Review: Service Management in Operations by Sue Conger, MaryAnne Winiford, and Lisa Erickson-Harris

I would have to agree with Sue, Mary, and Lisa in the steps they took to "examine the state of art in managing IT operations with a service perspective." Upon doing their survey of 364 individuals they found out that:

• 45% were using IT Service Management 
• 15% were in planning Stages Only 
• 37% were Not Using IT Service Management 
•  Finally 3% Did Not Know

 Next, of the people who were using the IT Service Management; Lisa, Sue, and Mary were able to show how familiar they were with each of the Concepts and Frameworks:

• 66% were Familiar with ITIL
• 36% were Familiar with COBIT
• 77% were Familiar with IT Governance
• 78% were Familiar with ITSM
• 66% were Familiar with BSM
• Finally 87% were Familiar with SLM

Finally the people who were not using the IT Service Management:

• 34% were Familiar with ITIL
• 17% were Familiar with COBIT
• 47% were Familiar with IT Governance
• 50% were Familiar with ITSM
• 42% were Familiar with BSM
• Finally 56% were Familiar with SLM

 Like I said earlier, I agree with Sue, Mary, and Lisa; Because, I have always done survey's to answer any one of my in depth question. Plus the results were fairly reliable, personally I would have tried to review a few more people but 365 is a good round number.

Review: Mastering IT Change Management Step Two: Moving from Ignorant Anarchy to Informed Anarchy

I would have to agree with Ken Dietel, with his decision on implementing a more ITIL way of managing changes. Ken's company was constantly having to do Emergency Changes. He describes the problem as:

"The Software Engineering Institue's (SEI) Capability Maturity Model (CMM) ranking for a software process exhibiting these characteristics in maturity level one (the lowest of the five levels): 'characterized as ad hoc, and occasionally even chaotic. Few processes are defined, and success depends on individual effort and heroics.'"

He then recommended that his company should move to a more informed way of managing changes in which he was able to, but he still had problems: 

 

"All this work only brought this organization to a state I call 'informed anarchy'."

He goes on to say that:

"Information about upcoming changes was beginning to be collected in a centralized location, available for anyone to go look up, but proactive communication was still occasionally lacking. Incidents still occurred with root causes which traced back to changes that affected something unanticipated, which could have been prevented if the right people knew about the change ahead of time. The process was still being significantly adjusted as it was being rolled out to more groups. Adherence to following the process was not always enforced."

 Like I said at the start I agree with Ken, He enforced his work group to absorb the ITIL practices of Change Management, however, like he said, he still has a way to go before it's fully implemented.

Review: You Want us to Support WHAT!? Negotiation, Delivery, and Cultivation: The Gateway to Excellent Service Deployment

Personally, I agree with Nathan Carpenter and Ryan Tucker in their article "You Want us to Support WHAT!? Negotiation, Delivery, and Cultivation: The Gateway to Excellent Service Deployment," They are trying to give the Help Desk more input into the services that they are providing. Carpenter and Tucker started out by writing about the "PAST" of their business, when the help desk had very little to say in the process of making the service, and, if they did, they were left to the very last.Then they wrote about the "PRESENT" in which they now have the Help Desk "at the table" and having a open say into the service. Finally they addressed, their "FUTURE" which is being updated continually. From there, they went on to describe the path that their Help Desk follows by showing a seven-step process to success:

1. "Active Listening" 
2. "Early involvement" to "help shape a project" 
3. awareness of "What is happening" and "When is it happening" 
4. "Understand the scope, consequences and problems anticipated"
5. "Establish clear escalation paths and expected turnaround times" 
6. "Preparation for support, which includes building a knowledgebase, announcing charges, receiving training, establishing communications with customers"
7. Finally, "Gather Data and share feedback."

As I said a the start of this review, I agree with Tucker and Carpentener, mainly because I like the fact that they are giving the Help Desk more input into the service right from the beginning. They also had a easy to follow process of steps to follow.

Random Question of the Week is Cancelled

Hey everyone,
as you can see by the title I am cancelling the random question of the week and instead doing random song of the week so starting this Friday I'll be adding my voice to a random song of my choosing so see you on Friday. XD

Review: Developing a Service Catalog for Higher Education Information Technology Services by Andrew H. Lyons

The IT Services web page at Hobart and William Smith Colleges needed to be updated, mainly because it was difficult to navigate; disorganized, and not customer oriented.

The website was in dire need of a major overhaul. To quote Mr. Lyons "Information was grouped according to the technology involved (e.g. networking or database reports), not the end service desired, creating a cumbersome learning curve for customers trying to parse through it. The large amount of information available was presented all together in a large mass of text … that was intimidating to those unfamiliar with the structure and content."

They did everything right. They used an ITIL approach to their development. They used customer feedback on what worked and what didn’t work, and they set some achievable goals. They chose to rebuild the website from scratch, which I think was a mistake. They could have used some of their existing code as a basis for their new site. They used a project management approach involving a “statement of work and project plan documents describing the terms, goals, processes, involved parties, project timeline and milestones, and other information” which resulted in a successful project. Finally they went back to their customers to determine their priorities for the web site. This resulted in a customer oriented development and implementation.

Random Question of the Week.

