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| Daily Coping Tip Make some tasty food for someone who will appreciate it I also have a thread at SQLServerCentral dealing with coping mechanisms and resources. Feel free to participate. For many of you out there working in a new way, I'm including a thought of the day on how to cope in this challenging time from The Action for Happiness Coping Calendar. My items will be on my blog, feel free to share yours. |
| What's Important to Your Organization I've had the chance to work in a number of organizations in my career. Every one of these places needed to run a network and software applications to support the business. Most of them also built some a portion of the software they used. No matter how much software they built, but there was always a need to manage a software lifecycle with new applications, patches, and the retirement of systems over time. While every organization recognized the value of software, some saw this as an expense, like salaries or buildings. The funds needed were the "cost of doing business." In these organizations there was always a focus on controlling or reducing costs, doing what needed to be done, and being efficient with how computing was integrated into the business. These organizations seemed to be stodgy and traditional, with management focused more on the analog world than the digital one. Some were quite successful, which I often think is a combination of good management, good staff, and luck. These days, I think that view that software is an expense is less and less successful in many organizations. Over time, this will see a deterioration in the success for those businesses. It might be a slow decline over decades, or a more rapid one in a few years. I truly believe in software eating the world, and every company needs to be a technology company. They don't all need to build software, but they do need to manage it, and more importantly, take advantage of software to better run their businesses. We see this in all kinds of industries. Perhaps it's highly visible in the automotive industry, but in plenty of others, from finance to insurance to retail to manufacturing, the use of software as a strategic asset improves the competitiveness of business. Even in government, organizations are finding that making better use of software allows them to offer more services at a lower cost. I wonder how many of you see your employers treating software as a strategic part of their business model. Do they aim to increase profits or become more efficient or even innovate in their industry with the power of modern computing? Or is it just a tool that they depend on, and consider the cost of doing business? If your group isn't seen as strategic, likely they don't value your work as highly, don't provide training, and don't create opportunity or innovation that ensures your work is interesting. If those are things that matter to you, perhaps it is time to look around for other employment. Steve Jones - SSC Editor Join the debate, and respond to today's editorial on the forums |
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