Let's be honest, it didn't need a brain the size of the Universe to work out that if you lend lots of money to people who can't afford to pay it back, then the whole house of cards will come tumbling down one day. It staggers me that so many people got caught up by the whole thing and threw away the fundamental rules of banking, but hey I don't run the world (thank God I hear you cry)!
What the current crisis has brought home for me, and I hope for lots of others, is the painful truth that you can't have everything today. Good stuff costs hard work and money, and if you haven't got enough money then you need to prioritise your requirements. Too many people, IMHO, say "I need", when they really mean "I want" or "I would like".
The same thing applies to IT. As a bedrock, I require sound business policies and a strategy that lays out the requirements and the priorities. If I don't have that, then I have a system that will collapse under pressure.
It is very easy to run things efficiently in IT - there are loads of tools for people to play with and tune stuff for hours - all of which is a total waste of time and money if they are working on the wrong thing. The first step is to be effective. Then you run what matters efficiently.
Now, could we have some effective global fiscal rules please?
What the current crisis has brought home for me, and I hope for lots of others, is the painful truth that you can't have everything today. Good stuff costs hard work and money, and if you haven't got enough money then you need to prioritise your requirements. Too many people, IMHO, say "I need", when they really mean "I want" or "I would like".
The same thing applies to IT. As a bedrock, I require sound business policies and a strategy that lays out the requirements and the priorities. If I don't have that, then I have a system that will collapse under pressure.
It is very easy to run things efficiently in IT - there are loads of tools for people to play with and tune stuff for hours - all of which is a total waste of time and money if they are working on the wrong thing. The first step is to be effective. Then you run what matters efficiently.
Now, could we have some effective global fiscal rules please?
Peter emphasizes the "business" concept of managing IT in that a business person would focus on those things that would generate revenue, cut costs, increase efficiency, etc. Everything else goes away ...there simply isn't time for doing things that don't satisfy a business requirement. Doing "nice to have" or "interesting" tasks or satisfying "I want" requests aren't (shouldn't be) in the cards for a BSM oriented shop. I know there is gray in most decision making ...but survival in times of cutting IT costs is aided by black & white thinking.
See "A Note on the Marco-Economic Crisis" http://tinyurl.com/yhzdogv for the rules that have been spelled out by Carlota Perez. Basically we encountered a double bubble: Internet mania in the late 90's; credit insanity as of 2004.
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