I’d like to start off this week’s blog with a question; how does organisational culture affect IT Teams? All organisations have their own specific culture, but it is something that can be difficult to define. The way that I sometimes think of it is that if the company...
Over the last 10 or 15 years, server and storage technology has changed beyond all recognition, but one thing that has remained reasonably constant within the IT Department is the Service Desk. Granted, it may once have been called a Helpdesk, but the principle is...
When I apply for a job, I always ask the same question; is there a good IT Team in place? The response I get is invariably the same. A few exchanged glances across the interview panel, a pause, and then a measured reply along the lines of; “On the whole, yes, but...
We’re undergoing a lot of change at the moment, and one of the ways that we are addressing this is by holding sessions to develop what we call a “Team Charter”. Essentially, the charter is a description of; What is the purpose of the team How the team contributes to...
It’s holiday season and we’re short staffed on the Service Desk at the moment. In our business, summer is the busiest season, so July and August tend to be our problem months. In order to cope, we’re trialling a system whereby everyone in the IT Department is by doing...
I wrote last week about our printer rationalisation project, which is one of a number of projects designed to reduce costs, but which can be seen as a threat. It is time to take turn threats into opportunities. Costs are very much on the corporate agenda at the...
The best way to achieve efficiencies and save money is to get support from the top It’s important that IT departments have support from the Board for the projects that they undertake. I’ve written before about the governance responsibilities that IT teams have, and...
Are IT just blockers? Ever heard this? “We prefer not to go through the IT Department, they just block everything we try to do.” Sadly, it’s a fairly common refrain in many organisations and often leads to departments buying their own systems without the help of...
Internal communication is key…. We had a senior management team away-day last week and one of the things we considered was how, in these times of budget cuts, we could demonstrate our value to the organisation. Overall, we felt that our communications could be...
