Dysfunctional IT

The following quote by Vaughan Merlyn is geared towards large organizations.

But it is definitely not limited to large organizations. (Emphasis is mine);

..IT eventually finds itself in a vicious cycle – low business demand maturity begets low IT supply maturity.  When IT does get engaged by the business for a new system, it fails to “push back” on the business demand to “automate the manual process as is – don’t make us change the process!”  IT does what it’s told, even if that means customizing the heck out of an off-the-shelf package.  The customization triples the implementation costs, and sends subsequent maintenance costs through the roof.

No small business / medium business manager would state that we deliberately designed and implemented our IT infrastructure to be brittle, fragile and inefficient.

But lack of vision, communication and management will definitely get you there.

And complexity? Its a killer.

Complexity equals Chaos

Start now

Design in the processes and tools to ensure that as you grow – your IT Infrastructure (and people) are growing as well.

Photo Credit:Kevin Dooley

Do We Really Need this?

Saving money and cost reduction in a SME is a good thing.

But don’t overlook that that avoiding spending unnecessary money in the first place is good too.

It happens; either a statement from a customer on a must have technology or tool you need to deal with them.

Or perhaps some new cool thing that a consultant or the folks at the golf course mentioned.

It happened to us some time ago. When I joined the organization some initial pricing etc had been obtained for a required technology initiative. I was to take the next steps.

In this case I was looking at technology spend with dollar values in the tens of thousands.

Dollar Signs

Do We Really, Really, I mean Really Need this?

So I hit the research trail and the phones.

I discovered that what the client asked for, was not what they really wanted.

I also discovered that the many thousands of dollars in this proposal would not even do all that the customer wanted.

I also discovered that for about a hundred bucks per hour there is a supplier in my region that does this technology on a pay per use arrangement – the same way many of you probably use voice conferencing services.

Cost Avoidance

In the last 18 months, we may have spent 5 or 6 hundred bucks with that provider.

Compared to the multiple tens of thousands that it was supposed to cost.

Photo Credit: pfala

Virtualization – What SME’s Want

Courtesy of the Ottawa Network and Gowling Lafleur Henderson LLP I had the opportunity to attend a casual panel on the concept of virtualization.

The technology aspects of the discussion ranged from abstracting hardware right up through the application layer and the current buzzword of cloud computing.

But for the my audience in the SMB / SME space.  Outside of the panelists, there were two questions that I found say it all,

He Says; IT Doesn’t Matter

Just Plug It In

One gentleman, (A small business owner) whose name I was not able to get, asked when he would just plug in a display type of device into a wall and have his computing environment.

(If I was able to, I would have given him copies of Nicholas Carr’s IT Doesn’t Matter and the Big Switch )

She Says; She Can’t Give it Away

The second interesting point was from Fay Khazai, President of a SMB that supplies a software suite for some SMB verticals.

These business are reluctant to use her hosted offering – for one reason. They cannot rely on their internet connections.

These SMB’s rely on lower end offerings connectivity from their providers such as DSL and cable for their internet connections. No connection – no business.

There you have the SMB dichotomy. Can I give you an answer for this?

No, sorry I cannot.

Panelists:

Mike Kemp: CTO Liquid Computing

Jean-Marc Seguin: Chief Architect, Embotics

Miro Adamy: Founder, Thinknostic

Socket Image Credit

Internet Image Credit

ITIL – (Over) Simplified

I was asked in an email if I wasn’t simplifying the ITIL Framework a bit.

No.

I am simplifying it a lot

As stated on my About Me page, my goal with this blog is general IT information geared towards the non-technology business manager, general manager or owner in the SMB space.

My target is those individuals that are looking for basic information on a variety of SMB IT issues (not just ITIL). And along the way I have pointed out links for more detailed and in depth information.

If you are a senior ITIL expert and have successfully implemented multi-million dollar ITIL aligned service support / service delivery – well, my little outlines here are not for you!

While this blog has covered IT topics for non technology managers from file services, to financial controls, – the magic of Google has ITIL and the small business / medium business as one of the most searched for topics.

The first post on ITIL for the small to medium business is here.

As quoted by Tim Walker I do it because;

..because then they’re easy to understand.

Alexander and the Gordian Knot

Image Credit

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Blog as Website

I have seen one or two small business web sites that were actually blogs.

I was not overly impressed because, Well, they looked, kinda blog-ish

Courtesy of Havi Brooks,  I was pointed to  this (micro) SMB web site that is actually doing a pretty good job of utilizing blogging software for their web site.

For a smaller organization, blog software could be pretty effective;

• If you ensure that you update it regularly, search engine rankings will help generate traffic. Which can help generate sales.

• Easy to operate

• Easy to update

• Easy to add pages and links

For All SMB’s?

I don’t see blogging software as much use in the general SMB /SME space as there are negatives. These include:

• a very flat structure

• lack of scalability into e-Commerce or CRM applications

That being said, for what I would call cottage industry businesses, it would be an excellent choice.

Also, local non-profits, or local chapters of non-profit organizations could use them quite effectively.

If you are a small business using blogging software, please point me to it!

UPDATE: After getting proven wrong, the Blog As WQebsite Revisited Post is now available !

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ITIL Change Management And The Smaller Business

The first post on ITIL Change Management is located here.

The official ITIL definition of the Change Management process is;

“..the addition, modification, or removal of approved, supported or baselined hardware, network, software application, environment ….”

