Disqus - Latest Comments for colinbeveridge

Re: Can we save the world by taking the piss?

Colin Beveridge — Mon, 04 Aug 2014 06:46:44 -0000

I believe that the Romans used to collect jars of urine from homes and some public baths were plumbed to collect in bulk, for industrial use.

Re: Has two decades of outsourcing cut costs at HMRC?

Colin Beveridge — Tue, 27 Aug 2013 05:29:04 -0000

A fundamental problem here is that the increase over the past 20 years is clearly not just about HMRC "IT costs."

For sure, the original EDS deal may have had a sting in the tail, with Post Contract Verification coming in at 20+% of original bid value, but it is plain that the lion's share of the increases will have come about due to the high volume of 'business' change in HMRC.

Over the past 20 years we have seen successive Governments investing heavily in IT - but not necessarily effective Information Systems - so it is inevitable to see quantum changes in the contract values.

To really compare apples with apples over such time-scales is fraught with difficulty. The really insightful point would be to drill down into the nature of the costs and thereby determine the relative proportions of true "IT costs" versus the cost of change.

Re: IT needs soliders

Colin Beveridge — Wed, 17 Jul 2013 06:24:18 -0000

Not really a new phenomenon. Over the past thirty-odd years, I have met many ex-service people in IT and they are generally very easy to spot, by their attitude, approach and bearing. Of course my 'ex-uniform' sensors are slightly biased from my own 8 years service in the Royal Corps of Signals :)

Re: Goodbye, CIO – Say Hello to the Chief Customer Officer

Colin Beveridge — Wed, 29 May 2013 12:51:51 -0000

the proposition (CIO transition to Chief Customer Officer) demonstrates a fundamentally incomplete understanding of the problem. I have long advocated that nobody needs a Chief Information Officer but a far more credible future for the CIO is as the Chief Integration Officer, responsible for making sure that the organization is coherent and congruent, internally and externally. More about this at: http://www.colin-beveridge....

This isn’t just about job titles though, it’s about delivering effective information systems, in a world populated by uncertainty, ambiguity and complexity.

Re: Education to Employment Report

Colin Beveridge — Mon, 10 Dec 2012 14:38:11 -0000

Why do we agonise over the 'short-comings' of education in preparing future generations for employment, while completely ignoring broken recruitment?

Re: 10 Metrics for a New CIO

Colin Beveridge — Fri, 01 Jun 2012 08:39:18 -0000

I dispute the time to close metric (4) because this often leads to premature closure.

Re: Goodbye Outsourcing, Hello Insourcing: A Trend Rises

Colin Beveridge — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 05:41:34 -0000

I think that insourcing has long been part of the service delivery cycle (aka the IT hokey-cokey: in, out, in, out, shake IT all about).

On a more serious note, we did this (insourcing) at PowerGen back in 1999, bringing the East Midlands Electricity services into PowerGen IT from Perot Systems. I was the interim Head of IT for EME and had just over 600 FTE on my headcount, less than 10 of these were EME staff - the remaining hundreds were PSE.

I think the issue always remains right-sourcing, rather than a bald choice between internal and external providers. Effective service management requires a service broker model, which provides the business stakeholders with best value, regardless of cap badge.

Re: Government CIOs and IT suppliers 'hiding behind a comfort blanket'

Colin Beveridge — Wed, 11 Apr 2012 11:57:05 -0000

Better the 'death-bed' conversion than going quietly into the distance. Of course, real change in Government systems will only come when we finally drop the outdated techno-centric IT obsession and start designing effective information systems, with a capital S.

Re: Panic and carry on

Colin Beveridge — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 07:55:51 -0000

Indeed, although my Systems-based analysis of the Year 2000 fuel protests/ shortages focused on four dimensions: Political, Economic, Privacy and Environmental.

Re: 'Big data' creating big career opportunities for IT pros

Colin Beveridge — Sat, 10 Mar 2012 05:15:47 -0000

For sure IT professionals will play important roles in Big Data (capture, storage, manipulation and transmission) but it will be Systems professionals who provide key the interpretation and intuition required for insight.

Re: What skills will the new government CIO team need?

Colin Beveridge — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 07:47:18 -0000

A new Government CIO appointment is always interesting but judging from the article above the role remains poorly conceived and understood. I still hope for the day when we may see real evidence of joined-up-management and a strategy properly focused on effective information systems, rather than persistently chasing innovation and exploring techno-centric models while the big picture remains fractured and out of focus.

