Java Coding Guidelines - Part I

Does your company have a standard or set of coding style guidelines for writing Java code? Have you ever tried to write one?!?

From past experience, I'd recommend against it. Instead, I'd point you and your Java developers / programmers to Sun's Code Conventions for the Java Programming Language. This guideline has been vetted over many years and the entire JDK mostly follows it. As a result, most Java programmers are familiar with them, and Java code that follows these guidelines is generally readable by all Java programmers.

That being said, I'm going to ignore my own advice and begin writing a Java Coding Guideline for Xpediant. "Why?" you ask...

Well, I believe that Sun's guidelines are good, but incomplete. Remember, Sun's audience was much larger than Xpediant's audience, and therefore, had to be agreed to by a much more diverse group. Being smaller in size, we have the luxury of espousing and enforcing more specific coding practices - hopefully enhancing the quality, consistency, and effectiveness of our services.

So, where should I start? How does one go about crafting such a document?

Well, I believe the first thing that needs to be done is to create a vision - the same thing I would do for any new project.

Yikes.

Hm... Well, we are an integration and consulting company that works with and customizes software products that are Java-based, so it stands to reason that our Java code should be integratable with those products. And our projects generally deploy into enterprise-level production systems so the code should be high quality, production-ready. And since it's very likely we'll eventually turn over the code to the client to support, our code needs to be supportable and maintainable by other programmers.

So, the vision is:

To write a set of Java Coding Guidelines that:

• Enhances Xpediant's ability to write, test, deploy, maintain, and reuse its Java codebase.
• Consistently and seemlessly integrates with the Java codebase of the software products Xpediant's vendor partners create and sell.
• Consistently and seemlessly integrates with Xpediant's clients' existing and new Java codebase.

Next, I'll explore the most basic Java guidelines - get the easy stuff out of the way first!

Unstructured Business Process(es)

Recently I came across a blog post that discussed the concept of unstructured business processes. You can find it here.

So, what is an unstructured business process (I hear you thinking)... Read on.

Internally here at Xpediant, I've always talked about dividing business processes into two types: linear and collaborative. Linear processes possess a set , pre-determined path of execution where one activity (step) is dependent upon the previous activity completing. In other words, the process is step-wise (and may loop or branch) and has a clearly delineated execution path from start to finish. Collaborative processes are ill-defined processes where the path of execution is non-deterministic, the order of execution is not defined and the only requirement for completing the process is that all activities have completed (either normally or abnormally, but 'done' nonetheless).

So, structured versus unstructured processes is the same set of concepts (with better names that are broader, more encompassing). It turns out, I'm not the only one that sees things this way (and, by the way, I know it is not the only way to segment business process types). There are several others that discuss the inherent differences between structured and unstructured processes as the blog entry noted above discusses.

One idea that spurred some thought for me was the suggestion that the relative number of structured versus unstructured business processes is analogous to the amount of structured versus unstructured data in the corporate world, which by the way is about 1:10. That ratio suggests that there is *large* market opportunity of unstructured business processes for BPM vendors to tap.

But as I thought about it more, the idea of BPM vendors addressing unstructured business processes was potentially antithetical to the processes themselves. In other words, the idea of applying a BPMS to an unstructured business process would inherently change the unstructured process into a structured (or at least partially structured) business process. So, it seems to me, the nature of the business process is altered and the process is no longer unstructured - walls are built that the process must work within.

That may or may not be a good thing. As I thought about it more, a potential opportunity with unstructured business processes is to reign them in and move them towards a more formalized (structured) process. In fact, this is the very point for applying a BPMS to a business process - structured or not. Formalization of the business process provides the opportunity to make the process reliably repeatable which can be measured and analyzed. This in turn provides the opportunity to manage the process, possibly making it more efficient.

However, it seems to me that in this same group of unstructured business processes there are processes that won't lend themselves to the application of a BPMS. That their unstructured nature is exactly what makes them work - the process itself depends upon and is enhanced by the unstructured, dynamic application of the work.

