The Zander Report

From 5/5/10 eWEEK.com...
According to a Gartner study, 42% of CIO's currently report to the CFO - and do not have the direct ears of the CEO.  Is this a "CFO power grab" or is it because CIO's have failed to earn the seat at the top by not clarifying the value of IT or it's return on investment?
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From 11/6/09 CIO Insight...
How to use a Balanced Scorecard approach to measure your IT organization's contribution towards corporate goals.  This article discusses value from the a) financial perspective, b) customer perspective, c) critical process perspective, and d) capability perspective.
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From 10/21 InformationWeek...
Gartner released this latest report this past Monday.   Modest growth is expected in 2010 increasing through 2012.  Areas expected to receive most client interest include:  business intelligence, cloud computing, virtualization and social media.
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From TechServe Alliance (formerly NACCB)...
It's been 10+ years since the 1999 Microsoft v. Vizcaino co-employment case and many companies still needlessly maintain consultant tenure restrictions and rotation policies which are highly inefficient and expensive.  Two prominent expert attorneys in federal & state labor laws describe the procedures necessary to minimize re-classification and co-employment risk in the TechServe Alliance white paper, "Microsoft - Understanding the Implications."  This will allow companies to retain critical consulting resources and avoid the high costs and project risks of forced labor turnover.
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Project One plays a leadership role in TechServe Alliance as Chapter President and National Board Member.  We actively participate in legislative conferences and congressional activities in Washington DC helping to shape public policy affecting the IT services industry.
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From Amazon.com...
Today's challenges call for new levels of IT savvy:  the ability of all managers-IT or non-IT-to transform their company's technology assets into operational efficiencies that boost margins. Companies with IT-savvy managers are 20 percent more profitable than their competitors. This book describes how to:
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-Define your firm's operating model-how IT can help you do business
-Revamp your IT funding model to support your operating model
-Build a digitized platform of business processes, IT systems, and data to execute on the model
-Determine IT decision rights
-Extract more business value from your IT assets
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From 8/31/09 InformationWeek...
Outcome-based partnerships are when vendors share in the risks and rewards of major IT implementations and upgrades.  But to effectively track, manage and make it work, a company must be completely metrics-oriented, and most clients simply aren't ready.  Vendors too are challenged with this approach, but are scrambling to comply with this growing client requirement.

Project One works closely with Vendor Management and IT Finance departments to share industry data on vendor scorecards & metrics, rate card strategies, chargeback methods, contract terms & policies, outsourcing trends & issues, balanced scorcards, etc.
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From 5/8/09 CIO Insight...
Many executives view IT budgets as erratic.  Here's what CIOs can do to present a strong plan for financial control, ie: re-thinking the way they pitch numbers.
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From 5/4/09 Computerworld...
Maybe some IT jobs will be saved if enough executives read a March 8 research note from AMR Research Inc.'s Phil Fersht and then are able to convince the top brass of the sense of Fersht's argument.  Which is this:  The cost of laying off an IT employee may exceed the benefit to be derived!

From 3/09 BusinessWeek...
The economic downturn and capital crunch is favoring vendors whose customers make purchases as an operating expense over those whose customers use capital expenditures to pay for technology. This trend gives an advantage to services-oriented companies versus hardware and software vendors.
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From 3/9/09 Computerworld...
The recession provides a unique opportunity to challenge the status quo.

Virtually every IT organization is feeling the impact of the recession. Many have been forced to cut services, and some have cut staff as well. Most new projects have been eliminated, even those with compelling business cases. Organizations have cut all the fat (to the bone, in some cases) to meet budget constraints.