Wow, great things happen while your away. As you know, I've been offline for the last week and when I came back it was to some great news! My friend and co-blogger Stephen Ibaraki was announced as the recipient of the "2005 IT Leadership: Lifetime Achievement Award. Now that is really great news!! Congratulations Stephen, it nice to see someone that gives so much get recognized. The official...

Are you in career stagnation? I feel one of the hardest challenges for IT professionals is to reach beyond their comfort zone. Ask yourself, are you feeling too comfortable in your job? This can be a key indicator of stagnation, complacency, and career stall! It's good to take ownership and control over your future. I believe there's a lot to be gained by incremental improvements on a continual...

Graham Jones (Surrey, BC - IT Professional and President of VANTUG ) The Opportunity to Spread the Word Last week Stephen Ibaraki (blogger extraordinaire – congrats on being named one of the top 10 in Canada ) and I attended the "Global" MVP Summit and a "World" UG Management Summit in Redmond. Most of you may have heard of the MVP Summit but the UG Management Summit was a new event organized...

I had a wonderful conversation with Dr. Maria Klawe . She is a World Renowned Computer Scientist, past Dean of Science at UBC and current Dean of Engineering at Princeton. Talk about a prominent Canadian; her ideas are so important that this summer Maria was the moderator at the world computer science faculty summit where she fielded questions with Bill Gates. In fact we talked about this important...

I received an e-mail yesterday if I could share some of the roles I have undertaken and then provide career tips. I thought for a minute and complied this list of a few background experiences: Hardware: technical papers, designing; since 1965 Software: systems, design, development; since 1970 Teaching: IT and business; since 1980 Writing: technical papers, articles, books, blogs;...

MVPs represent a tremendous resource to IT Managers since their recognized and elite expertise extends to more than 90 technologies/services and they are part of your technology community—as independent professionals who have been acknowledged for their many continuing important contributions to the industry. In my travels, I get a chance to meet outstanding individuals. Arthur is one of them and also...

I really enjoyed my time at EnergizeIT since it is about working with the community and giving time and resources to things that matter. As a highlight of my day, I had the special honour and pleasure of introducing Dr. Gary Birch, executive director of the Neil Squire Society (NSS) and a noted researcher in the field. Gary provided an inspiring talk in the morning about NSS followed by a video...

This is one of the most remarkable, open, personal, and candid interviews that I have “ever” conducted since the 1980s’ with a most talented executive and academic leader who is shaping history on many fronts. It is unlike any I have ever done before and it is part of a series—this extensive interview covers Maria’s experiences from early childhood to 30. As a side note, Maria is keynoting at the IFIP...

A question I often get is, "How can I progress career-wise and stay ahead?" Invariably, a good strategy is to keep informed. To help you, I am sharing an interview I did this week with Computing Canada (CC) Editor Patricia MacInnis, a leading and respected voice in the Canadian computing scene. Patricia provides insights into these topic areas: Top news items for IT managers in 2005...

I have been following Margaret's March 20 th blog, "Global IT Skills shortage fact, or fiction?' with interest and reading the comments. CIM co-host John and I had a recent discussion on it today, and I just finished an hour with a researcher for the US department of labour O*NET program where they called for input and we discussed these issues and the profile of IT workers in the future. I find Margaret...

One of the neat things about my job is that I'm often given cool technology to play with and review. A couple of weeks ago, I got an HTC 6800 from Bell Mobility to play with and so did my fellow WWITPRO executive member and Canadian IT Manager guest blogger, Don Spencer . Well, we decided to get together and do a video review of the device. It's my first time doing something like this, and figuring...

There's an extraordinary event happening in a matter of a few weeks. It's the MVP Global Summit 2008 -- a celebration about contribution, and value involving communities worldwide. The upcoming summit, April 14-17, will feature a keynote from Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and closing by Chief Software Architect Ray Ozzie, in addition to hot-topic sessions, including topics ranging from social media...

We Canadians have exceedingly rare national treasures that are the foundation of an entire worldwide industry, educational stream, and profession. Their contributions are so profound and their impact so diverse and in so many areas that the lasting value can not be comprehended. As befits this CIM blog, this time it’s in the computing field. I am having the real privilege of talking with computing...

