Links

How Microsoft Partners Are Selling Office 365

From this Redmond Channel Partner article… (Source)

Cutler, of Slalom Consulting, says his company sees an opportunity to deliver numerous new services, especially as they relate to building applications on top of SharePoint Online. “There’s a lot more in the application development space, so now that you’ve got a platform like SharePoint, people are now saying, ‘Well, you’ve got this great platform. Now we can enable all kinds of business processes.’ So we can build the applications on top of that. It’s actually expanding the work that we can do with our clients and the value they’re getting out of that work.”

CIO: Execs Get Ready: Workers Will Soon Be Running Companies

CIO: Execs Get Ready: Workers Will Soon Be Running Companies

Depending on the situation, it could take three, five or even 15 years for corporate managers to realize that the traditional corporate hierarchy no longer works, as younger, tech-savvy workers increasingly call for and use enterprise-level social collaboration tools.

… “They need to understand what a collaborative organization really looks like. They need to give an appropriate amount of resources and attention to changing the way they were doing things in the past,” she added.

CIO: Execs Get Ready: Workers Will Soon Be Running Companies

From this CIO article… (Source)

Depending on the situation, it could take three, five or even 15 years for corporate managers to realize that the traditional corporate hierarchy no longer works, as younger, tech-savvy workers increasingly call for and use enterprise-level social collaboration tools. … “They need to understand what a collaborative organization really looks like. They need to give an appropriate amount of resources and attention to changing the way they were doing things in the past,” she added.

Forbes: 10 Things They Don’t Tell You In Business School

Forbes: 10 Things They Don’t Tell You In Business School

6. If No One “Owns” A Project, It Won’t Get Done

… Which is why all projects need champions. Not the kind who beats his chest and spews happy mission statements. The kind who’s backside is on the line if things don’t pan out. More importantly, the kind who has the authority and resources to make decisions that other people have to follow, else their backsides are on the line.

7. Be Clear

They actually do tell you this one in b-school, but not in so many words and not vehemently enough. The clearer you are, the more thoroughly you probably understand what you’re talking about, and the more capable and trustworthy you will seem to customers, colleagues and employees.

Being clear has immense ramifications–on productivity, customer satisfaction and employee morale. If your Power Point deck contains the word “ideate,” cut, and do not paste. In fact, eliminate all jargon from everything you do. (If you think the word “utilize” is a smarter version of “use,” please, please read The Most Annoying Business Jargon.) This applies to electronic exchanges as well. The simplest, most straight forward emails can, and will, get twisted beyond meaningful comprehension. If the message is mission-critical, communicate face-to-face, or by phone, as best you can.

Hat tip to @DougStanley14.

Forbes: 10 Things They Don’t Tell You In Business School

From this Forbes article… (Source)

6. If No One “Owns” A Project, It Won’t Get Done… Which is why all projects need champions. Not the kind who beats his chest and spews happy mission statements. The kind who’s backside is on the line if things don’t pan out. More importantly, the kind who has the authority and resources to make decisions that other people have to follow, else their backsides are on the line.

7. Be Clear. They actually do tell you this one in b-school, but not in so many words and not vehemently enough. The clearer you are, the more thoroughly you probably understand what you’re talking about, and the more capable and trustworthy you will seem to customers, colleagues and employees.Being clear has immense ramifications–on productivity, customer satisfaction and employee morale. If your Power Point deck contains the word “ideate,” cut, and do not paste. In fact, eliminate all jargon from everything you do. (If you think the word “utilize” is a smarter version of “use,” please, please read The Most Annoying Business Jargon.) This applies to electronic exchanges as well. The simplest, most straight forward emails can, and will, get twisted beyond meaningful comprehension. If the message is mission-critical, communicate face-to-face, or by phone, as best you can.

Taking Email Etiquette to the Next Level

Taking Email Etiquette to the Next Level

Not unlike publishing free/busy time from your Outlook calendar, publishing email activity in an attempt to better inform those making requests of you via email.

…it periodically checks the user’s email load based on specific measurement parameters chosen by the user – unread messages in your inbox, total number of messages in your inbox, or how much mail you’ve recently sent. After an initial 12-hour analysis, courteous.ly determines the user’s email habits and what constitutes “light,” “normal” or “high” e-mail amount. It then updates the user’s status of email volume level every 10 minutes, which is reflected in an individualized courteous.ly link.

May have to play with courteous.ly and gmail.

InformationWeek: How To Interview For VP: Expert Advice

InformationWeek: How To Interview For VP: Expert Advice

Candidates must sell themselves. I look for energy, structure in the answers, subtle efforts to influence, and the ability to lead. If a candidate can’t sell me, then how could he or she ever sell a new program to the business or a change in technical direction to the technical staff? Convincing people, often with incomplete information or unknown motives, is a fundamental role of an IT VP.

…

Having a plan for what you will do during the first six months is a critical differentiator. Don’t talk about goals without an accompanying plan. Don’t be concerned that the plan isn’t perfect.

ComputerWeekly: Report predicts IT skills shortage crisis as data growth set to outstrip staff numbers

ComputerWeekly: Report predicts IT skills shortage crisis as data growth set to outstrip staff numbers

IT departments will have to manage 50 times the amount of information, 75 times the number of files and 10 times the number of virtual and physical servers, with only 1.5 times the number of IT professionals to manage it all, by 2020.

InformationWeek: How To Interview For VP: Expert Advice

From this InformationWeek article… (Source)

Candidates must sell themselves. I look for energy, structure in the answers, subtle efforts to influence, and the ability to lead. If a candidate can’t sell me, then how could he or she ever sell a new program to the business or a change in technical direction to the technical staff? Convincing people, often with incomplete information or unknown motives, is a fundamental role of an IT VP.

Having a plan for what you will do during the first six months is a critical differentiator. Don’t talk about goals without an accompanying plan. Don’t be concerned that the plan isn’t perfect.