Blog: Why Are We Still Using Business Cards?
They're fragile, easy to lose, and hard to convert into a useful digital format. So why are we still using business cards as the primary way to exchange personal data?
They're fragile, easy to lose, and hard to convert into a useful digital format. So why are we still using business cards as the primary way to exchange personal data?
In many ways, managing a developer is just like managing any other employee. Developers want managers who'll help them solve business and technical problems, who'll protect them from unnecessary office politics and who will help them meet their personal career goals. But programmers are...different. Like musicians, these creative folks can alternate between big-picture thinking and persnickety detail in a heartbeat. They can be sidetracked by silly toys, and convinced to work overtime by the promise of pizza and a T-shirt. Trying to understand and motivate these people can drive managers-particularly nontechnical managers-to distraction.
Probably the only technical qualification to put Joel Cohen, a writer and associate producer of The Simpsons, in front of the keynote crowd at the Red Hat Summit in June was that Red Hat Enterprise 5 was used to render some of the animation in The Simpsons movie. But Cohen had surprisingly deep-and quite entertaining-advice about innovation and the creative process to offer the conference attendees.
A handful of uber-programmers are immediately recognizable to most software developers, often on a first-name basis-the way that other communities might recognize "Britney" or "Oprah" without further explanation. These individuals shape the way programmers design and build applications, by identifying process improvements or designing life-changing tools.
Any businessperson who's going to bet the company on a technology decision wants to minimize risk. Sure, you want to get a bargain... but you also want to ensure that the company from whom you're purchasing the software will be around, and that the support will be there when you need it. No matter what the distribution method is.
Let's say that a company is philosophically willing to use open source. How does it learn about the best software for the company's purposes?
Open-source solutions used to be adopted quietly by company boffins who snuck in an Apache Web server or an open-source development tool suite under the philosophy "It's easier to get forgiveness than permission" (not to mention "It's easier to do it with open-source tools than to get an IT budget").
The old way of doing PR is broken. Social media might, might glue some of the parts back on.
If a previous employer called to ask you about a bug in the code you'd written for them, how much time and energy would you be comfortable investing in helping out?
"It used to take four people five days to test the software every month," says Kevin Bingham, vice president of IT at Arizona Federal Credit Union. "Now, we can do it in six hours."
Should your company have a Standards Czar? An argument can be made for both Yes and No.
Sometimes, there isn't much you can do to kick-start your career. Not everyone can be lucky enough to get involved in a high-profile project at work, or to develop a talent in a technology that's suddenly in-demand. But it surprises me when IT professionals who aim to move up the career ladders don't take advantage of one resource that's a win-win solution all around: get involved in an open source project.
Your IT department will soon need to support more remote workers than ever before. Both technology changes - such as video adoption - and cultural issues - such as user expectation - will require that your company embrace telecommuting. Doesn't that just cheer up your day?
Two Gartner analysts said the words that enterprises dread, and that will move alternate operating system proponents to tears of joy: "Windows as we know it needs to be replaced"
I love the idea of IBM's new social network, which it announced this week at the IBM IMPACT 2008 conference in the US. The social network, which aims to advance service oriented architectures (SOA), intends to connect technologists and business professionals in various roles, such as business analyst, college professor, enterprise architect and software developer. It also takes advantage of existing social networks like LinkedIn, Facebook and Second Life. Using both online and in-person forums, says the company, the social network is designed to help members build skills and share best practices.