Change is [NOT] Good

I saw a sign today at work that said, "Change is Good".

What a load of BS!

I love to change things. I have a personality type that insists that there is an improvement for everything. This leads me to change them. I am not against change. The Facetious CIO's business card reads "Agent of Change". I am a facilitator of change, but I cannot agree with the happy little sign that reads, "Change is Good"

Change is the process of letting go of the familiar. Change is often likened to the five stage grieving process:

1. Denial and Isolation
2. Anger
3. Bargaining
4. Depression
5. Acceptance

Do any of these things sound good to you? I think not. Change is often a painful process but once it's completed, we are better people and the change is hopefully one for the better.

I weight too much. I need to change this. Since there is no magic pill that will make my waistline smaller, I need to change my behavior to reach my goal. This means increasing the amount of activity and decreasing my food intake. Will this be good? The pain felt in my legs after a run on the treadmill and the decrease in the amount of my favorite foods will not be good. At least, it wouldn't be good that night as I try to fall asleep with a pain in my knees and a grumbling stomach. I would argue that this is not good. However, as a result of my change in behavior, I will have more energy and better fitting clothes. So, in this example, change is not good, but the result of change is fantastic.

How about another example, smokers. Quit cold turkey? That's a good change right? Not at all, it will be terrible, painful ordeal. No longer smoking after 1 year is awesome. The result is good. The change was not.

In IT, I find a lot of people with similar personality types to mine, the improvers. Yet, they don't realize that 95% of the population are not improvers. They dislike the change process and with good reason. My role as an agent of change is to act as a counselor to help people through the difficult change process.

Please consider these thoughts the next time a project comes along and someone suggests that staff will just have to "deal" with the change.

Seven Truths about Change

Who is Nicholas Carr?

It has come to the attention of The Facetious CIO that there are those amongst us that do not know who Nicholas Carr is. It can be said that a man is defined by his work, and since I do not know Nicholas Carr personally, I can only define him by his work. So here goes:

"Does IT matter?" - written in 2004, this book was already answered in Mr. Carr's "IT doesn't matter" article in the Harvard Business Review the prior year. In both works Mr. Carr argues that the strategic advantage of IT has diminished to a point that it is no longer a differentiator when comparing businesses. In other words, there is no strategic advantage to the way you deploy your CRM system on a PC server that is any different from your competition. The result: CEOs begin to reign in on growing IT budgets and CIOs begin to question their worth

"The Big Switch" - written in 2008, this book draws similarities between the power utility market just after the industrial revolution, but before the information age and current IT services. Mr. Carr envisions a future where IT services are commoditized to a point where they can be purchased like a utility. Just as most manufacturers used to make the power they consumed to build things and now they just get it from the grid, so too would companies shed their IT departments and just buy services from the cloud. The result: CEOs begin to distribute IT budgets out to individual departments to go get their own services from the cloud and CIOs start looking for new jobs.

"The Shallows: What the Internet is doing to our brains" - This one comes out sometime in 2010 and is supposed to answer the question, "Is google making us stupid?"

You may follow Nick's musing on a more regular basis by following his blog.

So, to those of us in the Cloud Computing and SaaS industry, "The Big Switch" is the book of Genesis in our bible. I believe that makes Marc Benioff, Moses.

Five Reasons SaaS doesn't suck

Sending your company's critical applications into the cloud is not for the faint of heart. The risk and rewards used to choose on premises software in the past are greatly exaggerated when choosing a SaaS application. As with any business decision, if you understand the risks and can take advantage of the rewards then cloud computing is for you. The article below addresses the concerns of consumers of cloud applications who did not understand the risks.

Here's the Facetious CIO's response to each of the Five Reasons SaaS sucks:

1. "My Internet connection sucks!" Not understanding that your connection to the Internet becomes a critical extension of your core network is dangerous. When entering into cloud computing your environment changes. Analyze what it takes to deliver that application and secure the underlying technologies (some you still own even in a SaaS world) to match or exceed your applications' SLAs.

2. "I don't trust the Internet..." And rightly so. Given recent high profile security breeches you should be wary of the information placed on the Internet, who has access to it, and most importantly what you are using to authorize access to it. Security breeches so far have been due to poor password management. Your application and data are now available on the Internet instead of behind your firewall. Please use something more restrictive than a username and password.

3. "I always forget to hit the 'save' button." I fail to see how this is any different from on premises solutions. Sorry, but if your users couldn't figure this out with local applications than it won't be any easier with an application hosted elsewhere.