I-m in frequent conversations with top developers and experts. Recently, I was talking with Yong Tao Chen, MCDBA, MCSD.net, MCSE+I. He has worked for some of the largest companies in Canada and in the US as a senior consultant and brings an interesting perspective on the latest technologies or trends. I invited him to share his views and he provides his insights into AJAX. You will find this valuable...

In a discussion I had with Thomas Moore, a top-tier developer, consultant, trainer and author, I asked him to share his 10 tips for trainers and for training. In part 1 of this two-part series, Thomas describes those attributes that have made him a well-respected trainer. Here are Thomas's top 10 attributes for Effective Training: Effective training begins with the ability to establish a rapport...

I caught Guy’s keynote presentation at a forum for entrepreneurs seeking " Angel " funding (early stage seed capital). He kept me laughing throughout since he cuts through the hype and gives it to you straight—all the right things you should be doing if you want to get investment. You know the startups presenting [and seeking funding] after his keynote have broken Guy’s rules so you...

I participated in a survey and two focus group sessions sponsored by the SHRC and CATA. My lasting impressions: there’s a “right” skills shortage now and insufficient numbers to meet our future demands around 2010. This is a serious situation since Canada lags in productivity and this is attributable to lower ICT penetration in businesses supported by qualified IS workers. What do I mean by the “right...

Adam Cole (Toronto, Director of Specialty Technology Solutions for McKesson Canada) Recently I talked about the value of networking. Personally I do a lot of professional networking through CIPS (the association of the Canadian IT professional). For CIPS upcoming 50th anniversary I wrote some bullet points on what I have got out of networking within CIPS... CIPS is amazing. For every measure...

This news release went worldwide through the UNESCO Consultative body, the International Federation of Information Processing (IFIP). IFIP through all it's affiliations represents some 93 countries and nearly 1 million IT leaders and influencers. CIPS is the official representative in Canada. This represents a historical inflection point in that for the first time in history there is both global and...

This is the next interview in the continuing series of Computing Canada’s (CC) Blogged Down (BD) which is featured here “first” in the Canadian IT Managers (CIM) forum. We began this blog series on September 15 th , 2006. I continue my talk with Gordon Ross , Internet Filtering Pioneer, Biometrics / Security / Telecommunications / Ethics / Privacy Expert, Founder of Net Nanny; President of Virtual...

"Take a fling on a startup. Experience will be invaluable. If it fails, you will have gotten valuable training for your next job." Dr. Mike Stonebraker, Founder and CTO, StreamBase Systems Professor at MIT World’s foremost pioneer on RDBMS; founder of INGRES, POSTGRES, Mariposa, Illustra 2005 IEEE John Von Neumann Medal Winner Computer Reseller News Top Five Software Developers...

Learning any new product always takes time and effort and, as someone who teaches Windows desktop and Office, I am, of course, very interested in what it might be like to eventually teach Vista and Office 2007. As the Office suite has evolved over the years, and steadily increased in features and complexity, most people, myself included, have said to ourselves, "why have they done that or where have...

When you receive your budget and it's less than last year, what is the first thing you do? You cut 'something' out. You measure and weigh, spend hours agonizing over your decision, and if you are like most IT Managers, you finally decide that your staff really don't require training; after all they've been using computers every day for the last several years of their working life - right? When...

Earlier, I introduced DJ Dunkerley, a Business Analyst and Project Manager currently lending his expertise with Annex Consulting and working on a host of projects. DJ has a two-part blog about Project Management. Here's part 2. ________________ Part Two of Two: The Secret List We draw on the pitcher to fill our glasses, and for some strange reason you are reminded of a scene in Revenge of the...

My colleagues and I get asked a lot about licensing. Frankly, Microsoft doesn’t have a great reputation for keeping it simple. And to be totally transparent – I, like many of my colleagues, would usually rather stick a fork in my eye that talk about it because it can get complicated. And confusing. And just…ugh. So you can imagine my joy when I was asked to write a newsletter...