Category: Business Page 17 of 18

Folding Update

On December 16, 2006

Just a quick update regarding my folding progress! If you have been watching my folding statistics on the left of this site you will have noticed that I have achieved my goal of breaking into the top 100 folders for Overclockers Australia. Seeing as OCAU are currently running 2nd in the world for folding that is quite a solid effort. It was helped by the fact that I won FBOX57, the 57th box given away as a prize for loyal folders (you can see the announcement here). The box is a late model p4 that seems to ripping up the FU’s at the moment.

So what else is new? Well I am working full time now, and we celebrated another year with another great xmas party at the Quay Grand down at Circular Quay. After lunch we moved up to the bar there, I found a picture of the view:

It is pretty crazy to think that I am one of the longest serving employees at Naiman Clarke, it has been almost 3 years now! Speaking of which we have just launched a new website, please take a look and tell me what you think. Over the holidays I will be performing some more work on the server and back-end software, hopefully the front-end will stay pretty stable for some time to come. It is a really exciting time for me as the work I have been doing for the last 12 months is finally coming to fruitition. It will be really great to see it all in action. I believe that in 6 months time (once the bugs are all gone and all features are operational) we will have the most advanced recruitment system ever created. Well I might be arrogant, but what is the point in aiming for 2nd best? 🙂

What is an IT Company?

By Scott Savage

On October 10, 2006

In Business

I had a few random thoughts today regarding what constitutes and IT company. This is actually quite related to one of my previous entries surrounding what makes a company cool.

Let’s start with a big one, is Google an IT company? Sounds like a stupid question. Well where does their revenue come from? Well most of it comes
from advertising (no surprises there). They only bought YouTube to get a big foot into the video advertising door. Their innovation is only driven by their need to open up more avenues of advertising. Therefore are they an IT company or are they an advertising company that leverages IT effectively?

What about Apple? Historically of course it was an IT company and it is credited with a large number of technical developments. Its move to Intel processors said something big however, it said “we are great because we make tech a great fit for people, not because we make great tech”. Drop the relentless push towards new tech, let Intel do that for you.

Apple is now filled with industrial designers, marketers and advertisers. Sure they still have plenty of tech people and come up with great ideas, but that is just expected with any Apple product. They don’t need to push features,
they push ease of use and beauty (something a mass market always appreciates). Look at the page for their Macbook Pro,
there is only a column of tech specs. Plenty of pictures, copy and quality page
design. They are a design and an ideas company, they are not an IT company.

All these companies have something in common that Microsoft could learn from by following a few conclusions:

IT companies have a ‘nerd’ stigma that makes breaking into new mass markets difficult
All the above companies use technology in a way that the user takes for granted. The user is barely even told of the technology or features, they are discovered in a natural way. The Google understands what you want, it doesn’t ask a multitude of questions.
It is all about integration within itself and within the world around us. Mac computers are beautiful objects against any natural surface, Google ads compliment the information provided on webpages, maps etc.

But surely the task for Microsoft must be harder? To an extent yes it is, they are far more embedded in the tech sector.

I think Vista is a step forward, design and clarity are two things Windows needed. It is a beautiful operating system to use, but I would argue it still isn’t clean enough. Rather than have annoying shields everywhere why not allow quick switch to an admin user? This would clear up the UI for the 80% of users who have no idea what is in the control panel. It could be cleaner, it could be smarter. Not smart as in fancy file systems and network stacks, fancy as in intuitive and fun to use. I definitely think MS is on the right track, just don’t lose focus…
🙂

The Rise of CRM

By Scott Savage

On September 12, 2006

In Business, CRM, software

Long’s post about talking to customers sparked my interest due to my current thesis work surrounding CRM packages. It raises a very interesting question, and that is do these companies genuinely not care or are they not capable of caring?

A company can only ‘appear’ to be capable of caring if it has invested in systems that ensure each customer interaction is responded to in the best possible way (for both the customer and the company). This requires a lot of business strategy planning and scripting, often using inputs such as customer surveys, psychologists, marketing managers and front line staff. Getting to know your customer clearly takes a lot of time and effort.

All this planning work is in vain however without a successful implementation. Big companies for many years have invested heavily (millions of $) in packages from SAP and Oracle.

It is only now that small and medium enterprises (SME’s) are investing in this area. This shift has mainly occurred due to 2 things, an increase in customer service quality expectations and a decrease in the implementation cost of CRM software.

To give you an idea of what CRM software is capable of I would suggest watching this demo video. It is tucked away on the Microsoft Dynamics website, but it gives an excellent overview of how a CRM system works.

Microsoft and a number of other providers are making a large scale push into the smaller end of the market. By smaller I definitely mean employee numbers, not value. In Australia the SME market actually represents 92% of businesses and 80% of total business value. As far as developing areas of IT go this is a huge one, and it brings with it a whole load of business analyst, software customisation/integration and many other job opportunities
with it.

The exciting part for me however is not that I will have a career path, but that IT is being recognised as a business driver and competitive advantage rather than a necessarily evil to support a business. The TLA‘s of CRM, SFA, ERP and logistics areas are leading the way in this area. One day will the CIO always
have a seat at the board table? Will IT staff be recognised and valued as revenue generators and as holders of crucial business knowledge? Sooner or later, time will tell.