In The Eye Of The Storm ...

Good post i like your post so much because it'...

2012-02-17T14:19:18.794Z

Good post i like your post so much because it's talk about pyramids i like all pyramids constructions especially Ancient egyptian Pyramids it has great construction and Khufu pyramid is one of 7 wonderful things in life and more about Ancient Egyptian pyramids like
Ancient Egyptian Pyramids and Ancient Egypt pyramids Giza and Ancient Egyptian Pyramids Facts and Ancient Egyptian Pyramids for Kids and Ancient Egyptian Pyramids History and Ancient Egyptian Pyramids Information and Ancient Egyptian Pyramids Names and Ancient Egyptian Pyramids Pharaohs and Ancient Egyptian Pyramids Pictures and Images

This is a perfect application for runners; a perfe...

2012-02-14T05:01:19.860Z

This is a perfect application for runners; a perfect device especially for those who are training.

Anon ... glad you found a place to leave your thou...

2012-02-13T09:44:20.191Z

Anon ... glad you found a place to leave your thoughts. Charles was truly a special person.

Its taken me a long time to find somewhere to leav...

2012-02-12T18:04:00.107Z

Its taken me a long time to find somewhere to leave a goodbye to Charles. Without intruding on family memorials, I left my own tribute in a favourite meeting place in London, but I've never really been able to share my memories and in some ways I don't want to. But seeing other people who I had some awareness of writing here, it feels like the right time.
I looked up to and admired him so much, and learnt so much from him. About many things, and always with such wit, kindness and so much humour. Now I'm based in London, I think of him everywhere I go and its so sad that such a wonderful mind and inspiring person isn't about any more. He opened my eyes and my mind in so many ways, and helped me to fulfil my potential. I always be grateful and miss him a great deal. My wonderful more than friend. A xx

Sure iCould is a good thing, I use it for some tim...

2012-02-09T16:58:54.209Z

Sure iCould is a good thing, I use it for some time now. The only problem I have, every company is wanting to copy each other, without adding any additional features, especially the smaller companies. They get annihilated quickly, so only the big boys stay in the game.

Interesting post. Actually outsourcing began in th...

2012-02-05T06:45:35.452Z

Interesting post. Actually outsourcing began in the 1980s for the NHS. And there is a case for arguing that some of the failure of NPfIT is due to the decline of in-house capability and service provision which began with the out-sourcing of regional IT units.

Outsource or in-house? Hard to call. I wonder ho...

2012-01-29T17:22:55.715Z

Outsource or in-house? Hard to call. I wonder how much is to do with control (as you say re Brent), how much empire building and how much to do with supplier performance and cost. Probably a mix of all. You touch on some worrying points (hint rather) which may be an issue.

What I suspect we will see is a cycle as both models if done badly will make the other look desirable. When moving from in-house to outsource one forgets (or has not experienced) the problems of outsource. Probably the reverse is true. Organisations to not move to an new model, they move away from the old, which is why neither seems to work.

The in-house team will no doubt appear to be good. As you touch on though, will the same quality and demands be made of the in-house team as is made of a supplier. Probably not. Will their documentation be any good, if productivity falls will there be a route to force improvement at the expense of the supplier? No. Holding the reigns of in-house development is hard. It is a totally different game to outsource. In-house development is not the cheap version of outsourced development. If it considered to be that then you one is going to hit real issues.

The second issue with in-house is it is hard (and expensive) to keep in-house development teams up to speed on technology that completely changes every 3 years. Training overheads can be large (and rarely considered when comparisons to outsourcing is undertaken).

Finally, the in-house development team is in danger of bespoking not just the design of things like web sites but also the product sets that could be used. Is it cheaper to enhance an open source product to do a wider range of things or to buy a product. The drift from simple web site design into actual product development is a slow drift, but in many ways inevitable. As you rightly point out, the move from a bespoke to a product based CMS was a shame but done for good reason. But again, the suppliers let the side down and costs exploded.

Perhaps the secret is to pick suppliers who make products that can be used by smaller in-house teams to use. Make sure the in-house team is contractpr based so the agility can be dealt with.

But I suspect the grass is never greener.

Nice to hear from you Michael, thank you for the k...

2012-01-29T15:01:06.265Z

Nice to hear from you Michael, thank you for the kind words. I had a lot of fun at the conference you mention. and Gerry is still doing what Gerry did - funny to think, really, that practically 10 years on, those lessons are still to be learned. Good luck in whatever you are up to now.

Considering RIMM has a vast network of carriers al...

2012-01-27T03:50:07.219Z

Considering RIMM has a vast network of carriers all over the world and does not lack in the front end communication part of the phones, an approach from Amazon to RIMM makes sense.

I reported to Charles in South Africa as his Sales...

2012-01-20T17:13:24.013Z

I reported to Charles in South Africa as his Sales Director for EDS. We were about to change things in this geography and then the incident happened. For the short time I knew him I found him to be a risk taker and a man of his word. He is sorely missed.
Shaun

Thanks for the info - had never heard of ascent bu...

2012-01-20T11:06:18.553Z

Thanks for the info - had never heard of ascent but going to try rubitrack first. Have years of polar,suunto and garmin data and would like to keep them somewhere

Alan, I appreciate this detailed and interesting ...

2012-01-19T13:57:39.913Z

Alan,

I appreciate this detailed and interesting response to my question, thank you very much. The changes that gCloud presents really do seem very important.

