It was a 10,000 pound sterling bet that got John Loebenstein into computing. During the 1980s as a specialist in reinsurance and risk management, Loebenstein was visiting an insurance company in England, watching rows of people inputting information from travel agents into an insurance company system. Loebenstein told the manager he could write a program that would cut the number of people needed by 90 per cent
Valda Berzins would like to be chief executive officer of Australia Post; she makes no bones about her ambition. But she is not convinced that there is yet an easy transition from her current role as CIO of the organisation across into the CEO role. She hopes to move first into another senior management role in Australia Post that might help her further her ultimate ambition
People are willing to change. They're just not willing to change continuously, says Dr Max Jory, a senior lecturer in psychology at Monash University."Change consumes a lot of our resources," he warns.
IT regularly gets rapped on the knuckles for overspending, over-promising and under-delivering. Expensive projects, hyped as huge productivity boosters, cost trimmers or revenue generators, never see the light of day and garner media headlines. But is IT business's only wayward child? How do CEOs rank the risks and rewards of IT investment in relation to other business disciplines?
CIOs hunger for a strong dialogue with their CEOs. Trouble is, their CEOs don't always reciprocate. Beverley Head explores the unrequited relationship.
Old money and the new economy is a recipe for growth.
Roll up, roll up for the greatest deals in town.
Beverley Head looks at some of the stunts that vendors are pulling to win your IT budget dollars.
Information technology employment was a huge locomotive, steaming along faster and faster.
Then the track ran out. Beverley Head reports
Old hands in the CIO game have seen their budgets rise and fall over the years in lockstep with the broader economy. Beverley Head asks them how to best ride out the peaks and troughs.
In a four part analysis Beverley Head casts a weather eye over the Australian IT marketplace, and asks savvy CIOs how they steer safely through the storm.
Privacy has often been cast as the victim of the information age. New legislation that comes into force in December aims to change that.
Analysts suggest that CEOs come from Mars and CIOs hail from Venus. Maybe. But they have to find a way to communicate if business is to reap the full benefits of technology. Beverley Head examines the reporting structures that prevail and those that present problems.
The arrival of Australia's innovation patent this month should make it easier for business to protect intellectual property associated with e-commerce processes and, in some cases, secure an eight-year monopoly over best practice.
Human ambition is a powerful force. It has seen mountains conquered, oceans traversed, continents carved and (latterly) information systems tamed. Beverley Head identifies what it takes to get to the top
Next year mankind will spend $US2.4 trillion on information technology. The people who sell it are thrilled. The people who buy it aren't. They want better service, better products, faster delivery and more honesty. But they
Can't Get No Satisfaction