Ram Charan, Global Business Advisor and Author was the CIOhio afternoon keynote speaker. There was no presentation Powerpoint. Ram just laid it all out from his experiences. It was quite impressive!

· You must always practice to be better

· We tend to recycle leadership characteristics but some are more important at certain times

· For these times Ram suggests the following are most important

1. Inspire your people in tough times

o Requires integrity and trust

o Be engaging and substantive

o Have humility

o This is not evangelism

2. Practice realism with a touch of optimism

o Articulate opportunities for the future

o Create positive energy

3. Practice frequent communication

o Break the bunker mentality

o Communicate the good and the bad

4. Leadership by hands on management

o Requires urgency – do it now and stop discussing, make tough calls

o Requires speed

o Requires flexibility

5. See the action in the external environment

o Get out to the end consumer

o Watch what is happening there

o Take no one’s word for this, see it yourself

o See things through other people’s lenses

o Go outside your industry and function

o Probe font line people

o Ask a team member to describe a change they see in the world at a staff meeting

o This is a form of social architecture

Remember - People are very anxious when they see no solutions

CEO’s and CFO’s are wrestling with the following issues now

· CASH – weather the storm and review cash positions daily

· Reduce your breakeven point to the lowest level

· Reduce complexity

· Understand that almost all companies will be smaller and get ahead of the curve

· Put people first

o Focus on the most talented people

o Change agents are the key people to keep around

o Those that have a the attitude to collaborate horizontally

· Make the tough calls!

3 specific things that the CIO’s can do

1. Learn about your company’s cash situation

a. What is being done about refinancing the debt?

2. Visit your peers in the company

a. Where is their pain and how can IT help reduce it?

3. Align you budget

a. What keeps the lights on is first

b. Compliance spending is next

c. What projects can increase the cash flow in the short term?

How best to trickle information down to the bottom layers?

· Have layers meet at the same time and translate information into the language of the audience

· Create cross functional teams

· Practice realism with a touch of optimism

Recommendations for small businesses

· Watch your cash!

· Watch your customers!

· Look for opportunities in this crisis!

CIOhio Morning Keynote – John Seral, VP and CIO, GE Energy Infrastructure

I do have his full presentation. If you would like a copy, please email me - email@kevingadd.com

· John is a member of the Technology Association of Georgia (TAG)

· He moved through the ranks at GE since coming in during early 80’s

· Energy infrastructure is the fastest growing GE line of business

o 07 revenue was $31B, 65K employees in 140 countries

· Energy and water needs in other countries will continue to grow rapidly

· GE has created the ecomagination focus

o Double R & D to $1.5B by 2010

o Grow revenues to $25B in 2010

o Reduce greenhouse gas emissions

o Reduce water usage by 20%

o Inform the public on GE efforts.

· IT Challenges at GE – Supporting global growth

o Grow GE Talent – find and grow the best people

o Globalization – put our people there

o Drive global ERP programs – close the books on Oracle/SAP and remove point solutions

· Focus on performance and availability

· Focus on systems that can help the business grow

· Do what you do but more cost effectively

· 1.3% of GE revenue goes to IT now, hoping to get to 1.7%

· Security

o John has a TS clearance and less than 10 people have it at GE

o Focus on stopping attacks. Hackers are looking to steal data now

o Soon they will be conducting regular assessments

· Disaster recovery is a big area

o Tier 1 goal of <>

o Tier 2 goal of <>

o He suggested that it is a great idea to ask business lines what they believe is acceptable and doable for getting systems back up and online after an emergency. This aligns expectations

· Demand growth is still outpacing deflation

· Moore’s law still working!

· It is a goal of GE to have all employees connected at all times

· GE is focusing on finalizing the Oracle and SAP integrations

· There is a challenge with the number of advanced PDA’s

· GE uses Cisco Telepresence, which is very cool

o They have 9 locations now with 7 more coming soon

· GE is moving to Star Office. They have frozen Microsoft Office purchases

· They are moving to cloud computing eventually

· GE has created their own MySpace type intranet

o People can tag themselves and others with their interests

· Virtualization is big and growing – it is like FREE MONEY

· He is freezing some purchases to force more virtualization to occur

· His group was spending $21MM on telephone calls annually. Moving more to VOIP to reduce this

· GE is working on “PC on a Stick” so people can take what they need with them, plug into any machine, work, then remove and nothing stays resident on the workstation.