So, while there may be a large market opportunity with unstructured business processes, it's smaller than the whole set by some amount. Not only that, when choosing which process to apply a BPMS to, care and consideration of the nature of the business process is critical to the success of the project.

Response: OJT is Dead; Long Live Training

I've got to rant. Recently, I was forwarded a link to a blog post by Anne Thomas Manes that poses the notion that SOA is dead. After reading this post, I had to respond:

Obituary: OJT

OJT met its demise on January 1, 2009, when it was wiped out by the catastrophic impact of the economic recession. OJT is survived by its offspring: mentoring, coaching, experiential learning, Observational learning, and all other training approaches that depend on “hands-on” efforts.

Once thought to be the savior of business, OJT instead turned into a great failed experiment—at least for most organizations. OJT was supposed to reduce costs and increase agility on a massive scale. Except in rare situations, OJT has failed to deliver its promised benefits. After investing millions, businesses are no better than before. In many organizations, things are worse: costs are higher, projects take longer, and work is more fragile than ever. The people holding the purse strings have had enough. With the tight budgets of 2009, most organizations have cut funding for their OJT initiatives.

It’s time to accept reality. OJT fatigue has turned into OJT disillusionment. Business people no longer believe that OJT will deliver spectacular benefits. “OJT” has become a bad word. It must be removed from our vocabulary.

The demise of OJT is tragic for business. Organizations desperately need to make training improvements to their work force. Training is a prerequisite for rapid integration of people and business processes; it enables situational development models, such as mentoring; and it’s the foundational architecture for experiential and observational learning. (Imagine shifting aspects of your business to the cloud without training between on-premise and off-premise work.) Although the word “OJT” is dead, the requirement for training is stronger than ever.

But perhaps that’s the challenge: The acronym got in the way. People forgot what OJT stands for. They were too wrapped up in silly debates (e.g., “what’s the best job?” or “Skilled vs. Unskilled”), and they missed the important stuff: training.

Successful OJT (i.e., training) requires disruption to the status quo. OJT is not simply a matter of deploying new people and building friendships with other employees; it requires training. And it requires a massive shift in the way business operates. The small select group of organizations that has seen spectacular gains from OJT did so by treating it as an agent of transformation. In each of these success stories, OJT was just one aspect of the transformation effort. And here’s the secret to success: OJT needs to be part of something bigger. If it isn’t, then you need to ask yourself why you’ve been doing it.

The latest shiny new buzz-word will not make things better. Incremental training projects will not lead to significantly reduced costs and increased agility. If you want spectacular gains, then you need to make a spectacular commitment to change. Like Bechtel. It’s interesting that the Bechtel story doesn’t even use the term “OJT”—it just talks about training.

And that’s where we need to concentrate from this point forward: Training.

Yes, that's a parody (not the real blog post). Interesting, no?

In my mind, Ms. Manes' post was nothing short of a call to arms for evangelists, marketing types, and the media to come up with a shiny new buzz-word (or words). SOA (the term) is dead, so we need a new term. Something new to write about - to market, to hype.

We don't need no more stinkin' buzz-words.

My apologies if you find this offensive, but if I were working for a business that decides on a budget based upon media hype (or denouncement, as the blog post suggests), then I don't want to work for that business. Business decisions - and by extension business cases - need to be based upon solid, quantifiable information, not hype. A business cannot hope to survive by investing millions (as the post claims) in unwarranted, unsubstantiated claims of vendors and media. I have a higher (and experienced-based) expectation of the budgetary decision process.

What about you? What do you think? Does your experience indicate that the arrival of a project proposal on a business manager's desk with the moniker SOA make the proposal DOA? I would hope not!

A Call for Agreement

Can the BPM industry please stop 'defining' what BPM is? Please? Pretty please?

Am I the only one who's noticed that every time someone - an individual or a software vendor or a consultant or a book writer or etc... - talks about BPM, the first thing that's discussed is "What is BPM?".

