Tag: Jonathan Ginter

Fresh Links Sundae – February 3, 2013 Edition

Fresh Links Sundae encapsulates information I have come across during the past week. They maybe ITSM related or not entirely. Often they are from the people whose work resonates with me, and I hope you will find them at least thought-provoking or something of value.

In a four-part series, Bob Lewis talks about managing up and suggests effective tactics to consider. The art of reverse delegation; Managing up, part 2: Getting your manager past consensus; Managing up, part 3: Dealing with an authoritarian boss; Managing up, part 4: A great way to build consensus (IS Survivor Publishing)

Not matter what services your organization provides, Stephen Mann advocates it’s never been more important to build strong customer relationships and gives suggestions on where to focus your effort. Is Your IT Service Desk Customer Experience Up To Scratch? (Forrester Blogs)

With the right data and proper analysis, Jonathan Ginter believes you can actually fix many application delivery problems by deploying six suggested tactics. Monitoring 101 – 6 Steps that Can Fix Poor Application Delivery; Monitoring 101: The 2 Pillars of Performance (BMC Communities: Blog: DevOps)

With the increasing use of external infrastructure in cloud form, Robert Stroud explains why it is crucial to integrate the “cloud CI” into the CMDB and do it in an automated fashion in order to be effective. Is the “ITIL” CMDB Still Relevant in Cloud Era? (CA Technologies)

Sometimes the phrase of “Best Practice” can sound like blue sky thinking or even theoretical. Rob England discusses what the word “Practice” means to him, and how the word conveys powerful uses and meanings in the ITSM context. In Praise of Practice (The IT Skeptic)

In many organizations today, IT costs are often buried in the corporate expense line and simply appear as administrative expenses. Perry Rotella outlines the key changes IT leaders can implement to effectively identify costs and gain recognition for IT as a critical driver of business development. Check, Please: Paying for IT (Forbes)

With the changing nature of work and the opportunities created by these changes, Andrew Horne talks about how IT leaders should rethink how they support collaboration, information management and mobility. Three Ways IT Can Drive Employee Productivity (CEB IT Blog)

Reflecting from her recent air travel experience, Melanie Karunaratne talks about the importance of customer experience in IT being the sum of the total engagement that a customer has with an organization. Delivering a Service versus Servicing your Customer (LANDesk Blog)

Advocating that living with meaning is the exploration of the fullness of human possibility, Umair Haque poses thought-provoking questions for all of us to explore within. How to Have a Year that Matters (Harvard Business Review)

In pursuit of reliable, predictable operations, Seth Godin believes the airports have largely ignored the human elements of air travel and outlines the lessons that organizations can learn from when interacting with their own customers. Eleven things organizations can learn from airports (Seth’s Blog)

Fresh Links Sundae – November 4, 2012 Edition

Citing the recent news and the survey results from the ITSM tools space, Stephan Mann advocates that ITSM Tools vendors should focus more helping their customers on solving business problems and improving customer experience while using the tools. More ITSM Tool Bells And Whistles, And Where The Real Focus Of Vendor Attention Should Be (Forrester Blogs)

The notion of management support has been preached by many as the pre-requisite to ITSM initiative success. Kirstie Magowan describes what management support for an ITSM effort should look like and the ways to obtain such commitment from senior management. Are your managers just going along for the ride? (Common Sense and Service Management)

While many knowledge management (KM) efforts focus on the reusability of knowledge captured, Adam Krob points out another metric that a support organization can use to improve its KM practice and effort. The Teeter-Totter of Knowledge Management: A Close-Up View of the New-vs.-Known Lever (HDIConnect)

While there are many who advocate the new and improved monitoring approaches, Jonathan Ginter explains why infrastructure monitoring is still a very much relevant component in your end-to-end monitoring solution. Monitoring 101 Myth – Infrastructure Monitoring is Old Hat (BMC Communities Blog)

Reflecting from her recent technology upgrade experience, Susan Cramm describes the roadblocks she ran into when upgrading her smart phone technology and how the lessons learned can be applied to other technology upgrade endeavors as well. 72 Hours of Technology Hell (Valuedance)

In IT we are often taught to prioritize process design over tool implementation, instead of the other way around. Gregory Tucker explains why the improvement of service and process often goes hand-in-hand with the implementation of the tools through automation. Process Before Tool (right)? (ITSMinfo)

Reflecting upon a recent office move project, Alicia Choo describes how IT and Facilities teams leveraged technologies and collaborated effectively in making the office move more seamless and less chaotic. The collaborative potential of WhatsApps and GoogleDocs (Choofca’s Brain Dump)

Relating to his personal experience, Marshall Goldsmith explains why the quality of information flow within an organization often is a good indicator of the quality of the organization. Failure to Communicate (Marshall Goldsmith Personal Blog)

Thinking back to his high school days, Bret Simmons talks about how one teacher’s action affected how he views personal responsibility and professional conducts. Mr. Owen’s Lesson: The Irresponsibility Tax (Positive Organizational Behavior)

Seth Godin discusses his thoughts on how consumers have become more willing to work with technology changes. The similar mindset shift could have similar impact on how we support our IT constituents. The bell curve is moving (mass geekery) (Seth’s Blog)

Fresh Links Sundae – October 28, 2012 Edition

Fresh Links Sundae encapsulates information I have come across during the past week. They maybe ITSM related or not entirely. Often they are from the people whose work resonates with me, and I hope you will find something of value.

