http://techcafeteria.com/blog/2009/04/21/the-roi-on-flexibility/ Wed, 03 Aug 2011 16:23:03 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 http://techcafeteria.com/blog/2009/04/21/the-roi-on-flexibility/comment-page-1/#comment-7356 Judith Mon, 29 Jun 2009 23:50:14 +0000 http://techcafeteria.com/blog/?p=224#comment-7356 Great post, Peter. You are right on. Our PC's software and internet access was almost completely locked down until we allowed certain sites like Facebook or blogs to be accessible to employees just a few months ago. While there was a valid concern about bandwidth, we basically locked down almost all sites for our employees... but not for our group, IT (I know how Beth feels!) This lack of innovative thinking and opportunities that you mention was painfully obvious to us when we hired our first CIO, who basically could not get at anything. He would be in my office every 10 minutes asking me if I could get to an article, and of course I could, but none of the "staff" could. He lived with that policy as long as he could without strangling us, but that wasn't long! A few months later, we also hired a web project manager and had to remove all his group policy restrictions on day two because he would not have been able to do most of his job otherwise! Yet we impose those restrictions on almost everyone else. We've since opened up the gates a bit more, but the problem still exists. I think that until our own management and corporate staff understand how to use the web more effectively, they won't know what everyone is missing. We need to address that by having short training session about basic web2.0 awareness that includes information on HOW to make effective use of the web, using RSS readers, etc. not just "have access" to the web. As an IT department, I feel that's been missing from our services for a while, and it's entirely too clear now that we are trying to implement more advanced concepts of social media, without a good general grasp of communication and collaboration tools. If we don't provide staff with the knowledge they need to make more effective use of the internet, we will not be able to deliver our services as well, or to as many people, as we need to. Great post, Peter. You are right on. Our PC’s software and internet access was almost completely locked down until we allowed certain sites like Facebook or blogs to be accessible to employees just a few months ago. While there was a valid concern about bandwidth, we basically locked down almost all sites for our employees… but not for our group, IT (I know how Beth feels!) This lack of innovative thinking and opportunities that you mention was painfully obvious to us when we hired our first CIO, who basically could not get at anything. He would be in my office every 10 minutes asking me if I could get to an article, and of course I could, but none of the “staff” could. He lived with that policy as long as he could without strangling us, but that wasn’t long! A few months later, we also hired a web project manager and had to remove all his group policy restrictions on day two because he would not have been able to do most of his job otherwise! Yet we impose those restrictions on almost everyone else. We’ve since opened up the gates a bit more, but the problem still exists. I think that until our own management and corporate staff understand how to use the web more effectively, they won’t know what everyone is missing. We need to address that by having short training session about basic web2.0 awareness that includes information on HOW to make effective use of the web, using RSS readers, etc. not just “have access” to the web. As an IT department, I feel that’s been missing from our services for a while, and it’s entirely too clear now that we are trying to implement more advanced concepts of social media, without a good general grasp of communication and collaboration tools. If we don’t provide staff with the knowledge they need to make more effective use of the internet, we will not be able to deliver our services as well, or to as many people, as we need to.

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