I even caught myself doing just that as I was drafting a newsletter article recently. Ugh!

I know why we do it. We hear different ideas about BPM all the time that oftentimes don't line up with what we think we know about BPM. So, before we delve into what we have to say about BPM, we feel we have to "set the stage" (so to speak).

Why don't we have one definition? Why don't we all agree? Presumably we are all trying to do the same thing, right? So, if we all have the same goal, then we should be able to state it.

From now on, can we all please reference ONE definition for BPM and reference it? May I suggest wikipedia? Here's the BPM entry.

Now, if you have something you want to add, do it there. Let's discuss it, agree to it, and start using it. I will be happy, you will be happy, and most importantly, clients/customers will be happy they have a centralized reference.

By the way, looking at this entry in wikipedia, does anyone know how to eliminate the proposed merger of BPM and BPI entries? Maybe I should define BPM and BPI for you...

Professional Development

This past December 2008, our company held an 'all-hands' meeting day. Basically, we all came together in our main office in Houston to get together before the holiday vacations and do a little internal training and networking.

I gave a presentation to all our consultants about professional development. While I believe there was interest in the topic, I think the presentation was received with bewilderment and a collective "huh?".

Have you ever volunteered for something and then been given the list of expectations after-the-fact (kinda like signing up to send out the church volunteer schedule only to find out that you are really responsible for managing the entire schedule - from finding the volunteers to facilitating communications to filling in for no-shows)? Yeah? That's the response I saw on the faces of our consultants.

I wasn't upset about the reaction. That's happened to me before - I used to be a corporate Java programming and software engineering instructor, and have seen worse reactions as I presented material. But, the reaction did make me think and assess ("inspect and adapt" as the agilists say).

So I did my own personal retrospective of sorts. It's taken me a couple of weeks to process what I can only describe as guarded "what the?" for what I had to say.

Here's my retrospective results:

We simply had mismatched expectations, and that is a communications failure - my communications failure.

I failed to adequately describe what the presentation was about. I just told everyone I would talk about professional development (like I just wrote above). That's it. So, miscommunication happened.

I believe the expectation of our consultants was that I would talk about "How to be professional as a consultant". You know, guidance on proper consultant behavior on and off a clients' site, and ways for managing your time and relationships with a client.

I certainly talked some about that, but my presentation was broader - I came ready to talk about "growing professionally" (not just as a consultant). I included discussion about proper consultant behavior, but also included skills training and company responsibilities as a professional.

Wow. That's really different perspectives. But, they can both be concluded from the same base idea, "talk about professional development". I really missed the mark communicating within my own organization.

So, what's the moral? "Don't let Bill present to our consultants anymore..."

I hope not. Or, maybe I do... Hm...

No, that's not my take-away.

My learning is that communication, whether formal or informal, whether verbal, written, or otherwise has a lot to do with success, especially as a consultant. It is one of the pillars of wisdom for consultants, and affects most, if not all best practices for consultants (and really, for professionals as a whole). Bad communication is the bane of professionals. We all need to develop and keep refining our ability to communicate. It's in our best interest and our customers' best interests too.

So, I'll add communication skills to my "Professional Development" presentation (and at the same time, try to come up with a better title!).

Do you have any good stories about miscommunication that lead to unexpected circumstances? I bet you do!

Leaf Blowers

Have you ever seen those guys who cut grass that use a leaf blower?

As I was taking my usual walk the other day, one of them was blowing leaves and grass clippings across the sidewalk into someone's flowerbed - out of sight, out of mind.

That kind of behavior really gets to me. And it's not just landscapers that exhibit this lack of judgment.

I am seeing this kind of behavior with software engineering and application development professionals - especially as the complexity of coding increases.

Here's what I mean.

Software code can be generally thought of as either internal or external with respect to other aspects of a system, specifically if your company is a software vendor. The external code is the code that the source is available and the internal code is the code that the source is private.