4. "I don't understand why (insert SaaS app here) can't just (insert desirable feature here)" Again, this does not change between the on premises and cloud worlds. If you do not correctly set expectations up front your implementation will fail. This holds true if you buy a product off the shelf, develop it in house, or rent it from the cloud.

5. "What do you mean ten years from now I'll still be paying for this thing?" Yup, it's true. Unless you plan on keeping your current on premises system at its current version for the next ten years, it's less expensive and hassle free to just rent it. Software, even mission critical software, can barely be considered an asset to your company. Buy a building and add it to your company assets, rent the software.

This is NOT the Knowledge Age

In 1966, Peter Drucker described the knowledge worker in contrast to the manual worker. The knowledge worker is one who works primarily with information or one who develops and uses knowledge in the workplace. This type of worker is a product of the Knowledge Age described by Savage in 1995 as "the third wave of human socio-economic development". The first two being, the Agricultural Age and the Industrial Age. This third wave points to a time when the majority of workers will deal in information. They will work with their minds more than their hands. In the Agricultural Age land meant power and in the Industrial Age, factories meant power. In the Knowledge Age, knowledge is power.

The fact is, the United States has been in the Knowledge Age since the 1950s. At this time the number of white collar workers began to exceed the number of blue collars workers. The Information Age (as it was known then) began. This is the decade that brought us the mainframe and many other business technologies that are still in some form used today.

If knowledge equals power in the Knowledge Age, how do the powerful give away knowledge to get more powerful? Many of the blogs that I read and the twits I follow freely give away the knowledge they have. When they do, they are considered experts and grow more powerful as their standing in the community is raised and their demand increased. We have grown beyond the Knowledge Age. Thanks to web 2.0, all knowledge is shared. Wether it is a blog, a tweet, or just a posting I can google, it's shared. Having the knowledge is no longer powerful. How to aggregate the data and use it to create new ideas is powerful. We are now entering the Creation Age. In the Creation Age, creativity is power.

If you are a knowledge worker, there are two things to do to reach the next level of career evolution.

1. Recognize that you may not be a knowledge worker: Just because you work with data does not automatically make you a knowledge worker. You may be acting as a manual laborer pushing paper instead of operating a wrench. Anybody can be taught to use a wrench, if what you do doesn't have a value add then you are the 21st century equvilant of a manual laborer. You too will be replaced by automation, just as factory workers were replaced at the end of the Industrial Age. Avoid this fate by differentiating your work from what other people can offer.
2. Give away the knowledge: Since knowledge is not power, give it away. The more you share the information, the more indispensable you become. It sounds counter-intuitive, but it's worked for many already. Giving away the knowledge lets people know you are the expert. Now instead of maintaining knowledge and educating each individual about pieces of your expertise, you can concentrate on growing your abilities and creating something new.
   

2008 was all about the mash-up. Writing the music is good. Combining it is genius.

The same wave will transcend art and be adopted by business and education in 2010.

Welcome to the Creation Age.

around the world in a Mini (x3)

This is the Pitney Bowes Business Insight Mini. Well, it was the MapInfo Mini prior to MapInfo being purchased by Pitney Bowes in 2007. Its a 1978 mini cooper and it is currently on its third trip around the world. The vehicle is outfitted with a satellite phone, three GPSs, a laptop with two screens, and killer sound system. The trailer in the back houses a spare engine, a bike, and two tents. At the top you can see a satellite antenna and a small bank of solar cells that produce over 20 amps of power for all the equipment inside. Standing next to the mini is its driver Duncan Mortimer. The ten-month journey started in the UK and will take Mortimer through the U.S., Canada, Japan, Australia, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, China, Russia, Poland and back to the UK through Europe. You can follow Duncan here:

www.mapinfo.com/minimap.

and here:

http://envention.mapinfo.com/envention/ecx/track/Duncan.zul

How I stopped a 3 ton truck with one bare hand

Bike riding in the United States is seen as a recreational activity. While it is very fun and a great form of exercise, bicycles are transportation vehicles. As vehicles, they are subject to all rules and regulations when operated on streets. Most drivers understand this and treat cyclists as slow moving vehicles when they come across them on roadways. For example, I was riding my bike recently in the city of Albany and came to a busy intersection where I needed to take a left. Safely, I moved from the right most part of the right hand lane to the middle of left hand lane and signaled my left hand turn. As there was traffic moving in the opposite direction, I was forced to stop and wait. Behind me I heard the air brakes of a large truck squeal and hiss. Glancing back, I saw only the grill (which was at least a foot taller than I stood) of this tall truck. I could barely hear the other traffic over its diesel roar. It felt pretty powerful to make a hand gesture that was able to freeze a vehicle that outweighed me by at least 30 times. I used a standard protocol for signaling a turn recognized by all road worthy drivers. My small hand became equal to any size vehicle on the road for a brief moment. This is the power of standards.