Re: Contract CIOs get 10% pay hike in 2011

Colin Beveridge — Thu, 24 Nov 2011 07:06:10 -0000

Price is usually a function of supply and demand. It is also a distraction, however, because the fundamental questions are all about delivered quality and value, not the cost.

For sure, some may look at the "headline" day rate for the contract CIOs with warm, aspirational assurance; while others may view the same figures either with disregard, or with sanguine retrospection of better times.

Re: Console generations do not compute?

Colin Beveridge — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 16:24:28 -0000

This isn't a generational misunderstanding.

the problem of falling numbers of students wishing to follow Computer Science courses is well documented.

So perhaps we should ask [and many academics do ask] why have 'computers' become less attractive as a subject over the past 30 years, rather than more attractive?

Some believe it is because of the school technology syllabus, I think that it is far more fundamental - hence my piece about the Console generation thinking differently to the Micro generation.

Re: a cure for corporate dyslexia?

Colin Beveridge — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 13:49:58 -0000

Excellent point, Nick. Our organisations are not always as healthy as we would hope.

Re: Confession: I was wrong on Google+

Colin Beveridge — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 11:15:01 -0000

re G+ Circles, I don't regard these as a control process. For me Circles gives me an accessible method of creating structure and, properly used, the potential for increasingly effective communication channels.

Of course, the problem with Wave was we had few people to wave at. I expect some of the collaboration aspects of Wave will eventually re-incarnate within G+ though.

Re: Google+ : Who You Know Changes Everything

Colin Beveridge — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 11:09:53 -0000

Good piece, thanks. Especially your final paragraph, at this stage in development G+ is not the finished article - but it IS good enough to work with for the time being.

Rather than rushing to judgement, we need to recognise the risk of premature evaluation and tamper the glowing and damning reports with a fair dollop of patience. A virtue too often overlooked in the frenzy of social media.

Re: The Google Plus 50

Colin Beveridge — Sun, 03 Jul 2011 17:16:11 -0000

sorry Jeffrey, I have no views on Panda or website owners' serp opportunities.
I am interested in G+ potential for facilitating greater integration of systems, not search.

Re: The Google Plus 50

Colin Beveridge — Sun, 03 Jul 2011 12:31:01 -0000

Hitting the G+ spot?Not used Google+ yet but looks like an ideal approach for anyone (like me) interested in a properly joined-up-world of integrated Systems. Not even thinking about Google+ in relationship to FaceBook because FB is not a serious Systems platform. I'm thinking more about how Google+ might play well with public networks, such as Twitter and LinkedIn, in conjunction with multiple [private] membership organisation architectures.

Re: Why yo momma won’t use Google+ (and why that thrills me to no end)

Colin Beveridge — Fri, 01 Jul 2011 10:19:27 -0000

Not used Google+ yet but looks like an ideal approach for anyone (like me) interested in a properly joined-up-world of integrated Systems. Not even thinking about Google+ in relationship to FaceBook because FB is not a serious Systems platform.

I'm thinking more about how Google+ might play well with public networks, such as Twitter and LinkedIn, in conjunction with multiple [private] membership organisation architectures.

Re: The next three weeks are very important to Microsoft ...

Colin Beveridge — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 07:01:42 -0000

From a buyer's perspective, it's always extremely useful to be aware of the vendor's financial context - particularly their present position in the corporate financial reporting cycle. Some of the best bargains are to be had in the early days of Q4 :)

Re: NHS IT contracts could cost more to cancel than complete

Colin Beveridge — Tue, 24 May 2011 11:02:07 -0000

poison pills in NHS contracts? Some of us saw this coming ages ago http://bit.ly/ts-poisonpill

Re: The Word Bubble

Colin Beveridge — Sun, 24 Apr 2011 07:59:38 -0000

has the technology investment market ever been in anything but "greed mode?"

Re: At last an IT supplier that tells it like it is

Colin Beveridge — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 07:26:46 -0000

I listened to the proceedings live and sensed that Martin Rice made a few jaws drop - on both sides of the hearing.

Nevertheless, despite Martin's forthright - and long overdue candour, I have also followed the other sessions in this current investigation by the Public Administration Committee and remain frustrated by the exclusive focus on IT.

