IT Infrastructure - News

hey still may be slow to respond to candidates who answer their job ads. Out of every 20 clients with job orders for a recruiter to fill, typically only four or five of them are serious about actually hiring someone between now and the end of the year.

Even companies that are serious about the hiring process may find it next to impossible to get the ball rolling on the interview process. With the stress, [holiday] parties, and people not wanting to lose vacation time, it’s difficult to get everyone mentally lined up for the interview process. Nevertheless, security job seekers can still take advantage of the hiring lull by using the time to regroup. Here are some tips on how to do that, between bites of pumpkin pie.

What you can do to stay active during this period is:

• Re-think you job search process
• Research the markets and companies that you are focusing on
• Network with decision makers and their key advisors
• Refresh your resume
• Be patient - not pushy

• Failing to have a life plan. "This is the No. 1 biggest mistake that I run into with my clients. I work with a number of clients in IT, many of whom are in C-level roles. A life plan is a business plan, in the same way that a company leader creates an annual business plan for what the future is going to bring from a corporate perspective. Three life aspects to focus on include one's career, personal and family, and financial goals. If someone has a good title and a satisfactory personal and family life but they're struggling to make monthly payments, then they're not going to be satisfied. They should look at those aspects for themselves. They should look at the competitive environment, the job marketplace and whether their skill set is current. If someone can replace them because they're cheaper, faster or better, it's no different than looking at your IT requirements. Most importantly, this plan should be written down. Only 14% of people do that. 86% are putting their futures in the hands of others. It's not a good place to be in."
• Not keeping your skills current. "The business landscape is ever-changing and there is more demand for jobs than supply. Not staying on par with colleagues and those vying for your job will be a death knell. With individuals able to do the same work that someone is doing anywhere in the world today and the prospect that organizations will chase skill sets around the world, if you're not up to date with your skill sets in IT, you're significantly at risk of being replaced. This includes the need to stay up to date in technical skills, business skills and soft skills."
• Failing to deliver results. "Winners in business know that it's all about accountability. Those who harbor a sense of entitlement for simply having put forth effort, irrespective of the results of those efforts, are guaranteed to fall by the wayside. It's very easy in a corporation to believe that becoming more efficient will translate into becoming more effective. So becoming preoccupied with creating greater efficiency may be a short-term solution to helping the bottom line, but it doesn't help the organization to grow. I rarely see people get the big bonuses in the organization simply because they understand the policies and procedures of the company. It has to do with delivering the goods. You have to know your customers, know what your marketplace wants. Great leadership is all about asking questions."
• Confusing efficiency with effectiveness. "Those who think that communicating via e-mail replaces the need to actually talk with people around them fail to recognize the importance of personally connecting with others in today's highly automated and technological environment. Communicating in person whenever possible is imperative for success-seekers."
• Believing that you are irreplaceable. "There is no room for divas in the workplace. As soon as you convince yourself that you and only you can do the job 'right,' your star will surely start to fall. In any organization, any person can have a good couple of ideas, a good couple of years and a few successes under their belts and they start to think that the company can't do without them. They start to sit on their laurels and find themselves in greater jeopardy of losing their jobs. Comparing notes with others in the organization helps keep people grounded. It helps anyone in the organization to have different trusted advisers' perspective on what's going on and how their performance is being viewed."
• Knowing all the answers. "This old adage remains true: Knowledge is power. Professing to know it all can readily stagnate a career. Winners remain unceasingly interested in learning new ideas and approaches. Asking a lot of questions is a hallmark of great leaders and great managers. When one stops asking questions and starts believing they've seen it all, they are devaluing the amount of change going on in the world today."
• Surrounding yourself with "brown-nosers." "Losers like having people tell them how smart they are, whether or not it's true, while successful managers and other professionals accept and encourage intelligence and creativity in others. If you're constantly being told by your peers that everything you're doing is wonderful, you need a better group of advisers. If your supervisor believes that you're doing a great job, that's terrific -- it's probably reflecting well on him or her."
• Forgetting to give credit to others. "Losers inappropriately take full credit for positive events despite the help or input received by others, while winners give credit where credit is due. Losers inevitably reap what they sow. If your boss is a real pumpkinhead, you can probably get away with this a few times. But if you keep doing this, chances are your boss is going to catch on that you're a glory hog."
• Failing to self-promote. "Bragging is one thing, but letting colleagues throughout your industry know of your success through case studies, promotion bulletins, or other such tools is quite another. Losers often fail to recognize the importance of letting others know about their successes, or go about it in entirely the wrong way. In today's disconnected business world, where many people work at a distance from their supervisors, it's important to let your boss and leadership know your contributions and that you are a valuable asset. This could be as simple as providing your supervisor with an e-mail once a week to inform him about what you're working on and your progress. By doing that, when decisions are made for promotions or job transfers, you're more likely to get what's due to you."
• Losing perspective. "Intuitive businesspeople recognize that, despite their best attempts to do everything right, sometimes they approach roadblocks and seek the advice and perspective of a respected friend, colleague or even a business coach. Those who fail to recognize their shortcomings are destined for the unemployment line. It has everything to do with forgetting the reasons why their business exists, why they're in this business, and what it is they intended to accomplish when they entered this industry. You need to be excited about what it is you're doing, and you need to put more enthusiasm into what it is you're doing. If you're not looking forward to getting out of bed in the morning, you're working on a downward trend -- you just don't know it yet."