Yay, another week of fun and frivolity, Caramelldansen, Twins, and one paper. We certainly have been through alot, but were not here to listen to me wax philosphical were here for the question, so here it is: If you could be any fictional Character who would it be? (mine would most likely be Dark Link)

Review: What Determines IT Spending Priorities by Hoon S. Cha, David E. Pingry and Matt E. Thatcher

I would have to agree with Cha, Pingry and Thatcher. That IT companies are spending "in the areas of administration and production and distribution while the lowest priorities are in the areas of R&D and security." Although personally I wouldn't agree with the fact that companies are spend so few in security. For instance look at this table:

as you can see "An up arrow indicates a increase in the independent variable will increase the probability that the business function will be ranked first (last). A down arrow indicates in the independent variable will decrease the probability that the business function will be ranked first (last). Blue indicates that an increase in the independent variable increases the business function's priority. Orange indicates that an increase in the independent variable decreases the business function's priority."
Like I said before I agree with Cha, Pingry and Thatcher that IT companies are doing their expenditures this way, but I don't agree with the IT companies in that they don't do R&D and security as their highest priority. The reason why I say this is because  if they don't put R&D and security as their highest priority they will be very susceptible to Hackers, bugs and other Malicious software that could take the entire company down, for example: look at the stock market crash that started the Great Depression (otherwise known as "Black Tuesday") or look at "Die Hard 4.0" if these companies had put security at the forethought of their business they wouldn't be in the mess that they were in.

Peter Commits Social Suicide Again

Hi everyone,
As the title suggest's, Yes I've done another "Caramelldansen" type video on youtube but this time my one is slightly different in that it's the first male version of "Boogie Bam Dance" where I memorized all the steps and made a complete fool of my self but then again everybody makes fools of themselves all the time well let's stop listening to me rattle on and watch the video:

OH GAWD I'll NEVER HEAR THE END OF IT. XD

And just for nostalgia let's add in the Caramelldansen video as well to show you how different it is:

AWWWW MEMORIES. XD

Random Question of the Week.

Hey Everybody,
Another week down the tubes and you know what that means ANOTHER RANDOM QUESTION YAY, This week we look into something more sinister:
What was the very first movie that truly scared you? (Mine was "The Relic") Happy Hunting. XD

Review: Six IT Decisions Your IT People Shouldn't Make by Jeanne W. Ross and Peter Weill

I would have to agree with Ross and Weill: The six points they put forward are more for heads of companies because they have a broader view of the company. Ross and Weill put forward the idea that the following six questions should be tackled by a head of office with minimal input from the IT department:

• "How much should we spend on IT?"
• "Which business processes should receive our IT dollars?"
• "Which IT capabilities need to be companywide?"
• "How good do our IT services really need to be?"
• "What security and privacy risks will we accept?"
• "Whom do we blame if an IT initiative fails?"

This doesn't mean that there is no input needed; it means that the head and the IT department should work together to sort out these problems. Otherwise, if no action is taken, the following problems could arise (respectively):

• "The company fails to develop an IT platform that furthers its strategy, despite high IT spending."
• "A lack of focus overwhelms the IT unit, which tries to deliver many projects that may have little companywide value or can't be implemented well simultaneously."
• "Excessive technical and process standardization limits the flexibility of business units, or frequent exceptions to the standards increase costs and limit business synergies."
• "The company may pay for service options that, given its priorities, aren't worth the costs."
• "An overemphasis on security and privacy may inconvenience customers, employees, and suppliers; an underemphasis may make data vulnerable." 
• "The business value of systems is never realized."

The reason why I agree with Ross and Weill is that IT professionals do not have the scope of  a CEO, or COO or other heads of command, and the heads of command don't have the IT expertise that the professionals have so they need to work together to answer the questions that Ross and Weill proposed.

I'm Dreaming of a White...Wait it's not Christmas

Snow, snow, snow as far as the eyes can see and not a single drop for thee. Hey everyone Snowbound Peter and New Zealand is getting something as rare as a blue Moon, SNOW. Just take a look at these pictures:

 First the backyard directly outside my bedroom door amazing isn't it.

Then Our Frontyard. 

 More of the backyard isn't it beautiful.

 And our Driveway looks like there will be no driving today

And finally outside our kitchen window.

As you can see Today I was able to have a SNOW DAY YIPPPPPPEEEEEEE. XD

Random Question of the Week.

Hello everyone,
I've decided that at the end of each school week I'll be proposing a random question for all of you to answer, and this week's one is:
When you were younger did you take driving lessons or did you take lessons with your parents? (if so, then was it easier than driving with your parents?). XD

Review: IT Doesn't Matter by Nicholas G. Carr

            I would have to agree with Mr. Carr: IT has become a commodity. Mr. Carr contends that current companies need to realize that IT is no longer a strategic advantage and that they need to transfer "From Offense to Defense." He takes the reader through the evolution of IT from strategic resource to commodity of electricity, railways, and communications. He explains how each of these, when introduced, provided a strategic advantage to those who had it because of its scarcity. He goes on to explain that as these became widely available, they were still necessary, but no longer provided any strategic advantage. He claims that IT is heading down that same road, and that it no longer provides unique opportunities because it has become so universal and ubiquitous. He advises that if you are "spending more frugally and thinking more pragmatically, you're already on the right course. The challenge will be to maintain that discipline when the business cycle strengthens and the chorus of hype about IT's strategic value rises anew."
          IT will continue to evolve and change much like the gaming world described in "Extra Credits: Consoles Are the New Coin-Op."Some parts will become obsolete, and new technologies will emerge. What Carr is saying is that "The key to success for the vast majority of companies is no longer to seek advantage aggressively, but to manage costs and risks meticulously." 

A First Time for Everything

Hello everybody,
I'm finally making my own blog, so as far as the blog goes I'll be writing about: the future games I'm looking forward to, School Assignments, and big events that I've been to or looking forward to. See you all soon. XD