What I've noticed is that internal code, if you decompile it, oftentimes looks like the flowerbed where the leaves and grass clippings were blown. It seems that some software engineering professionals allow their code to get cluttered with bad or ill-designed code that has been swept under the mat of abstraction and encapsulation (to use object oriented terms), and left there - out of sight, out of mind.

I urge software professionals and vendors to clean house. Your code needs some spring cleaning. Dust out the cobwebs and sweep under the mats. And then, put in place some best practices (continuous integration with unit tests would be a good start) that will help keep the leaves out of your flowerbed.

Just promise me one thing... Don't be a leaf blower.

Year 2009...Looking Back...Looking Forward

As 2009 unfolds, it’s clear that enterprises with a forward-thinking approach and a solid grasp of technology trends will have a distinct competitive advantage. In an economic downturn companies that invest, develop and capitalize on technologies that decrease cost while increasing efficiency and effectiveness will have an opportunity to increase significant market and mind share with new and existing customers.

Even though the media is overwhelming us with consistent bad news and a doom and gloom outlook for 2009, I am fairly optimistic about the innovative spirit that makes us the leading economy in the world. There is a reason that investors all over the world flocked to the US Dollar at the height of economic downturn a few months back.

The technologies that companies will be looking to employ in 2009 range from Software as a Service (SaaS), virtualization, Web 2.0, document management, social networking to video collaboration. Other areas such as Portfolio Management, Business Process Management (BPM), Service Oriented Architecture (SOA), Enterprise Mobility, and Risk & Compliance will continue to stay on the radar for the next few years.

I also believe that companies that commit to applications developed using content management, collaboration, portal, SOA and BPM frameworks will not only find new opportunities/markets but also cost savings that are important for the short term.

To quote Edward Cornish “ The future of every organization, nation, and individual is filled with uncertainties, and our task in dealing with the future is to recognize the fundamental uncertainty in human activities but not allow that uncertainty to make us act without due consideration to the possibilities and probabilities.”

As we move into a year that may offer both sobering downturns and heartening recoveries, let us take this advice to heart and act with due consideration and thoughtful optimism.

Looking back 2008 has been a good year for Xpediant – our customers are happy, we have deployed mission critical systems on time and under budget, kept our annual revenue consistent from 2007 and had most of our customers renew or extend our contracts into 2009.

From all of us at Xpediant, Thank You for your patronage, we Wish You A Very Happy New Year, be safe.

Sincerely,
Qusai Mahesri

Are we ready for a true paperless society?

Do you think technology is at the point where we can eliminate paper from our standard business process(es) and activities?

I recently had an experience with a company that claims to have done just that - moved entirely away from paper communications with its customers and now relies solely upon email for that correspondance.

Sounds good, and in principle should be a means for cutting some cost (not to mention the number of trees you can save)... That is, until you have a challenge.

Last year, I had a need to store some digital content in a location that I could access via the internet from any location. At the time, I didn't have a good, reliable solution in-house so I started looking at online storage solutions.

In my search for a solution, I ran across XDrive that, as fortune would have it, was offering a special deal to test drive their service for 30 days before you were actually billed for the service ($9.95 per month). And... one could cancel the service at any time in that 30 day window and never be charged.

Of course, I figured I could take advantage of this offer by using and cancelling the service before the end of 30 days. The one thing that bothered me slightly was that I had to provide a credit card number to activate the service. I figured that I would be able to handle the situation though and I signed up.

I used the service over a 2 day period with great success. Then, I went to the website to cancel and could not find ANY indication of HOW to cancel the service. So, I wrote an email to their support group indicating that my account should be cancelled. I forgot about it until I got an email from XDrive about 3 weeks later indicating that I needed to cancel my subscription through their telephone support system, not through their email support group.

So I called the telephone support group, miffed that I was now past the 30 day grace period of the offer. I asked for the service be terminated and that I be credited for the 1st month since I was unable to find the appropriate process for cancellation on their website and because their email support organization could not "tell" their phone support organization that I wanted to have the service terminated.