This article reprinted by permission of www.computerworld.com

What worked for your parents does not work today. Back in the day sure you could work for a company for 40 years and retire. The company would pay for your retirement and you could enjoy life on the golf course. That is not the case today. Companies are about making money, period. Paying for employees retirement proved to be very costly for companies. So they had their lobbyists in Washington change the law.So today we have 401k's and they are worthless! 401k's take all of the responsibility of retirement off of the companies and lay it on your shoulders.

Now most people don't even contribute to their 401k's, so they will have nothing to rely on but Social Security. Now before you start patting yourself on the back, people contributing to their 401k's are the bigger fools. Ok when I invest in something, I have to have full control of my investment, period. 401k's offer no security, and no control. I'd hate to break it to you but when you are investing with your 401k you are investing in the stock market. The stock market is one of the least secure investments out there. I know people say well my 401k is worth $500,000. Well that's all great but what is your 401k going to be worth when you retire, that is what counts. And you have no way of knowing what the stock market will look like when you retire. If the stock market goes up awesome but what about if it doesn't. You are gambling with your future by depending on your 401k. And of course your financial advisor will tell you on average the stock market goes up, it's his job to tell you that. Remember he gets paid on commissions,you don't buy no money for him, most financial advisors are just salespeople.

So ok what do you need to do? You need to become financially educated. Before you invest in anything you need a financial plan. You need real professionals around you. When looking for a financial advisor find someone who actually makes a living by making money off of their investments. Do not go with a financial advisor who makes money solely from commissions. Gaining financial education can be the difference between you enjoying your life on the golf course or having to work at Wal Mart in your 70's.

Anticipating that over 40 percent of U.S. households will be on the net by the year 2000, Tapscott predicts how the N-Geners, many of whom are already expert net users, will be the catalyst for change in education, recreation, commerce, the workplace, the family, and government. His immediate advice is to listen to our children because we can learn from them.

Tech professionals need to adapt their skills to the business side of the job.

In an age of cost containment, a looming economic slowdown, outsourcing, off shoring, the impending retirement of a bulk of the IT professional population, and declining enrollments in math, technology, engineering and science classes, it comes as little surprise that IT professionals are an insecure bunch. Many are questioning what can be done to ensure their career survival.

For numerous IT professionals, keeping their skills fresh and proving their continued importance to their organizations is a significant source of stress. This was the topic of a study released Aug. 29 by the Richard Ivey School of Business at the University of Western Ontario, in London.

Because of the dot-com bust and excessive media hype around outsourcing, Brady said, parents and guidance counselors have discouraged young people from studying technology, resulting in decreasing enrollments in computer science programs and a diminished IT talent pipeline.

The savviest way to ensure job security is for IT professionals to adapt their outlook and enhance their skill sets to accommodate what organizations will need from their IT departments in the coming years. Some of this will involve losing old, bad habits and require evolving inherent technology skills to better serve businesses.

Such actions will bring IT professionals not only more job security but also the satisfaction that comes with knowing that one's daily work is unquestionably central to the functioning of an organization.

·      Do the small things right - The IT department has long suffered from a bad reputation, for which it has only itself to blame. In the years before the tech bubble burst, IT was king; a huge demand for technical prowess and a shortage of able bodies put IT professionals in an exalted state. Tech workers could pick their job and name their salary. They could wear jeans and T-shirts to meetings, and nobody would raise an eyebrow. They often rolled their eyes when an employee did not know where to put his or her Ethernet card. If they didn't feel like doing something, they often didn't. The dot-com bust and the ensuing IT job cuts largely killed off this "stupid users" attitude, but surprisingly enough, remnants of unprofessionalism remain.

