The pressure on CIOs to deliver business intelligence tools and analytic applications--on the cheap and ASAP--has been building steadily for years. In 2010, survey results point out that that demand has reached a fever pitch with which CIOs are very familiar.
Any and all executives or managers looking to get more productivity from their information workers--and, really, what company isn't shamelessly espousing a "more with less" philosophy these days?--might want to pay attention to the following strategy: Set your workers free from the office.
As a core competency for businesses, "supply chain automation" seems like a management directive from the bygone eras of "knowledge management" and "reengineering." It harkens to the days of sending and receiving handwritten orders via fax, to lacking a thorough understanding of the true identities of the suppliers that exist in companies' downstream chains.
The battle and competition in the enterprise software market between SAP and Oracle has fast become one of the hottest rivalries in high-tech. And while it might not have the pop-culture pizzazz of Red Sox-Yankees or Coke-Pepsi, the passion of the thousands of the combatants involved makes it no less fervent or important a battle.
It's been little more than a week since the New Year's Eve ball dropped, and people everywhere may have already dropped the ball on fulfilling their important work-related resolutions. How many of these apply to you?
Conventional wisdom has long held that CIOs should never say "Wait until next year," because that year often doesn't come for them. Everyone knows that CIO stands for Chief Information Officer, but in the early 1990s, it stood for something disparaging--"Career Is Over"--due to their purported brief tenures (two to three years, we were told).
What's next for the ever-evolving and consolidating enterprise applications market in 2010? The rise of next-generation "socialytic" apps that fuse business apps with analytics and social and collaboration software.
For the past 10 years, radio-frequency identification (RFID) has followed the classic buzzword trajectory that is typically a blessing and a curse for new technologies: Next-generation appeal, bursting hype, rampant confusion and fragmented success.
No one ever claimed that managing corporate IT systems was easy, or without its fare share of tumult, or for the faint of heart. But during the past decade, as better IT tools emerged in the high-tech industry-such as application integration software, Web-based software delivery methods, project implementation strategies and virtualization techniques-it would be reasonable to think that the overall management of IT might have become less arduous and risky.
Corporate IT budgets may have gotten slashed in 2009, but that apparently didn't stop companies from investing in their ERP software this year.
Lately, much of the furor encircling ERP costs has revolved around software maintenance and support fees. The global recession has forced customers of Big ERP vendors-SAP, Oracle, Lawson, Infor-to question the value they receive from the fees.
The employment numbers in the United States remain scary and sobering: In September, companies shed 263,000 more jobs, increasing the unemployment rate to 9.8 percent, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The construction, manufacturing, retail trade and government sectors suffered the worst losses.
It's been really difficult using the Force to convince your HR manager or boss to see things your way: Your threats of turning fellow workers to the Dark Side sound hollow and that Jedi mind trick you've been working on for the past six months doesn't seem to be getting you anywhere. Your big promotion? You might as well be working in the Spice Mines of Kessel.
If 40 is the new 30 (in terms of age), then 1 billion is the new 1 million.
Jason Coyne describes his unusual job in many ways: Marriage counselor. The Equalizer. Relationship guru. Project conscience. Resolution manager. The Fixer.