The support tech I spoke with was courteous and friendly. I was assured that all would be handled, so I thought no more about it.

Three months later my wife came to me with our credit card bill and asked what the XDrive charges were for. It had been several months since I called the phone support desk to cancel and so I could not find the phone number (and it wasn't on the website). So, I asked the credit card company to refute the charges.

All seemed to go away until 3 more months later when I got a letter from XDrive indicating that there was a computer glitch in their system and all accounts had been tripled-billed. The letter assured all its customers that the problem had been fixed and their accounts credited, but my account had magically been re-activated.

I called the credit card company again to refute the charges and I got a phone number from the credit card copmany for XDrive support. I called the support desk AGAIN and asked that the service be cancelled, my account be credited for the past months charges, and that I get a confirmation that the transaction had been completed. I was given a confirmation number, told I would receive a confirmation email, and I felt satisfied that I had done my job as a conscientious consumer.

This past week, my wife brought me the credit card statement and sure enough there was an XDrive charge. I called XDrive again, livid that I cannot get this company to stop charging my credit card for a service I no longer wanted and only once ever used. When I got through to a support desk tech, I politely asked for a supervisor right away.

Here is where the story gets interesting and made me wonder if we are really ready for a paperless business environment.

After much wrangling over how my account had been handled, we got to the point where the supervisor told me the account had finally been cancelled, gave me another confirmation number, and suggested that all was well and that I'd receive a confirmation email shortly for my records.

I informed him that this was exactly what I had been told the previous encounter with his company and I asked that I be sent a certified confirmation letter since the process had failed the previous time. The supervisor told me that he "could not do that", that his company only handled business via email. He suggested that I go look in my inbox and that he was sure I'd find the confirmation email.

I did just that while still on the phone, and lo and behold, no email... I told him it had not arrived and that I was not confident this process would work since it had not worked the first time and appeared to still not be working. Again the supervisor refused to send me a snail-mail confirmation letter.

I suggested that maybe there was something wrong with my email address and that he and I should review it and update it if necessary. He politely informed me that he could not do that either. Then he hung up on me. I called back and went over the same issues and he hung up on me again.

To date, no email has arrived. I am uncertain if the account has been closed. What do I do if I get charged again next month? How can a business that charges a consumer's credit card without the consumer's permission get away with that?

In my opinion, these charges are theft. I have notified the company's only representatives I can contact and I have told them in no uncertain terms that I do not want their service.

So, how do we as IT professionals handle a circumstance like this from a technical perspective? With the business constraint that no paper mail will be sent to customers, how can a business ensure that important communications are delivered, in this case, via email?

Well, it can't. The email delivery process has many places where it can fail and none of the exising protocols guarantees email delivery. In fact, with the rise of spammers and other forms of email exploits, email has an even higher chance of being rejected. And, there are no other alternatives to employ at this point.

So, I don't think we're collectively ready to switch business processes to rely completely upon our technologies such as email to create the paperless business. In my opinion, it is only a matter of time until we see legal proceedings calling into question business practices such as the one I encountered (and could possibly still be dealing with, ugh...).

What's your take?

You heard it here! - Y2K has a new name - DST

Our senior architects Bill Berger and Garry Winningham have this amazing knack for keeping their finger on the pulse of "technology happenings." Bill pointed out this article about how Daylight Savings Time in 2007 is going to cause some amount of maintenance in your IT systems. They have provided this article as a start up for you to get an idea of what is happening, but they have been really been discussing it in more detail off line. If you want a chance to tap their minds on what this might really mean to you, please contact them through this blog.

November Newsletter - Simplifying Content Management

I was so energized by all the content management talk at the conference, I decided to write an article about it in my monthly newsletter.

The newsletter is not just technical stuff, it has links to interesting world events that are not mainstream, for example why Japanese women are wary to marry these days.

You can also see some current events like conferences or conference calls that I think you will find valuable.

If you ever find this blog and read my articles and have some comments please don't hesitate to write.