·      Let the users win -  For as a long as the IT department has existed, much of its role has been to prevent bad things from happening—avoiding security lapses, network breakdowns and faltering desktops. IT responded to this dictate by exerting as much control as it could over systems. IT professionals will make more meaningful relationships within their organizations by ceasing to say "no" by default, and instead asking, "How do we allow good things to happen safely? Move beyond 'How do I control everything' to 'How do I keep things in order.”

·      Outsource-proof yourself - Outsourcing and off shoring, two economic realities that contributed to IT's reputation as a less-than-ideal place to work, show no signs of letting up. Technology company CEOs predicted that their use of offshore services will increase over the next several years, according to a 2007 CEO Survey released by Deloitte. 45 percent of the respondents stated that they were currently off shoring, and 55 percent said they planned to offshore jobs in the coming years, so much so that nearly one-third expected to have 10 percent of their work force offshore in five years. This has left IT professionals questioning what they can do to outsource-proof themselves. What most recruiters and analysts suggest they do is find ways to move up the proverbial career ladder.  

Globalization need not have universally negative consequences; it also creates opportunities for technology workers to position themselves as liaisons in outsourced relationships.  Moving beyond pure technical skills into the management arena creates a value proposition for an IT professional that cannot be easily commoditized and sent elsewhere.  Other experts encourage IT professionals to see certain inevitabilities in offshore outsourcing and do all they can to position themselves out of harm's way.

·     Be an asset - One of the clearest things, beyond bulking up business skills, IT professionals can do to ensure their future job security is to become assets to their organizations. Technology is as central to companies as ever, and its place in the business world will only increase over the next decade. Herein, analysts and recruiters said, exists the great opportunity for IT workers—to move beyond managing IT to becoming the go-to technology geniuses in their companies. Even the most technology-savvy employees can be inundated by their digital options within the workplace.

Much of this involves staying ahead of the curve of new technology. If users are overwhelmed by collaboration software, simplify it for them. Become aware of the pitfalls and perks of social software, moving beyond seeing it as the IT enemy. Organizations have questions about these technologies and need tech-savvy employees to answer them.

·      Be well rounded - It is difficult these days to discuss technology success stories without mentioning one of the biggest of all: Google.  The search giant doesn't just run its business in an unconventional manner—providing employees with free haircuts, on-site dry cleaning services and free transportation to work—it recruits differently, too. Unlike most organizations, Google makes a point to recruit not just for positions—such as a new systems administrator—but for a whole package: hybrid employees who can work in many roles. Other technology organizations are beginning to implement these practices as well.

IT workers are increasingly expected to demonstrate a job capacity beyond IT and some business know-how. Organizations want to see how they fit in the big picture, and being able to show oneself as a multifaceted and valuable asset to a company is nearly a guarantee of job security.

If you had the Janco Internet and IT Position Description HandiGuide (r), you could solve the problem quickly with the detail Job Description contained with the document. Plus if you had the IT Hiring Kit  you would also have all the lastetet salary information you need to hire the right canidate.

The Job Description HandiGuide come is both Microsoft Word and PDF format an some of over 200 job descriptions include:

Are Certifications Worth the Time and Effort Required to Get Them?

As enterprises cut IT expenses one of the ways that IT professionals justify greater salaries is by getting certifications.  In a recent report by GlobalKnowledge they determined which were the the highest paid certification programs.

