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Governing the IT Beast

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I note the chaser’s take on blogs and how they can peter out (warning: some strong language in the Chaser Comments and some articles – non-FYOSS): “Blog Abandoned After Five Entries”.

At any rate, tonight I am to present at the CPA Australia IT Discussion Group, so you can as usual expect to see the growth in thinking that has occurred on IT Governance since the last time a presentations similar to this one was done. We had to close the books on this one at 50, so it is being re-run in May as I understand it from John Halliday.

Presentation for CPA Australia IT Discussion Group

Micheal is presenting to the CPA Australia IT Discussion Group on 29th March 2006 on the topic “Governing the Information Technology Beast”.

John Halliday is the convenor of this group – thanks John!!!

Topic: “Governing the Information Technology Beast”

Date: 29th March 2006 5:30pm for 6:00pm

About this Topic

This one hour presentation will introduce the topic of Information Technology Governance, and provide specific and practical tools to assist with taming the information technology ‘beast’ within your organisation.

Tools examined include:

  • Leading Approaches in Information Technology Management
  • The role of the Boardroom in Planning, Building, Managing, and Running the Information Technology business function
  • Business IT Planning Process
  • IT Governance Calendar
  • Project Governance Management Tools

The presentation is practical and is focussed on having an impact on the organisation, from an SME to a listed company. The material for this seminar will operate within the framework presented by CPA Australia’s recent ITM CoE publication, “IT Governance: a Practical Guide for Company Directors and Business Executives”.

About your Presenter:

Micheal is the Director of Information Systems Consulting within BDO Kendalls’ Consulting Division. Micheal has extensive expertise in the evaluation and assessment of information system projects and information technology services for large businesses and government agencies in line with business strategies, goals, and objectives.

Micheal has had several articles published on information systems and business in his role as Chairman for the CPA Australia Information Technology & Management Centre of Excellence. Micheal is also co-author of research papers on information systems in association with the University of Queensland and Georgia State University.

Corporate Governance, Boards, and ICT

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As you may have noticed by now, IT Governance is something of a professional passion for me (I also have two dogs but that’s not a professional passion!). 

ZDNet, who feature regularly in these pages, ran an article recently on ‘Do Boards get ICT?‘. 

I left a comment on the board about this topic, which I reproduce here:

“In looking at the issues raised in your commentary, ‘Do boards get ICT?’ I note that you are saying that boards often remain focussed on ‘cutting the costs of IT’ rather than ‘what can IT do to achieve efficiency’.

An interesting effect of ‘cutting the costs of IT’ is often an increase in overall costs to the business – IT can’t undertake Department X’s project (because it cut costs) and Department X does without or finds a hollow log to cobble together an external solution.

The topic really is one of IT governance – corporate governance of the IT business function. You should note that a Director of a listed company has to comply with the corporate governance requirements of the ASE, and although these aren’t specifically IT they do discuss the need to recognise opportunity to create value and riskiness of the situation. There is also AS8015-2005 from Standards Australia which outlines a best practice model here.

Australia’s leading accounting body, CPA Australia (I chair the IT Centre of Excellence), released a very good and practical guide for Company Directors and Business Executives in October 2005 – see http://michealaxelsen.com/blog/?p=46 and https://www.cpaaustralia.com.au/cps/rde/xchg/SID-3F57FEDF-79F61B28/cpa/hs.xsl/1017_16305_ENA_HTML.htm.

The point is, a board does in fact need to understand its business approach to ICT, and put in specific governance mechanisms particularly where the business is very reliant upon ICT. The CPA Australia publication gives a practical approach for any board that wants to fulfill its duties and legal requirements.

I am happy to discuss with anyone on the topic.

Thanks:  Micheal Axelsen”

Just to maintain it for posterity, really…

Data Quality Metrics and IT Governance

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Micheal is presenting a workshop on Data Quality Metrics and IT Governance in Sydney on 13th April 2006 for Ark Group:

Data Quality Metrics and IT Governance

Registration: 9.00am
Workshop starts: 9.30am
Workshop ends: 12.30pm

About the workshop:

This workshop will examine the link between data quality metrics, and the delivery and monitoring of this information to the operational, executive, and board management levels of your firm. These tools and approaches will ensure measurable impact on data quality and improved corporate governance over the information under management by the organisation.

In this workshop, the relationship between the frameworks available for implementing data quality and the metrics for assessing levels of data quality will be explored, together with their application to your industry. Practical tools to report on data quality at various management levels will be examined and their strengths and weaknesses will be tested. The issues to consider in the design of the reporting process necessary to address the corporate governance requirements of the information management function will also be addressed, together with templates and tools for addressing these requirements.

About your workshop leader: Micheal Axelsen

Micheal is the Director of Information Systems Consulting within BDO Kendalls? Consulting Division. Micheal has extensive expertise in the evaluation and assessment of information system projects and information technology services for large businesses and government agencies in line with business strategies, goals, and objectives.

Micheal has had several articles published on information systems and business in his role as Chairman for the CPA Australia Information Technology & Management Centre of Excellence. Micheal is also co-author of research papers on information systems in association with the University of Queensland and Georgia State University.

Take a developing nation, add a $US100 laptop, and stir

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Open source software continues to have an impact that its founders may never have envisaged, although I’m certain they would approve. The United Nations has supported an initiative of a $US100 laptop – being pursued by the One Laptop Per Child non-profit organisation.

It’s a hand-cranked (!) laptop capable of addressing most student’s requirements. It includes a web browser, a word processor, email, and so on, and it’s all based on Linux.

It was launched with a prototype on November 16th at the WSIS Summit in Tunis. I note that Andy Carvin has an 8-minute video covering the launch on his vlog at http://www.andycarvin.com/archives/2005/11/the_100_laptop.html.

Hmm. As always, everything I ever learn I learn from Wikipedia and Rocketboom.

It sounds like something that could indeed make the world a better place. Just imagine if developing companies really could have reliable ICT access and a generation that grows up using information systems and getting somewhere? Although $US100 is still a lot of money in some developing nations, it has to be better than the $US1,000 or so you’d need to pay out for the more standard system.

Given that it’s Linux, they’ve got a lot of learning that they’ll end up doing…

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Business Blogging InTheBlack

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This week’s CPA journal has an article in it – “It’s time to Enter the Blogosphere” – in which your humble correspondent is quoted. The article came about partly because of a discussion our Centre of Excellence had regarding blogs and wikis and such like, and our biggest booster Jan Barned suggested the topic to the editor of InTheBlack. And then the genie is let out of the bottle!

The article is also reproduced at Ed Charles’ own blog. Another “avid blogger” quoted in the article is Trevor Cook of the PR firm Jackson Wells Morris.

Good to see I’m not the only one out there blogging away to an unconfirmed audience. Corporate blogging on the rise. I am particularly interested in exploring the ideas of using the internal blog for more effective project coordination.