Transformations

Knowledge is power, no matter what challenges you face

Winning The Three-Legged Race

At summer picnics, a common event is the three-legged race between pairs of participants. Each participant puts one leg in a sack and they run together. The authors of Winning the Three-Legged Race — When Business and Technology Run Together point out that a business is more successful when it has a similar relationship with information technology. This text adds to our knowledge of business strategy in its discussion of Business Technology Management (BTM). The book gives insight into Portfolio and Program Management (PPM) and Strategic Enterprise Architecture (SEA).

According to a poll of Fortune 1000 companies, PPM is used by only 17% of poll participants. And yet, it is a very effective tool through which a company can manage its business. With PPM, a company’s projects are divided into portfolios. The value and risk of each portfolio are assessed in terms of the firm’s overall goals. One firm used PPM to force a dialogue between IT and other business units. The process starts by, on the one hand, creating a business architecture and, on the other, counting IT servers. The end result is less wastage through a better balance between supply and demand for IT services.

SEA is a process of organizing information so that a firm is more agile and can respond quickly to change. SEA combines business architecture (i.e. business strategies, operating models, and processes) and technology architecture (i.e. applications, data, and infrastructure).

Winning the Three-Legged Race concludes with discussions of risk and measurements of success.

By F Hoque, V Sambamurthy, R Zmud, T Trainer, and C Wilson. Published by Pearson, Prentice Hall. For more information visit www.prenticehall.com.  

Reviewed by Patrick Buckley, CMA, Ph.D. Buckley is a systems analyst based in Ottawa.

Chasing Daylight

What would you do if you discovered you had only a few months to live? In a poignant and provocative memoir, Eugene O’Kelly, a former CEO of KPMG, recounts how he played out the final parts of a life cut short. While an inoperable brain tumor left him little time for considering treatment options, it did give him room for reflection on what mattered to him most. O’Kelly devotes himself to living in the present moment while arranging to say good-bye to those important to him.

Although he chose to leave his job almost immediately after the diagnosis, he found that the skill set of a CEO helped him prepare for this final challenge. “And, not to be overlooked, my final experience taught me lessons that would have made me a better CEO and person,” he writes.

A moving perspective on life and business, O’Kelly’s book offers an unique view of the challenges of work and balance.

By Eugene O’Kelly. Published by McGraw-Hill. For more information visit www.books.mcgraw-hill.com.

A Thousand Barrels a Second

In 2006, world oil consumption will exceed one thousand barrels per second. This will mark an important change that will have far-reaching consequences for world economies, investments, and business profitability.

In A Thousand Barrels a Second: The coming oil break point and the challenges facing an energy dependent world, author Peter Tertzakian provides an analysis of shifts in energy trends, and explains how past critical junctures developed, evolved, and changed the world. Tertzakian answers the top questions that business leaders, policy makers, investors and citizens are asking him as we approach this critical breaking point, such as:

• Are today’s high oil and gas prices part of a routine business cycle or is there a more profound shift occuring? And
• Have we entered a new multi-polar world where energy is the primary source of geopolitical tension?

Sobering yet hopeful, Tertzakian shows how we can work towards a better, more secure energy future.

By Peter Tertzakian. Published by McGraw-Hill. For more information visit www.books.mcgraw-hill.com.

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