Highest Paying Certifications
(ISC)2 SSCP® (Systems Security Certified Practitioner)	$110,000
Voice over IP Expert	$100,714
CCIE™ Routing & Switching	$95,417
NNCDS (Nortel Networks Certified Design Specialist)	$95,000
ITIL® Managers Certificate	$94,000
(ISC)2 CISSP® (Certified Information Systems Security Professional)	$91,939
Security Management Expert	$90,556
PMI® PMP® (Project Management Professional)	$90,470
ITIL® Practioners Certificate	$87,917
CCVP™ (Cisco® Certified Voice Professional)	$87,500
Cisco® Advanced Wireless LAN Design Specialist	$87,500
CWNA (Certified Wireless Network Administrator)	$86,786
American Management Association® Certificate in Project Management	$84,545
Cisco® Advanced Wireless LAN Field Specialist	$84,000
CCDP™ (Cisco® Certified Design Professional)	$83,750
Cisco® IP Telephony Design Specialist	$83,750
Check Point® CCSA(Check Point Certified Security Administrator)	$80,625
CCNP™ (Cisco® Certified Network Professional)	$79,755
NNCSE (Nortel Networks Certified Support Expert)	$79,286
ITIL® Foundations Certificate	$79,167
CCDA™ (Cisco® Certified Design Associate)	$78,047
MCSD (Microsoft® Certified Solutions Developer)	$77,125
AMA®  Business Management for IT & Technical Professionals	$76,250
NNCSS (Nortel Networks Certified Support Specialist)	$75,833
Check Point® CCSE(Check Point Certified Security Expert)	$75,750
Voice over IP Specialist	$75,147
CCIP™ (Cisco® Certified Internetwork Professional)	$74,000
CTP (Convergence Technologies Professional)	$72,857
CCSP™ (Cisco® Certified Security Professional)	$72,727
RHCT (Red Hat® Certified Technician)	$72,500
MCTS (Microsoft® Certified Technology Specialist)	$72,258
Cisco® Firewall Specialist	$72,000

Steps to a successful career are defined by positive action steps that you take.  These include:

• Implement a career plan with specific goals
• Continue to stay current with your skill set
• Deliver results that your management sees and agrees with
• Work towards effective solutions – efficiently does not always matter
• Keep your ego in check
• Know what you do not know
• Have others challenge you
• Give credit to others
• Communicate your successes
• Focus on what is important

Corporations will not succeed in the global marketplace unless their leaders radically transform the way they think about differences. Consider the convergence of factors that are about to occur in the United States. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 40 percent of people entering the workforce from 1998 to 2008 will be members of minority groups. The number of women in the workforce is increasing at a faster rate than men; in fact, they will make up 48 percent of the workforce by 2010.

Persons with disabilities will make up an increasing portion of the labor force. Young people 16 to 24 represent a group that will grow more rapidly than the overall labor force while workers 55 and older will be working longer. In fact, the median labor force age in 2008 will be 40.7 compared to 38.7 in 1998. To compete in such a radically changing landscape will require more than world-class technology. It will take a major breakthrough in the way we see one another and value our individual contributions. Yet, organizational leaders are struggling to manage diversity and achieve inclusion in their organizations at precisely the time it is needed most.

Best Places for Business and Careers

(Forbes) The news on the economy in recent months has been uninspiring. The subprime lending mess threatens to accelerate the housing slowdown. Gas prices are at their highest in eight months. Gross domestic product growth this year is expected to be less than 3% for the first time since 2003. But one part of the country consistently manages to produce strong economic growth and still keep costs down. For the second straight year the Southeast placed 5 metros in the Top 10 of our Best Places for Business and Careers. While most economies in the West have also outperformed their peers in the Northeast and Midwest over the past four years, living costs there have risen dramatically. Housing prices in Phoenix, spurred in part by easy lending, are up 57% in the past two years, knocking it off our Top 10.

The overall rank for the best places to live according to Forbes is:

The best places to do business rankings are:

The greatest job growth is in the following locations:

CIOs and CTOs are all different in many ways but world class ones have the same characteristics

When top performing Chief Information Officers (CIO) and Chief Technology Officers (CTO) are compared they all have these characteristics:

• They have balanced knowledge of both the enterprise (business) world and technology
• They are excellent communicators (written and orally)
• They have a vision that is enterprise driven not technology driven
• They strive for knowledge about the enterprise and technology and how to apply that knowledge successfully
• They are good leaders who can motivate and direct disparate personalities to achieve a goal
• They are change agents and have the ability and desire to make change work

The old target of $1,000,000 per year has been surpassed by these 22 CIOs.

In a review of Secrutiy and Exchange Commissions filings of public corporations, 22 top IT executives (CIOs) were found who, with bonus, stock options, and other compensation, earn more than $2,000,000 per year.  The highest pure salary that was found was for $715,000 for the CIO of Home Depot.

Executive	Title		Company	Salary	Other Compensation	Total
Jeff Fox		Group President	Alltel	$673,077	$8,381,841	$9,054,918
Bob Willett		CIO, CEO	Best Buy	$622,962	$7,969,868	$8,592,830
Jean Davis		Senior EVP	Wachovia	$205,500	$7,091,389	$7,296,889
Larry Kittelberger