Content Management - 10 Steps to take into consideration

Hello all,
I'm sure some of you have given up on me, wondering if I am going to post anything to the blog or not. It's been really busy out here lately. The application I am working on is not a very stable one and we are constantly stepping two steps forward and one backward. Its tough to get caught up in that situation.
I did promise my presentation copy from Vancouver and it is linked in the title.
I learned some interesting things at the conference. Library Sciences professionals are really cool folks. I should know, I have worked with some for many years.
When we did the content management study at APQC a few years ago, best practice organizations had all involved their librarians as taxonomists, they included them in creating the taxonomy for managing their content. That's one of their critical success factors.
At the conference however, the librarians are not yet seeing themselves in that light. They are not playing a role in classifying the content and creating taxonomies mainly because the business has not yet realized that they can.
This conference was therefore an awareness building session to make them aware of the potential of content management in their careers.
I met some really wonderful people, some of whom I am sure I will keep in touch with for a long time and get to meet again.
Vancouver, of course is an incredibly beautiful little town. I spent a lot of time walking the streets and the sea walk and the island and had a great time.
My most memorable moment however was my trip to the Lush store. Its a bath and body soaps and shampoos store that is built like a deli because all the products are made from fresh ingredients. It was sooooo cooool. A complete delight to the senses. It will break your wallet though, but the experience was worth it.

No Worries Mate and Skinny Flat Whites

Unbelievable, its been a month since I last blogged. Of course if you read this article you will know why. I've been out and about. I spent a week in Australia, a week in the New Zealand North Island and got back on the 18th. Then I got hit by jet lag like I have never been before. Incredible - am I getting older and therefore my body just can't keep up with jet lag or is it really worse than going to India. I was in India last year and I can't remember when it took me so long to come around.
If you recall my last posting on "entering the process" I am happy to announce that I have now been assimilated into the Borg in this major organization that I have the privelege to be part of.
In fact part of the reason I was not able to keep up with my postings was because I was too much a part of the process and spent many countless hours waiting and testing and talking to my customer and waiting and testing and.. you get the picture.
the article in the title link is part of a newsletter that I e-mail every month. You can find the latest copy here.
I will post pictures of my trip if I can figure out how to. Next week I go to speak at a Regional SLA conference in Vancover. Will keep you'll posted on the trip and send out a link to the presentation.
Stay tuned on more about my experiences at my current place.

Entering the process

An important observation for me today is the process centricity here. I think it's amazing and probably very essential to be process centric in order to have some control over the chaos that could be if there were no process. In large organizations, so many people are doing so many different things that if the structure was weak, it's likely that everything would come crashing down.

In smaller organizations breaks in the system, breaks in the process have a chance of being noticed and caught before anything major happens. In larger organizations because of the sheer numbers of people the chances of deliquents who by pass the process being caught are fairly small and one might never see the act but will surely feel the impact.

I understand the importance of the process but it's still difficult to be caught in it and to have patience while the process is working. By that I mean things like waiting for a building card, or an official computer. I know they have hundreds of requests but of course I think mine is more important.

Having said that, I totally understand the term entering the process, it's what I have just done and the saving grace is that my team mates are extremely understanding and accepting of the fact that it just takes time to ramp up and get going. But of course i want to "hit the ground running."

Working for a large organization

I have throughout my career always worked for a small company. I have consulted with large companies many a time but have not stayed for a long term project and therefore have not been exposed to the many nuances of working for a large organization.
It would seem to me that it would be easy to get lost in a large organization. With so many people doing so many things a sub par performer can get lost easily because there is always someone else to pick up the slack.

Where I come from, both at APQC and Xpediant you are always in the forefront in terms of performance. In smaller organizations "not working" is not an option; there are so few people that it's easy to spot a slacker (for the most part of course).
So now I am here in a larger organization and I realize that I am not entirely correct about my assumption of being able to hide in a large organization.

