Blogs at PeopleTalents

Top 10 Internet Languages

nospam@example.com (MOHAMMED TAJUDDIN) — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 04:51:42 -0500

According to internetworldstats.com most used languages on the internet are English, Chinese, and Spanish. Most quickly growing language is Chinese, which gained some 1087% during last decade. Spanish raised by 650% and English by 237%.

Content is Key for Search Engine Optimization

nospam@example.com (MOHAMMED TAJUDDIN) — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 19:27:03 -0500

Check back soon...

Managed IT Support

nospam@example.com (MOHAMMED TAJUDDIN) — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 07:05:04 -0500

Although the computing needs of SMBs may seem less complicated than the IT issues
facing large corporations or major non-profit institutions, IT complexity is still a major
challenge for SMBs. System failures are more commonplace in many SMBs because these
organizations typically lack the in-house skills and resources to implement essential
management tools and perform routine management tasks. In addition, the threat of
computer viruses, spyware, malware and other security attacks is now an ongoing concern.
As a result, many SMBs spend more time reacting to IT problems rather than fully
leveraging the power of their IT investments to meet their business objectives. For instance,
many SMBs unintentionally overload their servers, causing crashes that often lead to
disruptions to their businesses and valuable data being lost.

Even when their IT systems and business applications are up and running, SMB executives
are not sure if they are getting the best performance out of these critical resources or the
best return on their investment (ROI). For example, many SMBs under-utilize their servers,
creating unnecessary added expense and effort buying, installing and maintaining excess
equipment and software. SMBs in many cases may be only generating 10-30% utilization
from their servers but not know it because the equipment is poorly configured, translating
into a poor ROI for this pivotal technology.

Many SMBs are unable to monitor and measure the performance of their systems around
the clock because of a lack of appropriate management software or staff skills. As a result,
they miss key indicators that would enable them to proactively manage their systems and
prevent potential problems and costly downtime.

Rectifying this IT management issue isn.t easy. An SMB must not only have the skilled inhouse
staff who can select and deploy the right IT management software, but also have
sufficient IT staff to properly configure and monitor the management solution around-theclock
to meet the SMB needs. In addition, while many IT professionals are good at installing
hardware systems and common business applications, few have the skills, experience and
dedication to evaluate IT trend data that can uncover potential issues before they become
real problems.

SMBs also face higher turnover among their IT personnel than larger organizations where
there are more career opportunities. Because IT personnel within SMBs also have less time
to document their work, staff turnover can make it difficult for new staff to become
acclimated quickly. The discontinuity in IT staff makes SMBs more vulnerable to system
failures or security threats. In the past, SMBs would compensate for their IT inefficiencies
by looking for outside help from two sources:

1. IT contractors to handle their IT issues on a part-time basis
2. IT service companies to address specific systems and software

Neither of these alternatives can fully address an SMB.s IT needs. Individual IT contractors
lack the breadth of knowledge, experience and time to handle an SMBs. end-to-end IT
requirements. Traditional IT service companies focus on specific products or applications,
and generally react to problems rather than proactively managing their customers. IT
operations on an ongoing basis to make sure they are performing properly.

Because of the shortcomings of IT contractors and traditional service companies, a growing
number of SMBs are investigating managed services as a strategic sourcing alternative.

Business Transformation – A Challenge?

nospam@example.com (Raghavendra Prasad Setty) — Tue, 12 Dec 2006 15:56:54 -0500

Let us start this subject by examining the a few basic questions of business administration.
 Why should a business embark on a business transformation?
 What should be done to transform the business?
 How the transformation process can be executed?

Motives for Business Transformation

Better Customer Service
As we are aware, today’s market is customer centric. The success or failure of a business is driven by how best it can serve its customers. Most businesses intend to adopt best practices and use the latest tools available in today’s information technology world, to facilitate its business with the objective of outdoing competitors, by providing better customer service.

Adaptable to Market Dynamics
Today’s market is highly dynamic and unless you are able to adapt quickly to the changing market, you are left out in the competition. Today’s customers are so demanding that, unless you are not able to come up with new products for your customers you will be left out in the race; and hence the need to have a strong information technology backbone to support your business demands.

Latest Technology tools
Most businesses which have been using information technology for some time now will be aware that customers in today’s market require services from the comfort of their homes and not be constrained by means to satisfy their requirements. In order to stand a place in the modern worlds' business, it is vital for a business to have the latest technology tools/products available in today’s IT world; obviously, you will want to use technology that does not get outdated.

Reduce maintenance overhead
One of the biggest challenges that business face today, is trying to reduce the cost involved in maintaining the IT systems that facilitate their businesses. Most often it so happens that businesses procure software to cater to the requirements of their various business domains or divisions, as a result of which they end up having disparate systems. Maintaining of each of these systems, such as infrastructure cost, support resource costs, etc., chew into a major chunk of the companies profits; and hence the quest for a single solution which caters to various business areas within the organization, is one of the reasons a business would embark on a Business transformation journey.

Provide a working environment that is conducive for employees
While one of the key success factors for a business is customer service, at the other end of the spectrum you will need to keep your employees happy by giving them adequate tools that make it easy for them to use in order to facilitate your business. You would not want to have a system, which takes an awful lot of your employee’s time feeding in information and spending long hours just trying to catch up with his/her work. This often stresses out employees and reduces performance; and this is one of the reasons why today’s businesses lay emphasis on BPR (Business process re-engineering) in order to adopt best practices revolving around the information technology tools that the business uses.

The challenges involved
Some of the challenges involved in a Business Transformation project can be categorized into :

Identifying the right solution

Project Planning

Identifying Key players and responsibilities

Change Management

Who should drive this initiative?

