Sh.. IT Happens #4

A week can seem a long time when you don’t have the comfort of a Microsoft Natural Keyboard, a coffee machine within spitting distance and an internet connection you can really rely on. So I had mixed feelings coming back from Egypt, until I was forced into a 500m detour when my flight couldn’t land in Bristol.

So back home in the comfort of my armchair and my 24″ monitor, I bring you this week’s pick of the bunch from across the IT blogosphere…

1. Welcome To 2009: Does IT Matter This Year?
   

   Yet again, Sh..IT Happens features another one of Dr Jim Anderson’s posts fromhis blog TheBusinessOfIT. This time, he remembers an article from back in ’03 where some wiseguy (Nicholas Carr from the Harvard Business Review) wrote “IT Doesn’t Matter”. At the time, the IT Industry was calling for some kind of Jihad on Carr. Carr’s assertion was that IT stuff is a commodity, and that anyone can put it together, and asked if it really adds to competitive advantage? Ha! 

   Ha? Was Carr right?

   Well isn’t that where we might be now? asks Dr Jim. Good question too! Cloud Computing is a commodity play (as I lamented on about in my post Dark Clouds Ahead? A Warning About Cloud Computing) and so is SaaS, so isn’t IT the infrastructure of business, a bit like phones, photocopiers, restrooms? Does IT matter? I won’t spoil the fun, but Dr Jim put’s any doubt about the value of IT to bed. Take a look at his post.

2. Connecting IT with Business – The Go Betweens
   

   My main-man Eric Brown shamelessly plugs himself from a quote in Oracle’s Profit magazine. Way to go Eric! I noticed you didn’t show us your quote from Fannie Mae’s magazine of the same name (joke). He writes about ‘Go-Betweens’ – the people who bridge the IT/Business divide:

   Make sure go-between teams do not report only to IT

   In the past 5 years, the ‘Business Relationship Manager’ grew as a role – provided by IT – to be an Account Manager of-a-sorts to Business customers. I employed one myself – seemed to be a perfect solution at the time, and it worked. What I discovered over time, though, is that it doesn’t really solve the problem of Business Ownership. This, perhaps above all else, needs to be in place for effective project and service delivery. Otherwise, IT leads the business. It’s a case of cart leading the horse or tail wagging the dog (any more synonyms?) The ‘Go-Between’ needs to be just that, in-between, rather than just another IT service.

3. What IT Business Alignment Isn’t
   

   I can be shameless too. This great post was discovered by Eric Brown. I liked it so much I wanted to include in this week Sh.. IT Happens as it’s such a great read. Glenn Whitfield on his blog IT Business Alignment (IT2B) critiques an article on one of my fave sites CIO.COM. Glenn isn’t vicious, but attacks their solution to the problem of IT Business Alignment – software. Fight fire with fire won’t work here, to turn a phrase. I guess Glenn has something. If IT and Business aren’t in a cohesive union, then adding more IT to solve the problem won’t solve it, it could make it worse. Glenn suggests a focus on process. Again I agree that process should always come before technology, but one problem I see (with my own eyes, daily) is that people understand technology, but far fewer understand process. So the debate will go on…

4. Jobs in a Recession Survey Results 5: What Recent Hires Recommend To Job Seekers
   

   Jeremiah Owyang on his blog Web Strategy shares with us some great data on what IT people who have just been hired are recommending to job seekers. What a great view to get! Interesting to see that Social Networking features very highly as top advice.
   

5. 10 Reasons to Use Microsoft Outlook for Your Company’s E-mail
   

   Whilst I am in a rebelious mood (against Cloud Computing anyway) I want to share this post by Lynn Greiner on CIO.COM which raised a few eyebrows and smiles which reminds us why Outlook is the de facto client for mail across the corporate world, and they’re also the reason why I still use Outlook at home. Webmail is too clunky for me… I am a drag ‘n’ drop afficianado (is that old-fashioned?)

6. 7 Reasons Not to Use Microsoft Outlook for Your Company’s E-mail
   

   <IGNORE AUTHOR=”Dee-Ann LeBlanc” SOURCE=”CIO.COM”>NOTE TO SELF: DO NOT READ THIS ARTICLE AS THEIR ARE SOME COMPELLING REASONS HERE, ESPECIALLY THE POINT ABOUT HTML EMAIL</IGNORE>