Supported by the European Union, the Reservoir Project seeks to create a uniform SLA for utility infrastructure. It will be very interesting to watch how the Reservoir Project will intersect with the Open Cloud Manifesto. While the Reservoir Project will focus on Infrastructure and the Open Cloud Manifesto will focus on service, these two depend upon one another and will have to cooperate in order for both to achieve their objectives. These are two of the major overall standards that are emerging. Individual layer standards are becoming defacto as their mass adaptation pushes others aside. Until a governing body (like IEEE or W3) takes control of the approval of these standards, standards will be decided by the marketplace.

Why do IT people love standards? When a governing body decides on standards, the outlook for such standards reaches into the future. Many proprietary protocols are not future proof and will never play nicely with protocols from other vendors. The marketplace sometimes picks those protocols because they come from an established vendor or they are first to market. Standard protocols are the only ones guaranteed to be agnostic and long-lasting. Standards give portability and options. The best thing about cloud computing is how quick and easy you can jump from your existing on premises solution to a cloud based one. The worst part (for service providers) is how quick and easy it is to jump from that vendor to another.

The Blues Brothers, master code developers

It's Monday morning and I'm reading tweets, my e-mail (home and work), and the various blogs that I track. Unable to think of a good posting myself right now as I am only half way through my first cup of coffee, I offer you this:

The Blues Brothers, master code developers

I must add one more allegory. Jake's wife (played wonderfully by Carrie Fisher in the film) is the stakeholder that comes from out of no where. The project is moving along despite a few pitfalls along the way. Suddenly the requirements change from another person at the customer's organization who at the last moment has decided that they need their fingers in this project. This is the moment when you think everything is about to fail. Project lead Jake pulls out all the BS he can muster and lets the project continue as planned.

Does this ring true?

Next: Can we create an allegory between project management and Star Wars?

Customer Service makes the difference

Tonight, the family ordered dinner out from a small local restaurant. My wife ordered the meal and I picked up the dinner on the way home from work. Arriving at the busy restaurant, I was asked to confirm my order, but I didn't know what was ordered. I answered yes and took the food home. The order was wrong. Not only was it wrong but the meal they sent me home with was linguine and clams and my wife is deathly allergic to clams. So, she called them and explained that they made a mistake. The restaurant decided to send a staff member with the correct entrée to my door. They included a dessert and an apology. On a busy Friday night, this restaurant was willing to be without a staff member for about half hour to remedy my situation. Of course, I will order from this restaurant again and do one better, I will recommend them to everyone. This is the benefit of great customer service.


As a multitude of players enter the SaaS marketplace, leaders will emerge. You have many choices when you wish to dine out. After deciding whether you want Italian or Japanese, you will make your decision on based on price, quality, and customer service. Successful cloud companies will offer the triple threat, price, performance, and excellent customer service. Without being a leader in all three categories, SaaS and PaaS providers will fail. Fifty percent of all new restaurants fail within the first two years. They fail due to loosing out to the competition on at least one of the three factors. I predict new cloud companies (and established companies entering the cloud marketplace) will experience a similar fifty percent failure rate when they fail to take the lead on price, performance, and customer service.

Open Source growth by SaaS adoption

Richard Stallman Interview about Utility computing


This is the best quote of the interview:

"It's stupidity. It's worse than stupidity, it's a marketing hype campaign, Somebody is saying this is inevitable – and whenever you hear somebody saying that, it's very likely to be a set of businesses campaigning to make it true."


While I agree that nothing is inevitable, Utility computing will be revolutionary. As vendors compete in the Utility computing space, they will be forced to lower overhead. Open source is great way to do that and with the economy of scale offered by Utility computing open source will grow.

Utility computing works because someone can build a large bank of resources and charge out for small bits of it. Not everyone can build an environment that fast and resilient without a serious draw on their margins. The same argument was made of open source engineers. They are costly. However with a few large companies employing those engineers, they can again build an excellent coding environment and sell small pieces to a lot of customers for a large profit margin. Smaller companies will use those engineers as well to build vertical specific applications on top of Utility computing environments. Again, with many players in the game, lower overhead is a must and therefore open source is a must.


In short, without an 800 pound gorilla in the room, it's up to the fastest, most marketed, and cheapest players to rule