Too often with Government initiatives [BIG] 'Technology' is seen to be the answer, when effective information systems (including technology) are really required.

For too many people the terms IT and Information Systems are interchangable and therein lies the root of many so-called Government IT problems.

An Information System comprises people, process, organisation and technology – all convened for a purpose.

Nevertheless, an IT-centric perspective prevails so something like the NHS Programme for IT began as an IT project, rather than an Information Systems initiative, by bringing in technologists and consultancies engrossed with IT from the outset. With an IT-centric outlook, it is usually all downhill from that point because the people, process and organisation become subsidiary to the technology, rather than using the technology to support the process and people.

We regularly hear “there is no such thing as an IT project, only business initiatives.” But we don’t need to look far to find business initiatives being managed as IT projects.

The UK public sector is ripe with examples, such as the NHS Programme for IT, Medical Training Application Scheme (MTAS), Identity Cards, Farm Payment Scheme etc. etc.

Apart from the obvious combination of Government and IT project, each of these high-profile initiatives has two common themes: disappointment and unexpected cost.

We ignore this at our peril and we must ask why this still happens.

Aren’t we getting better at IT?

Well the fact is that we are getting better at IT but the never ending series of
expensive cock-ups shows that we are clearly not getting any better at managing
change.

Of course, IT per se is neither to blame, nor the primary culprit, for any failure.

But poor selection and application of technology are crippling symptoms of a much bigger problem – our overwhelming subservience to the prevailing IT paradigm.

IT has become the be all and end all for far too many people. We call ourselves IT
professionals; our magazines and newspapers deal exclusively in IT terms and far too many business interactions are predicated on the mistaken belief that IT needs to get closer to the business.

In my view, IT and business are already too close for comfort.

Too close because the narrow focus on IT invariably neglects the broader nature of the overlying information systems, at great detriment to our ability to achieve effective information systems.

Of course, IT is a vital part of a modern system but by no means represents the whole recipé.

After all, if you baked a cake with flour alone, your customers would not thank you for the results, they would rightly ask: what happened to the eggs, butter and sugar, do you expect me to eat this crumby mess?

To be honest, that is exactly what I think is happening with many of our so-called IT
projects, we are forgetting to put in the proper ingredients.

An information system needs much more than dollops of technology, it needs proper proportions of people, organisation, process and data. Technology isn’t quite the icing on the cake but it should be measured in similar terms, if we want to achieve palatable results.

To deliver true value we need a whole new outlook, based holistically on information
systems (IS), not just information technology. A new IS paradigm will be a natural step, marking further progress in our evolutionary journey from the earlier paradigms of computing, data processing and IT.

We need to break free from the hobbles of the IT paradigm and start talking seriously
about IS instead.

As far as the present deliberations over Government IT are concerned, my view can be summarised by the following analogy: if you go to a carpenter with a badly leaking water pipe, you are most likely to have a boat built - or perhaps an ocean-going liner in Martin Rice's frank observation of Government IT procurement - rather than have your leak fixed.

Ergo discussing perceived IT problems with IT specialists will just get you an alternative IT delivery model, such as platform and agile, without adequate attention to purpose.

It’s time to move forward from IT to properly joined-up-management for a joined-up-world.

Re: NAO: CIOs left out of key decisions, joining up IT hard to do - but £2bn IT projects stopped, and praise for SMEs, G-Cloud.

Colin Beveridge — Thu, 17 Feb 2011 08:01:01 -0000

CIOs not involved in key decision-making? Goes with the territory of being a Chief Information Officer.

The Government does not need a new variant of Chief Information Officer, like every organization it really needs a completely new role: Chief Integration Officer. http://bit.ly/ts-cioisdead

Re: The future of Government IT?

Colin Beveridge — Mon, 31 Jan 2011 05:26:38 -0000

I look forward to seeing more details of the strategy. However, my initial reaction to the description in your article, is that there are serious flaws; for example the concept of letting short-term/ instant monthly contracts on a per user/month basis.

This would be fundamentally flawed because of the practical issues of chopping and changing services, with large volumes of data involved, let alone any contingent security concerns there would be substantial and unnecessary risk involved in such flipping.

Likewise, some performance issues need time to resolve and the potential discontinuity of service would open the door to diminished accountability when problems arise, possibly on both sides.