I take an avid interest in computer gaming and actively play a few myself. It was cool for me to read Keith Ferrazzi’s article on ways where virtual teams can successfully collaborate using a gaming analogy. How Successful Virtual Teams Collaborate (Harvard Business Review)

Although the nature of innovation and changes can seem conflicting to IT’s fundamental goal of keeping things running with great stability, Robert Stroud talks about why IT Operations must balance the need to facilitate innovation while still keeping the existing business solutions working and operational. IT Operations must accept risk and innovate (CA Service Management)

JavaScript Injection is an approach that can be used to monitor application performance from the end-user experience perspective. Jonathan Ginter explains why such method is not without risks and the implications for deploying such method in your application environment. Monitoring 101 Myth – JavaScript Injection is Safe (BMC Communities: DevOps)

Merger and acquisition activities can put up some very formidable challenges for IT to integrate various business operations. Sasha Gilenson describes what those challenges are and what can organizations do to integrate more effectively. Mergers & Acquisitions Road is Bumpy for IT Operations (Evolven Blog)

Advocating for solid documentation that support the process effectively and with minimum waste, Simon Morris talks about how to factor in user personas when writing productive and useful process documentation. ITSM User Personas (The ITSM Review)

Using the term “cul de sacs” as a reference from Seth Godin, Laura Brandenburg outlines the harder things to work on that will propel you much more towards your BA goal. Why You’re Not Achieving Your BA Career Goal (Bridging the Gap)

Citing information compulsion as a source of annoying habits and interpersonal flaws, Marshall Goldsmith explains why inappropriate sharing of information and emotions from leaders can be counter-productive and outlines four ways to change and to create a win-win exchange. Change for the Better (Marshall Goldsmith Personal Blog)

Many organizations (IT or others) set up customer service function to accomplish objectives. Seth Godin sums up what customer service is all about and what good customer service should subsequently lead to. The only purpose of ‘customer service’… (Seth’s Blog)

Fresh Links Sundae – October 21, 2012 Edition

Fresh Links Sundaeencapsulates information I have come across during the past week. They maybe ITSM related or not entirely. Often they are from the people whose work resonates with me, and I hope you will find something of value.

Personally, delivering high-quality, business-centric IT services is something I am passionate about, and I am glad my training in ITSM has enabled me to do more for my organization and profession. Drawing from her personal experience, Kirstie Magowan describes the various roles within IT service management field and what skills and training one might need in order to succeed in the ITSM career. Your ITSM Career Path (The ITSM Review)

Many IT organizations have difficulty mapping IT spending directly to the business values created. Robert Stroud describes what IT needs to do in order to provide the transparency and the data points necessary for an organization to make the informed decisions about IT investment. Financial Management for Effective Sourcing (CA Technologies)

Because ITSM tools can be a major investment for many organizations, Stephen Mann suggests tips on how to make the ITSM tool selection process more meaningful and productive. 50 Shards Of ITIL – The Bane And Pain Of ITSM Tool Selection (Forrester Blogs)

Maintaining sufficient, relevant information on our complex and intertwined systems is a critical task for any proactive IT organization. Rob England outlines the steps on how to capture and maintain such information in a CMDB. How to improve your service configuration data and what that means for CMDB (The IT Skeptic)

With today’s highly complex and interactive applications, Jonathan Ginter describes what fundamental monitoring capabilities should be in place and why such capabilities should be baked in as part of the application during development. Monitoring 101 – Are You Running a Modern Application? (BMC Communities: DevOps)

Here is a collection of several informative videos on the topic of DevOps from Damon Edwards. Defining and Improving DevOps Culture (Videos) (dev2ops)

As an opportunity to provide better IT service and to achieve cost savings, Jon Reeve suggests the tracking of the metric First Time Fix and what the metric does. Increasing First Time Fix – A Service Improvement Priority (ITSM Portal)

While one-time leadership training can be beneficial, Marshall Goldsmith advocates that the follow-up, support, and encouragement from the organization after the training will likely yield more meaningful changes coming from the organization’s leaders. Fallacy of ‘If They Understand, They Will Do’ (Marshall Goldsmith Personal Blog)

Writing business blog with a level of consistency can be an effective marketing tool. Patsi Krakoff outlines tips on how to write quality blog posts. 5 Steps to Write a Quality Business Blog Post (Writing On The Web)

While we can all debate about the proper use of social media for drawing conclusion about someone, Mark Horstman talks about the importance of managing one’s image presented via the social media. They’re Coming For The Kids Now (Manager Tools)