and how will it revolutionize the way we do business, but he thought the internet was just a new toy; people will pay with it for a while and then move on. My views were different, I told him “the internet will cut the cost of doing business, it is almost free to send an e-mail to any place in the world and having a website that advertises for your business 24/7 is almost free too.”

One of the major factors that lead to the internet revolution as we see it today was the way the business community saw the cutting cost benefits the internet brought.

Today we have the same story with Cloud Computing, having various applications accessed via virtual servers will reduce IT budget, a cost cutting tool that business community loves. We still have loud voices against Cloud Computing, their main concern are “loss of control and data breach.”

I have my own reservations against Cloud Computing, seeing my data living my hard-drive stopped me from using on-line back up tools. But either we support it or not, Cloud Computing will be a part of the natural growth of the internet.

Dogmas and Innovations

If it is not broken don’t fix it
This is how things are done around here
We have been doing this for generations
This is the American way
In Rome, do what Romans do

All the above are common phrases that we are all familiar with, if you notice one thing common to all these phases is the notion of doing things a certain way and never think of an alternative.

One of the biggest obstructions to a change in an organization are Dogmas, or the set of believes that certain things must be done certain way and no one ever questions that. An organization that fails to innovate will eventually die in the free market world.

If you think of great inventions, most of them were started with uncommon ideas and uncommon believes; great management theories stemmed from radical changes in common management practices.

A great mind is always inventing

Turn computer off or leave it on at the end of the day!!!!

• Everyday 156 million employees in US, UK and Germany make a decision at the end of their work day to turn off their computers or not.

• 50% of employed adults in the US don’t turn off their PCs after work
• Companies in the US are wasting $2.8 Billions and emitting 20 million tons of carbon dioxide annually

• 56% of employees in the UK and Germany always shut down their PCs and the end of work day

• In Germany and the UK, 285,000 Euros and 168000 pounds are wasted each year, respectively, by a company with 10,000 PC’s

These interesting finding about the wasted power of left on PCs and more can be found on the report published by 1E at:
http://www.1e.com/

Information Overload

Are you addicted to your in-box? Can you live one day without your cell phone? How often do you check your e-mails from home? Do you find it hard to hide? Can your boss track you even when you are on a vacation? Do you look up and search for everything online?

I think this is the typical profile of most office workers today. The availability of information and the ease of communications crated information overload for many people.

I am on the those people who must check his e-mail every few minutes, must check my cell phone for missed calls if I walked away from the phone for a bit and constantly browse the net for information.

How can you handle this information overload or the urge to go online? I am trying to train myself on setting up limited time each day for e-mail check, I would not check my e-mail each time I am free, but I will only check it at a certain time each day, I would not have my cell phone with my 24hrs and I would go online each time I come across something I don’t know.

These seem to be simple rules to follow, but hard to do actually, I have been trying to such a long time to stick to them.

I write this article from my bed at 11PM, so I better practice what I preach.

Management Information Systems, a bit of history

In the early days of business applications programming, there was little interaction between programmers and other IT staff with the rest of the business units. The business people didn’t understand IT and IT folks didn’t understand the business process.

Business people wanted programmers to come up with the ultimate solution for their problems and programmers had hard time explaining to management what is possible and what is not, technically, possible. This created a gray area between management and IT.

The solution was to design a course of study where both IT and Management courses are taught. The idea was to turn-out future managers who start their carriers in IT and move up the corporate ladder to take managerial occupations. These managers will have backgrounds in both IT and business which will help bridge the gap in communications between the two units.

Today, increasing numbers of companies are requiring their IT managers to have business skills since IT is increasingly becoming an integral part of the business process.