billso.com

This article appeared in my old blog at http://www.bloglines.com/blog/wsodeman?id=206

http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/feb2006/tc20060208_760555.htm?chan=rss_topStories_ssi_5

Peter Burrows of Business Week reports on Cisco’s recent performance. Cisco is the dominant vendor of networking equipment worldwide. I think of Cisco as the Internet’s plumber. Your packets moved through a Cisco switch or router at some point in their journey.

If you use a Linksys router or network appliance at home, you’re using a Cisco product. Cisco purchased Linksys in 2003, and has been integrating operations and marketing ever since. Linksys is positioned as an entry point for SOHO (small office and home office) users who need networking equipment, and who may need higher-powered Cisco equipment when their business expands. At the same time, Cisco engineers have been remaking the Linksys line, using best practices from Cisco’s enteprise networking equipment.

A virtuous cycle occurs when a company moves from one “favorable circumstance” to another over time. Amazon, eBay, Microsoft, Intel, Google and Apple have all benefited from the creation and maintenance of their own v-cycles.

One might argue that Nintendo and Sony are risking their v-cycles, at least in the video game market. Wii and PlayStation 3 each have their own issues.

Cisco has apparently built its own v-cycle around advanced networking technologies, including VoIP (voice over Internet Protocol). VoIP telephones are connected to an RJ-45 jack, not a telephone RJ-11 jack. Remember that RJ-11 also provides electrical power for telephones.

So how does a VoIP telephone get enough power to operate? Users could plug the telephone into an AC outlet, but there’s a neater way. Through a handy protocol called Power over Ethernet (PoE), special switches can connect these phones to the network and deliver 13 watts of power, which is enough to keep a telephone and a small display screen running.

PoE can’t deliver enough power to keep a laptop computer running, which is one reason why laptop computers need their own power source - either AC current or batteries.

PoE features aren’t built into most older network equipment, so any company that wants to deploy VoIP in its offices has to buy PoE switches from Cisco, Foundry or another hardware vendor.

PoE and VoIP adoption are powering Cisco’s virtuous cycle - at least for now.

Sometimes students ask me for examples of “white papers”. In IT, a “white paper” is an article or a case study that is posted or distributed by a hardware or software vendor. It usually features at least one happy customer, and discusses the positive points of specific products and services in glowing detail. I often lump corporate web sites into this category.

I usually tell students to avoid citing white papers and marketing literature in their assignments, because these sources are almost always biased towards the company that paid the writers.

This Apple page is a good example of a white paper. I’m surprised that there are no easy-to-find links to PDF or printable versions of this article.

I can’t imagine walking into a business meeting armed with ‘facts’ I found in white papers. That’s the perspective I take when I’m grading - I’m a CXO. That’s one reason why industry magazines are helpful, as their reviews tend to compare products and services on an equal basis. Occasionally, we might see white papers that read like industry research, including comparisons with products and services from other vendors.

Until someone rigs up a crapometer to detect marketing blather, it’s really up to the reader to determine how much trust they will place in a white paper. For my part, I find white papers interesting and funny, but I need to see more authoritative sources before I make up my mind.

From CIO Insight: John Parkinson asks an important question - how well can business schools prepare their students to take leadership positions in information technology and innovation?

Graduate education emphasizes meta-learning, or the ability of learning how to learn. A successful master’s degree candidate has demonstrated that they understand and use the course material, and that they can continue to learn and grow as professionals and scholars.

The MBA degree program is fundamentally different from more specific degrees programs. I speak from experience - I earned an MBA as a full-time student at Rollins College in 1988, and I’ve been program chair of an MSIS program for the last 3 years. I also teach dozens of MBA and MSIS students every year. I have a bio page here.

MBA programs provide broad cross-training

An MBA program provides cross-training over several required topics (finance, accounting, marketing, management, law, technology, strategic management) and a handful of specific electives. However, some MBA programs have no electives at all. Other MBA programs have specific areas of interest, such as entrepreneurship, technology, or vertical markets.

A major part the MBA program’s value lies in the integration among the courses. As this is a master’s program, students must do the integrative work themselves, using the frameworks provided by their faculty. This represents the integration of functional areas into business, corporate, and enterprise strategies.

MSIS programs provide managerial and technical preparation

An MSIS program tends to focus on technical skills (telecommunications, software, hardware) and management skills (project management, knowledge management, strategic management). Again, the students follow a framework provided by the faculty as they integrate their knowledge.

If we treat IS as a functional area, and innovation as a process to be managed, the role of the IS professional is to help the organization deliver more value and effectiveness through technology and innovation.

Parkinson’s thesis - that deep scholars are difficult to find - has some merit. Many organizations select CIOs who have demonstrated management ability, but who have limited technological experience. These CIOs are expected to be “quick studies” as they master the technologies and processes that provide value in their organizations.

The MBA degree has often be derided as the “quick study” certificate. Because MBA students get only one or two classes in each of the core functional areas, they learn how to perform rapid analyses that may be sophisticated, but may also lack detail and rigor.

On the other hand, Herbert Simon pointed out that decision-making is usually constrained by the bounds of time, space, and our own cognitive abilities. Managers want to optimize, but they end up satisficing, or making do with less in oder to complete the task at hand. This Wikipedia article has more information and links about Simon’s work, and any good principles of management textbook should discuss Simon as well.

Information systems and technology allow managers to extract more precision and process more data in their everyday work. While IS professionals are essential to this task, they do not necessarily understand the strategic value of the systems they develop, implement and maintain.

In the end, MBAs depend upon IS professionals, and vice versa.

This article first appeared on my old blog at http://www.bloglines.com/blog/wsodeman?id=48

URL: Dell facing slew of Chinese lawsuits over CPU switcheroo

To some consumers, it may seem like a minor change. Dell shipped the Chinese version of its Inspiron 640M portable computer with an Intel 200M CPU. The marketing materials indicated the model used a more expensive process, the 2300.

The major difference between the two processors is that the 2300 includes hardware support for virtualization. This allows the computer to run several different sessions and operating sessions at the same time with a minimal performance loss, when compared to older technologies such as emulation.

When used in a Macintosh, this technology allows users to run Windows, Linux, DOS, or almost any other operating system while they run the default MacOS.

Virtualization is also a key technology in server deployment. Dell, HP and other computer manufacturers sell large multiprocessor cmoputers that behave as many different servers. Each server runs in its own virtual session, so one large computer can replace several separate computers that were each dedicated to specific functions, such as e-mail, the Web, and transaction processing.

In a consumer-grade laptop, the loss of virtualization is not as as critical as it might be on a server computer.

However, word spread quickly through Chinese forums and web sites that Dell had advertised a more expensive processor than it actually shipped. In Windows, it is easy to check what processor your computer is using, by examining the System Properties box in the Control Panel. Try using the shortcut keys Windows+Break.
Dell managers blame a mixup between manufacturing and marketing, and have offered an apology and full refund to customers. The apology is crucial in Asian markets. However, some litigious Chinese customers have decided to sue Dell’s Chinese subsidiary for damages.

Tech: Taiwanese manufacturers are marketing relatively inexpensive Tablet PCs, just in time for the fall buying season. The Averatec C3500 has 802.11g wireless and a 12 inch screen. PC Magazine seemed to like it.