by Mark P. McDonald | February 9, 2010 | 2 Comments
A tongue-n-cheek look at something we all do every year. [Screen] The scene pans in from outside a nondescript office building through a tinted window and into a conference room filled with people sitting at round table. Please read the italics text as if being spoken by British Naturalist Richard Attenborough. “Each year between mid-January [...]
Category: Personal Observation Tags: 2010 planning, Business, Humor, Leadership, Management
by Mark P. McDonald | February 8, 2010 | 1 Comment
About 18 months ago the idea of decoupling was all the rage. Decoupling was the concept that the economic fortunes of Asia and the West were no longer strongly intertwined. Stock market analysts and economists postulated that the US and Western Europe would go into recession, but China and its domestic growth rate would keep [...]
Category: 2010 Economy Strategy Tags: 2010 planning, Business Leadership, Economic conditions, Economic Recovery, Economy, Strategy
by Mark P. McDonald | February 3, 2010 | Submit a Comment
Making the connection between IT activities and business value requires having the information and communicating it effectively. The blog post immediately before this one concentrates on creating a summary action plan that assembles the information needed to demonstrate IT’s value. This post concentrates on how you use the information to reveal the plan in a [...]
Category: 2010 Leadership Strategy Tools Tags: 2010 planning, IT management, Strategy, Tools
by Mark P. McDonald | January 21, 2010 | 3 Comments
If you are what you measure, then many IT organizations tell their business peers that IT is a non-strategic back office function. Metrics such as systems availability, project status and help desk backlogs re-enforce the separation of IT form the rest of the enterprise. The lack of business relevant metrics and measures that communicate the [...]
Category: Leadership Strategy Tools Tags: 2010, 2010 planning, Business Leadership, Business Management, CIO Leadership, Finance, IT and Business, IT management, product innovation, Strategy and Planning, Tools
by Mark P. McDonald | January 19, 2010 | 15 Comments
These years 2010 Gartner CIO Survey captured the priorities and plans of more than 1,500 CIOs. The CIOs reported that they see 2010 as a time of transition across three areas: Economically from recession to recovery and growth Strategically from a focus on cost cutting efficiency to raising enterprise and IT productivity Technology transition from [...]
Category: 2010 budgets CIO Economy Leadership Tags: 2010, 2010 planning, CIO Leadership, IT budgets, IT Leadership
by Mark P. McDonald | January 18, 2010 | 1 Comment
Productivity is a hot topic for investors, business executive and the media. Productivity is one of the reasons for the recent stock market run up. Productivity is a leading indicator for earnings and therefore share price. Business executives are interested in productivity for much the same reason The media is watching productivity as higher productivity [...]
Category: CIO Economy Strategy Tags: 2010, 2010 planning, Business Strategy, IT and Business, IT strategy, Strategy and Planning
by Mark P. McDonald | December 31, 2009 | Submit a Comment
Yogi Berra is attributed as saying “It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future.” That does not stop people from making predictions and rather than predictions, lets say here are a few things we might see in 2010. 2009 was a tough year for enterprise IT between budget cuts, new pending regulation and the [...]
Category: 2010 CIO Economy Leadership Tags: 2010, 2010 planning, Business Strategy, CIO, personal musing
by Mark P. McDonald | December 24, 2009 | 3 Comments
Its the time of year to take stock of the past year and think about our wishes for the future. 2009 has clearly been challenging to CIOs and IT organizations but not without its ‘gifts’ so to speak. It has been a privilege to work with CIOs during the past year and I want to [...]
Category: 2010 Personal Observation Tags: 2010 planning, CIO, personal, Personal Observation
by Mark P. McDonald | December 11, 2009 | 2 Comments
The recovery is among the hottest topics in the trade press and among pundits as sentiment has shifted. Now its hip for analysts and others to talk up the economy, proclaim that the end of recession is near and that things will get better. Conditions are improving, but the early signs are that it will [...]
Category: Economy Leadership Strategy Tags: 2010 planning, Business Management, Economic Recovery, Management, personal musing, Personal Observation
by Mark P. McDonald | December 10, 2009 | 3 Comments
This blog has discussed various signs of weak management (see link to the core post). Here is another one related to financial planning and goals. Back when I prepared my first project estimate. I do not remember the exact number but I do remember the precision of the estimate – down to the dollars and [...]
Category: 2010 budgets CFO CIO Personal Observation Signs of weak management Tags: 2010 planning, CFO, Signs of weak management
