Listen to Your Own Plumbers January 11, 2012
Posted by Lee Dallas in cloud, Consulting, Content Management, Technology.Tags: Business, Business and Economy, Information Technology
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Ron Miller’s piece on Changing the IT Plumber’s Image yesterday was excellent. Most businesses do not see the business value their own IT organizations can and SHOULD be providing. Instead of being seen as the experts who can expand the business through new technology, IT is just somebody you call when your virtual toilet backs up. The analogy of the IT as a plumber has one flaw though. Usually when a plumber leaves things are better than when he got there. (more…)
When Was Your Last Technology “Refresher” August 30, 2011
Posted by Marko Sillanpää in Consulting, Content Management, Technology.add a comment
An assumption that one can make from our blog title is that I’m a big guy. And one big assumption I made is that I learned everything we need to about exercise when I got out of high school. No I’m not talking about how the latest elliptical machine works but the most basics of human exercise, running. As I would try out a new diet program, I would get to a point where I needed to add exercise into the mix. That would then lead me to walking and then ultimately running. And after a few times of trying to run I’d usually hit ”the wall” at 5 minutes. Ultimately I’d give up. Where’s that “Runner’s High”? But this time around I did something weird, I re-learned how to run.
I found a “new program” for running, called Couch to 5k. And now after my third weekly run of week six, I ran for 25 minutes straight. Only three weeks before I thought I was going to die trying to run for 3 minutes. Now I’m running longer than I ran in high school.
Technology evolves much faster than the human body. Too often many of us get into a rut thinking we know everything about our chosen technology. But maybe we need to remember the words of Socrates.
Straight Talk in User Groups March 17, 2010
Posted by Lee Dallas in Consulting, Content Management, Documentum, EMC, SharePoint.2 comments
It’s that time of year again and everyone is deciding which conferences to attend. I enjoy speaking at user groups propably more than any other venue. I always make a point afterward to read the feedback to see if there is anything to improve upon. About a year ago I was priviledged to speak at all of the fall EMC Content Management and Archiving groups on the East coast (NE Boston and NYC, Mid-Atlantic in Philly and SE in Atlanta). I had a blast. From that particular series there was one review out of the stack was particularly negative.
I have come to terms with the fact that as lovable as I am not everyone will like me. Sometimes there is a personality or history issue that is impossible to overcome no matter how hard you try. Despite the positive responses I always dig into the negative becasue when receiving criticism I have learned to be objective first and ask the question ”are they right?” (more…)
Sharing Super Powers September 15, 2009
Posted by Marko Sillanpää in Consulting, Content Management.2 comments
A bright light was finally illuminated on some odd questions and conversations I had been hearing lately. These questions were about how administrators and super users could have super privileges and not have the ability to do everything at the same time. Sort of like giving Lois Lane kryptonite to make sure that she can get Clark Kent to take out the garbage. Today I heard the story of Terry Childs.
Calling out the ECM Posers August 19, 2009
Posted by Marko Sillanpää in Consulting, Content Management.6 comments
I am officially sick and tired of posers. Posers think that just because they saw someone implement an ECM system once or, scarier still, have seen a demo that they too are now experts. There are to many trained resources out there to work with posers.
Hopefully it will never happen to you, but let’s say you needed brain surgery. Would you let your family practitioner try it or would you find a brain surgeon? And ECM isn’t even brain surgery.
EMC Embraces CEVA Strategy with CSC FirstDoc July 30, 2009
Posted by Marko Sillanpää in Consulting, Content Management, Documentum, ECM, EMC.Tags: ceva, compliance, csc, Documentum, eDiscovery, firstdoc, regulatory
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A huge announcement was made today by EMC and CSC (Computer Sciences Corp) around the controlled and regulatory document space. EMC is focusing on platform functionality for controlled documents while CSC will provide “the last mile” functionality to the end user. This is a big shift for EMC who often competed with CSC FirstDoc (formerly First Consulting Group) on end user functionality. In the ECM space this if the first significant market validation of a CEVA (Content Enabled Vertical Application).
Consultant or Contractor? August 14, 2008
Posted by Marko Sillanpää in Consulting, Content Management.add a comment
I read a great post by Pie on “A Career or A Job … Redux”. In it he talks about how roles as both a contractor and a consultant are a career. He makes some great points at an individual level, but I’d like to point out that just because you work for a “consulting company” doesn’t mean you’re not a contractor. I see the symbiotic relationship that exists in a consulting company as the big difference but I’m afraid that this is slowly going away.
You might be a contractor if … August 14, 2008
Posted by Marko Sillanpää in Consulting, Content Management, Humor.3 comments
So how do you know if your role is that of a consultant or a contractor? Well here are some of the signs.
- If the last time you saw your boss in person was over your welcome cup of coffee, you might be a contractor.
- If you bought your welcome cup of coffee, you are a contractor.
- (more…)
Records Management Drawn and Quartered July 9, 2008
Posted by Marko Sillanpää in Consulting, Content Management, ECM, Records Management.Tags: Records Management
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Records management is in constant flux. Litigation, like the ownership of email, and new technologies, like PSS Systems, continue to mold the way records are understood. Sarbanes Oxley did look to normalize a lot of what a company is required to keep but even this changes as litigation looks to rewrite the rules.
No matter what anyone says, records management is an art not a science. It is an interpretation of how each companies sees its information and what drives those decisions. One can only truly understand records management by understand the pressures on it.
There’s No Such Thing as a Free Lunch February 21, 2008
Posted by Marko Sillanpää in Consulting, Content Management, Documentum, Technology.6 comments
This week’s announcement from Microsoft that they will be giving away developer software free to students and the BLOG posts on the topic, left me with two very different opinions I wanted to share.