At its simplest; Change Management is the balance between the need for a change & the impact, or possible impact on your organization.

For a smaller business, you do not need complex software, a Change Log template in something like Microsoft Word will do.

The important point is that it must be managed, and it must be updated.

Managed – The Warning!

By managed, I mean that You; the small business owner or manager must be part of the IT conversation with your IT provider.

In a smaller organization you may not need a formalized change board, but without you being part of the IT conversation, it will fail.

Communication

Ideally all changes should be discussed in advance (you do meet with your IT provider weekly right?) In this discussion the following questions should be asked;

- What Changes are coming?
- Why is the change required?
- Has the existing configuration been reviewed?
- What is the risk & impact, low, medium, high?
- what is the plan B?

This is also the opportunity to verify times and possible schedule conflicts with the change.

Trust, But Verify

For your next meeting, initially you may want the change log brought to you. Later on, random audit checks may suffice. But it is critical that the changes are documented. At a minimum, it will be your change log, and if there was a modification to an existing CI, (Configuration Item, my first post on ITIL is here) the CMDB or configuration management database (or in a small business,configuration document) must be updated.

Lets tie this up with the example I used previously where IT technician number two reversed some device changes that were necessary to allow email to work with your mobile devices.

- With technician number 1, The change, impact and urgency is discussed
- existing configuration is reviewed
- change to device(s) is made
- change logs and device configuration documents are updated

Lets assume that technician number 2, that reversed it, made an unauthorized change.

Your documentation allows the mistake to be rectified quickly. But this is where your management comes in; unauthorized changes are not to be permitted.

If technician umber 2 was following the process, when the existing configuration document was reviewed, the change and its purpose would be clear.

UPDATE: Change Management for the alrger SME is here.

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The Business Card Web Site

The title is from an excellent post by Jim Rubart at He Blogs She Blogs.

Sometimes in a local smaller organization you really don’t need to worry about a first place ranking on Google or Yahoo!

Maybe you are a local legal firm, consultancy, or staffing firm.

Maybe you are a roofing, plumbing or landscaping firm.

Deliberate vs General Search

Because you don’t care about general search queries regarding your product or service from half a continent away, As far as you are concerned, your web site needs to be no more complex than what product or service you provide, and, how to get hold of you.

Sounds reasonable.

But before going too far down this road, consider;

Perhaps through advertising, a sales call, or even a referral, someone remembers just a basic part about your business. Unfortunately they cannot remember all the details.

They already know you exist.

So that prospective customer deliberately hits the search engines with as much information as they have available.

That could be part of your name,

Maybe with your region or location,

And perhaps with your product or service.

They know you exist! Unfortunately for you, they can’t find you.

?????

Even with the information they have available, deliberate search queries are not finding you.

To them, you are invisible and have fallen off of the face of the planet.

Two Options

And you do have two options;

1) Hope that they try to find out somewhere else your complete information, before they go to a competitor.

2) Make sure they find you.

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Blocking Social Media

I definitely qualify as part of the older generation.

Social Media

And no – I don’t use Facebook. So I don’t have a vested interest here.

That being said, I was in a (quite) animated discussion with a boatload of people younger than I was on employers blocking or banning social media web sites such as Facebook and MySpace .

I don’t think it is necessary. The main reply was Time Waster and productivity.

My take was;

1) Some business can extract value from these sites. I cannot recall where, but I recall one organization that is using social media for retired and current employees to keep in touch and possibly identify new ideas. Another was using Facebook as an emergency contact list. (if your office building is currently in Galveston Tx. Can you think of a more central way to find out how people are doing and where people are?)

2) Even if you feel (and let me emphasize feel) that it would do your business no good. So What?

Failure to Manage

Making a policy for anything; time off, tardiness, etc simply because one or two individuals have abused it, is quite simply a manager who hasn’t the skills to deal with the individual who is abusing.

If you have one person who consistently arrives late – do you punish everybody else with a memo that tardiness will be docked from their pay?

Or do you find out the root cause of the abusing individuals tardiness?

Hint: if you answered with the first part, you fail.

Yes – there have been documented cases of Malware on sites like Facebook – but those are everywhere.

Photo Credit

Online Backup

Back in June I brought up the question of online backup viability in the SMB / SME space.

I documented a few caveats that I thought were important.

David Strom at Baseline Magazine adds a few extras to consider when moving your backups into the cloud.

….be sure to ask these key data storage questions: How much data will be stored? How fast do you need the data up and running? What makes up the data repositories? What kinds of data compression techniques will be used?

Clouds

Photo Credit

Update: David Strom has a full Online backup technologies chart available.

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Web 2.0 – Not In Canada eh?

Jennifer Kavur has an article titled Canadian CIOs shun blogs, wikis and virtual worlds.

According to the survey results, the majority of businesses either “do not use and/or do not plan to use” four of the seven tool categories. Tagging software received a no from 56 per cent of respondents. Wikis were snubbed by 62 per cent, with blogs following closely behind at 63 per cent. Virtual worlds were the least popular tool, unused and unwanted by 79 per cent of CIOs interviewed.

Is it that most Canadian Companies are clueless?

Or is it more likely that it is because as G.C Lynch at CIO points out, Most Corporate blogs just don’t go anywhere.

Stop!

Photo Credit FAhdad

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