Identifying the right solution
It could be with the best intentions that your business decide to embark on a journey of business transformation; however if the ends are not met you can never justify your means. One of the critical success factors in the business transformation process is to be able to identify the right package that suits your business needs. A compromise in identifying the right tool could only mean ending up with a long term expenses that will be significantly higher what you had budgeted for.

Some factors that play a critical part in deciding the solution you choose are:

Your business requirements – How much does the solution fit your business requirement?

Your budget – How much you are willing to invest?

The life expectancy – How long do you intend to use the solution?

Your project timelines – How fast do you want the solution implemented?

The solution provider – How capable is the solution provider?

Project Planning
As the wise men put it, it is important to plan your work and work your plan. A project’s success or failure depends on how well the project is planned; of course there is nothing like a perfect project plan, and hence we plan for contingencies. Most often projects are planned around a date driven by the management committee (i.e. the committee investing into the project). Based on this date, the program team work their dates to meet the end date, and often end up with challenges in meeting these dates. In order to avoid such a situation it is important to firstly consider elements that influence your project. A few examples are:

The Solution Provider: Does the solution provider have an out of the box solution or are there GAPS?

The Process Consultants: Is BPR in scope for your project?

Data Conversion Requirements:

Testing Requirements:

Identifying Critical Success Factors and Milestones:

Obviously, these are just factors that you will need to give emphasis while planning your project; nevertheless, you could have business reasons or requirements to decommission an existing solution by a given date which also drive decisions to complete a project within a stipulated time frame. If you have a challenging deadline it is wise to scope your project accordingly. It would be unwise to bite more than what you can chew, wouldn’t it?

Identifying key players and responsibilities
While project planning is an important aspect of any project, it is equally important to identify key responsibilities and associate suitable resources to execute those responsibilities. Typically within a project starting in a chronological order, you would want to have the following roles and layers:

A Steering committee (The Program Management Team) who make decisions for the project and monitor the project progress. A steering committee could consist of Project sponsors, Senior Management, Subject Matter Experts, and last but not the least “Advisors” who have relevant experience in the domain.

A programme team, involving senior managers and work stream leads from each work stream that you identify in the project, which monitors progress within each work stream and appraise the Steering committee on the progress, and takes up onus of each streams execution.

The execution team, involving team leads within the work stream and team members within each work stream.

Within each management layer, it is important to make sure that you have planned for continuity. You would not want to end up project delays due to unavailability of resources, especially if the team leads, and work stream leads are indisposed. Hence it is advisable to apply a “Two in a Box” concept, meaning all key roles will be executed by two individuals, both complementing each other during the course of the project. You could choose to have one of the members from your organization playing they role, while the other being an external resource, or have both members from your organization. It helps to have external resources who are proficient in certain areas involved in the project. They could bring in new ideas based on their experiences and also provide un-biased opinions.

Change Management
A successful project is one where the implementation of a solution is accepted by end users or business users. If you implement an excellent solution for your business which takes care of all aspects, be it business related or IT related; however, fail to get end users or business users to accept the new solution and use it effectively, then the project is clearly a failure though a solution is implemented.

This is one area where most business transformation projects are affected. Key elements for a successful change management include:

Resistance Management – The human psychology is such that we generally prefer to stick within our comfort zone and are hesitant to accept change quickly. This can be managed through effective communication and training programs. It is important to stress the benefits that one would get from the new solution which would inspire users to accept the change.

Comprehensive Training Programs – It is absolutely vital to have an effective and comprehensive training program for end users or business users. It is often difficult to address a large audience and get them to the same level of understanding of the system. Hence it is recommended to identify SME (Subject Matter Experts) and managers from various business units and train them, so that they can disseminate knowledge the lower levels of users. The concept of “Train the Trainers” is an effective way of transferring knowledge to end users.

Who should drive this initiative?
This is often a dilemma that most projects involving business transformation face. There are obviously two key parties involved in this project from the business undergoing the business transformation, one being the Business Users and the second being the IT Team. Most often these projects are driven by the IT team as the initiative is towards business transformation through effective use if information technology. Such projects usually end up meeting the IT requirements but often fail to see the business angle and result in failing to meet business user requirements.
It is important to strike a balance between IT and business users, especially in such projects. The program team should comprise of Business users involving SME’s, as well as, IT or Technical team. Both these teams need to work in conjunction if the project needs to be successful. Issues around Process Workflow, Usability, Data analysis, etc., can often be judged well by Business users, while areas such as Application Scalability, Stress Test, Operational testing etc., are areas which the IT team can analyse better.
Resources conversant with both areas (i.e. Business as well as IT), if available, will be able to contribute significantly to the success of such projects.

Conclusion
While one could end up writing a thesis on this subject, these are just a few critical aspects, which when given due consideration could make a business transformation project successful. Of-course no two experiences are the same and this is one area where one can learn lessons from every project.
Business Transformation - A Challange?

"He who is not courageous enough to take risks will accomplish nothing in life."

nospam@example.com (MOHAMMED TAJUDDIN) — Sun, 10 Dec 2006 05:06:56 -0500

"Champions aren't made in gyms. Champions are made from something they have deep inside them-a desire, a dream, a vision. They have to have last-minute stamina, they have to be a little faster, they have to have the skill and the will. But the will must be stronger than the skill."

"It's the repetition of affirmations that leads to belief. And once that belief becomes a deep conviction, things begin to happen. "

"Friendship... is not something you learn in school. But if you haven't learned the meaning of friendship, you really haven't learned anything. "

Muhammad Ali