Although it is only my first day here I find that large organizations are made of small groups. So at a high level it may be business units but they are too large, in a business unit you have functions, within functions you have processes or teams, so even though the organization as a whole is large, your exposure to the team and their expectations of you is the same as working in a small organization.
I am not making any absolute statements of large and small organziations or work behavior, just expressing my opinion based on observation.
I will continue to write about the nuances of working for a large company and point out the similarities and differences. If you have thoughts please feel free to share them with me.

Wanted Java Programmers

We are a national provider of comprehensive BPM, portal, content management and collaboration solutions. With strong expertise in Java technologies, we deliver scalable applications and implement technology solutions that are right for the customer.
We are looking for dynamic, personable, articulate Java developers with proven application development experience.
Prior to interview, technical abilities will be assessed with a technical interview and coding exam. CANDIDATES WITHOUT min of 2 yrs of JAVA experience NEED NOT APPLY.
Travel is required. Must have a valid U.S. Driver's License. Contract opportunities only at this point; full-time can be discussed at a later date. This opportunity is NOT location-specific.

REQUIRED Skill set:
1. MINIMUM of 2 years of Java experience and related technologies and tools.
2. Proven experience with content management or portal frameworks a plus
3. Demonstrate and leverage proven experience with full lifecycle software project implementations.
4. Interface with clients and teammates in professional manner and manage time effectively.
5. Experience with other business process or automated workflow products is a plus.
6. Previous consulting experience a plus.
Please contact me through this blog id you are interested.

What is a Leader?

We've always heard people say "who" is a leader? This article explains in very simple language "what" makes a leader. I have always maintained that management is an art not a science. Whether you are a leader or a manager or good at both, you have to have certain characteristics that make you a leader and make other people want to follow you. Do you have any thoughts on leadership? Please share them with us. You can read the article here.

Chatterbacking - A new marketing term

Very interesting write up. It amazes me that "we" never fail to come up with catchy terms for everything. "Chatterbacking" huh! I guess that's a marketers job. To keep refreshing old concepts with new twists.

I wanted to comment on the last few questions in the article. I think trust is essential in anything. Marketing, working, relationships, etc. Doesn't matter.

You have to allow the consumer to decide whether they want to read something sponsored by or written by a company that has a sales twist. Print magazines have always marked the word "advertisement" on their sponsored content whether it's a one pager or a booklet. Does that mean I dont read it? No, if it catches my eye I will read it. I will be a bit skeptical about its claims but if I like what I read I will investigate other sources for credibility. So what I am saying is if your content is well written then there should be no hesitation to mark it as sponsored. In fact being honest has a lot more potential for believability than being duped into thinking something is not sponsored and finding out later that it was. Then you have completely lost your customer forever.

Information Technology or Business Technology

I read this post by George Colony of Forrester where he talks about renaming IT to BT because the use of technology has changed from monitoring a business to running a business. You can read his post here.
Reading this post got me thinking about this whole concept of naming and renaming. The retail product industry does it all the time. They rename their brands, change an ingredient or two and release a new product with a new name. Apparently the reasoning behind this is that we like variety and we like newness so we are more apt to buy products as they "change" than if they look the same forever.Even Coca-Cola attempts new looks every once in a while. A new bottle, a new label, whatever.
So maybe its ok for us to change the term from Information Technology to Business Technology. Maybe a name change will get us the exposure we need with management, maybe changing the name from information to business will help employees understand that the IT department is not akin to Gestapo, its there to work with the employees, to make their lives easier and more productive. What do you think?

The X-Team Files - August 2006

Click here to view Xpediant's monthly newsletter. Please feel free to forward to anyone you think might be interested.

We cover a wide range of issues from business processes, information technology implementation, and collaboration to world issues. This month's focus in on acronyms used by technology vendors such as HRIS, PLM, SCM, CRM, etc.

Complimentary Genius

An excellent article that talks about a different path to innovation. Look for products that compliment your products, look outside the box. I will try this excercise for Xpediant Solutions, will let you know if I come across any ideas. You can click on the title link or read the article here.