I think the only other comment I would make now is that while short (one year approx) contracts may be a good and sensible aim for many services, there will be some where they will not be possible, as in your example.

btw I work in the web area of customer services in local government, and have followed your blog since e-envoy days and that excellent conference you organised at British Musuem. Will always be grateful for your introducing me to the work of Gerry McGovern.

I have this application on my PC and I love the wa...

2012-01-17T06:27:47.603Z

I have this application on my PC and I love the way it works. GPS is really fantastic.

Alan, I read your summary of Chris Chant's ter...

2012-01-09T12:26:57.875Z

Alan, I read your summary of Chris Chant's terrific tlak last year.

Do you have any comments on viability of contracts for less than one year? In particular, am I righ to think that part of the intention is to avoid the burdens of full EU tendering by keeping contract terms shorter, so reducing cost so contracts do not fall into scope of full tendering rules (before you even get to cost competition through the increased transparency of G-cloud etc)?

Well i think these days management auf zeit is the temporary provision of management resources and skills. Interim management can be seen as the short-term assignment of a proven heavyweight interim executive manager to manage a period of transition, crisis or change within an organization. In this situation, a permanent role may be unnecessary or impossible to find on short notice. Additionally, there may be nobody internally who is suitable for, or available to take up, the position in question

woooww nice post.... i want to share this post on ...

2011-10-07T16:48:35.795+01:00

woooww nice post.... i want to share this post on facebook

Barossa has really an interesting wine history.

2011-07-12T01:05:53.034+01:00

Barossa has really an interesting wine history.

Alan - This is David Zakim. I am the founder of ZM...

2011-04-01T21:04:02.047+01:00

Alan - This is David Zakim. I am the founder of ZMedix; we met when you visited SF. The program to which you refer is still alive although ZMedix is not. We have a demonstration project at Robert Bosch krankenhaus, Stuttgart, De. The program with the eponym CLEOS for Clinical Expert Operating System is owned by a charity, which I also founded for the purpose of protecting the integriry of the program. I can be contacted at dzakim@pacbell.net.

Alan - This is David Zakim. I am the founder of ZM...

2011-04-01T21:03:42.040+01:00

Alan - This is David Zakim. I am the founder of ZM...

2011-04-01T21:03:22.034+01:00

It works like a charm. Thank you soooooo much!!!

2011-03-22T14:14:32.027Z

It works like a charm. Thank you soooooo much!!!

cash flow definitely means offer shorter periods r...

2011-02-02T10:38:11.054Z

cash flow definitely means offer shorter periods rather than longer periods hence my suggestion to let the insurance companies profile as needed.

i'm wondering if there's a similar model for tv licences, council tax and so on. perhaps we should get the electricity or gas companies to collect those - it could even be tied to actual usage if we got smart meters, or council tax could be reduced the greener you were.

Why do they tax cars every year? Why not tax the ...

2011-01-31T17:00:38.954Z

Why do they tax cars every year? Why not tax the car at time of purchase for say 10 years and then again after that (for say 5 years). Or, just do tax every 3 years rather than yearly. I suspect it is to do with affordability. If you put 3 years worth of tax on at once you have to come up with a big wadge of cash.

But I agree, get the insurance companies to do it. They have almost 100% of car records (if everyone is insured) on their systems. They only need a flag to say vehicle is taxed. Then collect the cash with the insurance. Also, if the only way to buy tax is with insurance then you know if you don't have one, you don't have the other. Law enforcement becomes easier. Gov then only has to do policy (how much).
Even more radical. Do away with tax altogether and just make the insurance companies pay the entire car tax amounts gov collects and let them decide how they want to get the cash out of people (direct, in terms of car tax). No more car tax, just an insurance industry with a big bill to pay gov. Gov only has at most a few hundred customers and they can run that on a spreadsheet 8-)

well, that's a great way to put it and continu...

2011-01-19T00:51:30.000Z

well, that's a great way to put it and continue their journey... nice insights, works well in clientele explanation and information resource option.
ashes at sea

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2011-01-10T00:02:13.000Z

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In between are the suppliers. The big ones make enough money from the Reality B people to ensure that they work to keep things as they are. So they hobnob with the Reality A people, tell them what a grand job they are doing, help write the papers, declare they are right behind the Reality A strategies and continue to work with Reality B people.

The SMEs get screwed. The SMEs want to deliver the strategies. They get behind all of the strategies , transformational government, the strategy to get all services online by 200X, the customer centric government, Champion and exemplar status, shared services?

Now we have GCloud, the Gov CIO CT strategy and no doubt more to come. Strategies get written and strategies get signed up to and ignored. It works for the people in Reality A, it works for the people in Reality B.

It wastes billions most of which has gone to the big 5 IT suppliers. Money that should be spent on cancer treatment, heating for pensioners and so on (in fact name any good cause and it will come in above spending more money with the big 5).

The frustrating thing is that everyone talks about the strategy, what the strategy is, is it the right one, who does what apps, should they be hosted by gov or by private sector etc. All good conversations to be had but all irrelevant until someone recognizes the 2 realities and works out how to change it.

GCloud wont work because the departments (Reality B) will not relinquish control to create demand and those in Reality A have no way to do this. But some suppliers will invest (and lose money) and some minor depts will sign up because they want to be seen to do the right thing.

The strategy in Gcloud is right. It is right for government, it is right for the taxpayer, right for the SMEs. But it is the wrong problem and it’s taking all the focus. A new shiny thing for the world to be distracted by as OBEs are earned, the world laps the sun a few more times and nobody deals with the real issue.