Career / Opinions

A look at how companies find unique ways to embrace innovation and invest in new ways of thinking.

Leadership, not technology, drives transformation. CIOs have a lot to offer in the digital conversation. Great digital leadership means crafting a compelling transformative digital vision and then helping your organization to make it a reality through active engagement and strong governance.

CIOs have become brokers of IT capabilities for the business. Here are four questions IT leaders must ask to convey value more effectively.

Everyone loves to talk about best practices. After all, it’s only natural to want to replicate success. But sometimes you can learn more from worst practices. With that in mind, here’s a list of what not to do.

When we outsource, we like to think we are buying and selling technical solutions, when really we are buying and selling human ones. Companies that can remember the golden rule will get the most out of their outsourcing relationships.

I was reminded of why Steve Jobs hated focus groups when I watched the Fox News coverage of the Republican debate, specifically with respect to Donald Trump. Part of that coverage was to have a focus group expert query a captive focus group about their pre- and post-debate impressions -- he instead showcased why most firms should never use focus groups.

The CIO role is one of great influence and leadership. All great leaders are very intentional and they happen to things. As a leader or aspiring leader you must avoid "victim thinking" and begin to live on purpose. You have a choice as an individual and you can choose each day to not be defined by your circumstances. If you can master the guidance in this article then your leadership will become contagious and the world is desperate for great leadership.

An outsourced project is out of your hands, right? Well, no, not entirely. In fact, that belief is a common misconception that can lead to trouble.

You can always buy more users, however for the social media app Opinit, which uses emoji icons as a way to leave feedback on posts and images, there's a better way, build something people really want. That strategy has led to user growth of 1066 percent in two weeks since launching on the Apple Store and racking up about 1M "content views" (which are the views one user makes to another) and 100,000 "vibes" (one user rating another) since June. Co-founders Paolo Fidanza and Q. Ladraa told Demo.com the app started out as a project for friends and family about a year ago and spent the last year in development in beta testing with a small group of users.

End-of-mankind predictions about artificial intelligence, which have issued from some of today's most impressive human intellects, including <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-30290540">Stephen Hawking</a>, <a href="http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/05/03/ai_expert_nick_bostrom_talks_to_el_reg/">Elon Musk,</a> <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2015/01/28/bill-gates-on-dangers-of-artificial-intelligence-dont-understand-why-some-people-are-not-concerned/">Bill Gates</a>, <a href="http://betanews.com/2015/03/26/apple-co-founder-steve-wozniak-warns-of-the-dangers-of-artificial-intelligence/">Steve Wozniak</a> and <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3165356/Artificial-Intelligence-dangerous-NUCLEAR-WEAPONS-AI-pioneer-warns-smart-computers-doom-mankind.html">other notables,</a> have generally sounded overly alarmist to me, exhibiting a bit more fear-of-the-unknown than I would have expected from such eminences, especially the scientists. But that was before I saw reports on the self-aware robot.

"If you do not change direction, you may end up where you are heading." -Lao Tzu

We in IT need to lead. Within the enterprise, we need to be perceived as leaders. We need to articulate the value we bring to the table.  

I've been working from home for well over a decade now, so it would be tough to move back into a corporate environment. However, working from a home office isn't for everyone and while there are some huge advantages, there are some drawbacks as well.

As someone who's sometimes called to be an expert witness, I've had to testify in arbitrations and court proceedings about the best practices in agile project management. Of course, when things devolve to the point of legal action, there haven't been a lot of "best practices" in play by either side. Suffice it to say I've seen more than a few blunders by clients.

As technology advances, we poor humans are getting desperate for sources of self-esteem. Everyone knows computers can play chess and Jeopardy! better than we can. They sort thousands of documents for relevance in legal cases faster, cheaper and better than lawyers do. They assemble electronic products in factories faster, cheaper and better than people do.

By pouncing on the opportunity, the Portland startup is racking up the sales and new customer acquisitions. In a comparison between April of 2015 and the same month last year, Puppet Labs grew by 325%. And now more than 25,000 companies including Twitter, RedHat, Salesforce, and Bank of America use their service to automate infrastructure tasks. According to the Deloitte Fast 500, they are experiencing a three-year revenue growth rate of 3,832 percent and rank at number 42 on the list. New bookings based on this massive growth, also known as a run rate, are right around $75M.

The divergent paths of Facebook, Google and Twitter have never been clearer than they were this week. We learned that half of the world's estimated online population now uses Facebook at least once a month, that Twitter's growth is at an impasse and that Google is all but throwing in the towel with Google+.

If you love paying through the nose for hundreds of cable TV channels you never watch this post isn't for you. But if you're sick of Comcast and its rivals, here's some good news: In the last couple of months there have been announcements of at least four significant new streaming options and services.

Most of us have heard the warning: "Don't date anyone you work with." If you've been in the workplace for a while you have likely either been in an office romance, had someone that worked for you get into one or watched a co-worker destroyed by one.

Today, Google's Android is a brand akin to Coca-Cola or McDonalds. The software is everywhere, and it powers an endless variety of gizmos and gadgetry, some of which might surprise you.