I’m Moving!

I know posts have been a little thin here! But I (finally) decided that it is time to move. Still staying on the WordPress platform, but getting it hosted rather then the generic wordpress.com.

The moving truck is in place, just getting some DNS issues resolved.

WordPress has a new redirect feature that hopefully automatically bring everyone along with me as well. I guess I will be testing that.

Will update as soon as moving day hits.

Beat Regards and thank you!

UPDATE: I have removed the RSS button prior to the move – if you got here looking for it, my apologies, the new site should be ready soon!

Photo Credit by Stacy Lynn Baum via flickr

Your Website, and Your Competitors

A short post, if you are an executive in the small to medium business space, I urge you to read; What your Website tells your Competitors is what it tells Everybody in your Industry including your Prospects as well as Yourself (via the Order Of Magnitude CEO’s blog)

“Why should I tell my secrets on my website, a number of competitors will see it?”

Read that article for the correct answer.

Should ‘Social Media’ Matter to the SME?

‘Social Media’

Now that is a term that confuses, frightens, angers and generally irritates that hell out of too many people. (And I don’t blame you for any of those feelings.)

But let me pose a question that you should try think about in your business.

The Background

An American traveling to Toronto arrived by Canada’s Porter Airlines. This chap was seriously impressed with Porters’ service and sent out a note via Twitter how great that service was. (For full size image click here)

But?

But here is the thing. I was not being fair when I opened this up with just the words ‘an American’.

That ‘American’ was Mr. Peter Shankman. If you don’t know of Mr. Shankman, he publishes a very popular newsletter titled Help A Reporter Out or HARO, that connects journalists with possibles sources for articles they are writing. That newsletter, (at least the last I heard) has about a hundred thousand readers. Oh and Twitter? as of this writing just over ninety-one thousand people follow Mr. Shankman there.

The SMB Takeaway

Mr. Shankman had a great experience with Porter airlines and chose to let close to 100,000 people know of it. On its own? great (and free!) word of mouth advertising.

But what if Mr. Shankman has been seriously ticked off by your business?

Would you even know if someone told one hundred thousand other people that your business or service  sucks?

Would you even have a clue that a possibly momentous event just happened?

Answer that question. And ask yourself if maybe you should be listening.

As I stated in the opening sentence, I don’t blame you for the confusion or frustration that the term ‘social media’ can give rise to. But sometimes? Ignorance is not bliss.

Are You Asking Questions?

A nice article titled; The electronic health record meets the iPad from IT World Canada.

The articles demonstrates how Mr. Dale Potter, chief information officer at the Ottawa Hospital improved IT services at the hospital exponentially.

There is one key quotation that I want to point out regarding Mr. Potter’s work;

….. asked physicians how much of the information they needed in their work was available …

Look at the very first word in that quotation.

Asked

Asking questions.

How often does your IT Leadership actually do that? Or do they try to be prescriptive without asking those questions first?

The SMB Takeaway

Ask questions and then truly listen. Only then can you begin thinking of solutions or alternatives. It won’t always be easy.

Photo Credit Leo Reynolds via flickr

On IT Resistance To Change

I met a consultant a few days ago that provides SME organizations with implementation assistance in the CRM (customer Relationship Management) space.

In his career,  he saw the writing on the wall and had migrated his skills from dealing solely with on premises software (where you shell out money for servers, software licenses and then try to glue it all together in your office) to tools supplied as a SaaS, or hosted  model.

In our talk he made a comment that I found all too indicative of many IT organizations in the small to medium enterprise. I can’t remember the exact words, so I am paraphrasing a bit here;

.. in larger SME businesses, the most resistance to the SaaS model is their IT departments, it is as if the IT folks need to be able to hug a server..

That is – unfortunately sad….

Because when any part of your business starts thinking in silos, it  leads a business to operate in silos too. That goes for your IT Leadership as well.

In the Small to Medium Enterprise, your IT Leadership must be thinking beyond hugging servers. Beyond the silo of what they prefer, or what they like.

As Philip Papadopoulos of the Papadopoulos Group mentioned to me on twitter;

IT should always be pro-active, approach the business with ways to solve their problems meet their goals

Strategy, Goals &  IT

If your IT Leadership feel that unless they are hugging a server they are really not doing their job, then there is some internal IT change that needs to be taking place.

Your business technology must support your organizational strategies and your business goals. And that can include the tactical decisions you make to support those goals.

Mark McDonald at Gartner writes; (emphasis mine)

The strategist has a point in that new technologies and service models are changing the foundation and underpinnings for IT. The move from IT functions, to solutions and now to services reflects a major change in the way IT works that will require CIOs and leaders to prepare.

The SMB Takeaway

In some cases ‘hugging a server’ may be the recommended solution for a business requirement. But for your technology team to refuse to look at the way technology is changing, and to refuse to look at the ways that this changing technology will impact costs or growth, then they are not doing their job.

Simply but, there is no right answer for every business or situation. But you won’t ever get a right answer in your business technology if you aren’t even asking the questions.

#FollowFriday 10/01/2010: Eric D. Brown

For this October 1st 2010, My #FollowFriday is Mr. Eric D.Brown (actually, soon to be Philosophiae Doctor Brown) and @EricDBrown on Twitter

Eric also blogs at Technology, Strategy, People & Projects and offers great insights into both the world of business technology, and leadership for business.

As an example, from a post titled; What’s wrong with today’s IT?

Most IT groups have become blinded by process, procedure, technology that they’ve forgotten their main role – make the business run better.

Via twitter, or his blog, if you are student of IT Leadership, I highly recommend!

Have a great Weekend!