· When outsourcing, they are looking at low cost CITIES, not just low cost COUNTRIES. Rural Outsourcing is a big innovation for them

· This is actually keeping more development here as some cities here have a lower cost than some of the larger Indian cities

o Places like Erie, PA and Macon, Mo

o 10% of their contractors are in these low cost cities

· GE defined a few areas where open source would be best. Then they moved the freed up licenses elsewhere in the country

o John recommended picking 2 or 3 apps to go deep on.

o He recommended that you then must hang around people who think differently than you to learn more about these open source apps

· GE partners with 40 universities, including OSU

· John felt that the Midwest could be a place that is big on manufacturing again, but in the new innovations such as wind turbines and solar

Notes from CIOhio

TechColumbus hosted the 2008 edition of CIOhio on Friday 21 November. There were approximately 200 CIO's in attendance at the Polaris Hilton. It was a great event with many educational tracks to choose from and 2 keynote speakers. As always, the networking was top notch, too.

For me, it is always interesting to go to these events and interact with CIO's. I am 42 and have been in IT since 1985, so I have many peers in this group of IT leaders. I was on this path at one time and thought that this was what I wanted to become. But, the entrepreneurial bug bit me HARD (13 years ago) and I jumped onto that train, never to return to the CIO path. So now, my peers and I look at the world of IT differently. I look for commercialization opportunities, innovation and ways to grow new businesses. I enjoy the smell (and unique challenges) of a new company and could not see myself in a big company running a large IT organization. I am thankful that we have people that can do that, though! I am not saying either path is better, it is just interesting to think it all through.

Anyhow, thanks to Tim Haynes and his team at TechColumbus for getting this together. I know many people really enjoyed this event and it continues to get IT leaders and thinkers together to talk, network, brainstorm, and commiserate. These type of events help everyone, including the Central Ohio IT Startups. Someone in the organization of some CIO at this event has a great idea that will be a commercial success. Keep pushing them and training them and giving them freedom to innovate and make mistakes. That will help make great entrepreneurs!

Notes that I took from the keynote speakers will be in separate posts. If anyone wants a specific slide presentation, please just email me. I have them all.

Thanks, Kevin...

Microsoft BizSpark Program helps Central Ohio IT Startups

I am happy to announce that I signed TechColumbus up yesterday evening as a Network Partner for the new Microsoft BizSpark program. To get more information on this program, check out the website: http://www.microsoftstartupzone.com/pages/home.aspx, or contact me.

This is the program overview from Microsoft:

BizSpark is an innovative new program that unites startups with global entrepreneurial and technology resource in one community, with a common goal of supporting and accelerating the success of a new generation of high-potential Startups.

BizSpark is uniquely designed to help Startups engaged in software development to jump-start their business, by:
• Providing them with “express access” to Microsoft tools and technologies, for their immediate use in design, development, testing, demonstration, and hosted application production and deployment; and
• Connecting them with Network Partners and a united, global community of resources designed to support them.

More detail on this great program:

Startup Eligibility Requirements:
• An eligible startup must have the following characteristics at the time of joining:
Actively engaged in development of a software-based product or service that will form a core piece of its current or intended business1,
Privately held,
In business for less than 3 years, and
Less than US $1 million in annual revenue.

• To be eligible to use the software for production and deployment of hosted solutions, startups must also be developing a new “software as a service” solution (on any platform) to be delivered over the Internet.

Term: Startups can participate in BizSpark for up to 3 years. On the first and second anniversary of initial enrollment, they must update their enrollment (e.g., confirm they haven’t gone public and their ownership hasn’t changed).

Fee: A USD $100 program offering fee is due when the Startup exits the Program. As part of Microsoft’s commitment to Startup success, there are no initial costs for Startups to join BizSpark.

Technology offering: The BizSpark technology offering to Startups currently includes:
• Design, development, testing and demonstrations rights with regard to:
All the software included in the Visual Studio Team System Team Suite (VSTS) with MSDN Premium subscription
Expression Studio (Version 2)
VSTS Team Foundation Server (Standard Edition)
• Production Use rights to host a “software as a service” solution (developed by the startup during their participation, on any platform) over the Internet, with regard to products including: Windows Server (all versions up to and including Enterprise); SQL Server (all versions); Office SharePoint Server; Systems Center, and BizTalk Server The information is representative and not comprehensive.

Products, versions, availability and additional benefits are subject to change. Because this offering is likely to be updated from time to time, Startups and Network Partners should visit the Microsoft® BizSpark website at https://microsoft.com/bizspark often to check Program Guides.

Special offers: By virtue of their participation in BizSpark, Startups may also be eligible for additional special technology or services offerings (from Microsoft or others) from time to time during their tenure in the Program. Startups enrolled in BizSpark will be notified of special offers when they become available, as well as the terms of those offerings and how to sign up for them.