Is the iPad a revolution in productivity or just a thorn in IT's side?

In a recent blog post for Forbes.com, CITO Research’s Dan Woods explains how to say “’yes’ without creating a mess.” Woods taps PC Helps’ very own CEO, Brian Madocks, for advice.

In his post, Woods takes a look at what the consumerization of IT means in practice, and offers up a “playbook” for IT:

1. Don’t just say no to “bring your own technology” or employee-preferred devices:
   Writes Woods: “Show some leadership and help figure out how to get it right so that the company is protected and the users are happy.”
2. Listen to the end users:
   Ask your employees how they want to use the devices and formulate a set of guidelines that meet both IT’s and the workers’ needs.
3. Research and test your approach:
   Don’t just roll out BYOT to the entire company; start small, with a pilot that includes a mix of user types. Use the knowledge gained for a broader roll out.
4. Document and communicate a clear set of policies and guidelines for end users:
   We all need rules. Come up with a set both IT and end-users can live with and abide by.
5. Plan for a more complex support burden:
   Questions such as synching corporate mail and calendars will come up, and often. Be sure you have a support plan and trained staff ready to handle every type of query.
6. Don’t rely on device manufacturers for support of your end users:
   AppleCare will not help you synch your mail, and they really don’t care if you are on a deadline.
7. Prepare your help desk for the task:
   According to Woods: “Mixed device environments require specialization and expertise, as well as ongoing training and skill-building. Your existing help desk staff may need to be retrained, expanded, or supplemented.”

Read the full article here.

Gartner predicts that by 2013, more people in the world will access the Internet on a mobile device than on a PC.

“Smartphones have conquered PCs” — CNN

According to research firm IDC, over the past two years, smartphone shipments have tripled, while PC shipments grew by only 45 percent. The trend, reports CNN, is indicative of a marked change in the kinds of devices people are using for everyday computing needs. The article also points to research from Gartner that predicts that by 2013, more people in the world will access the Internet on a mobile device than on a PC.

What does this mean for business? Read the full article here.

“Who Needs PCs? Growth Slips as Tablet Demand Explodes” — Forbes

In this article, Forbes writer Eric Savitz looks at the exploding tablet market and its effect on PC demand. Savitz notes that two Wall Street analysts cut back their projections for 2011 PC unit sales, blaming the reduced outlook partly on “cannibalization of demand” by tablets.

Writes Savitz: “This could be trouble for a whole assortment of companies in the PC food chain…there’s trouble here for the disk-drive companies, for instance, and a potential reshuffling of the players in the microprocessor business. It certainly seems like it’s the end of the PC world as we know it.”

Read the full article here.

Unrelated, But Interesting: “Password Reuse is All Too Common, Research Shows” – CIO.com

In an unrelated but fascinating piece, CIO.com reports on the rising reuse of passwords across web sites, and the implications of such “laziness” on the part of users. The research was conducted by Brit Joseph Bonneau and the article makes special note of the password hack of media gossip site Gawker in December 2010.

The article offers tips on creating secure passwords, and safer methods of keeping track.

Read the full article here. And for a super-geeky take on the issue, read Bonneau’s blog.

This is where it got us: 3G service on Mt. Everest.

“Mobility is one line item in the IT budget that’s held steady or grown over the last three years…”

In today’s PC World magazine, Brennon Slattery reports that Nepalese telecom firm Ncell has installed 3G service at 17,000 feet on Mt. Everest. Cynics complain that the iconic peak will now be ruined (a quote from Slattery’s article, “Great — people yakking on their cell phone on the roof of the world”). But optimists point to its benefits to climbers (they can keep in touch with tour guides, call for help, and access weather reports and safety information).

Whether 3G service is necessary on Everest is open for debate, but mobility in the workplace is not. Here’s what the industry pubs are saying:

Companies Embrace iPads

This Financial Times piece reports on the goings on at a recent Gartner symposium held in Orlando, Florida. At the conference, Salesforce.com’s chief executive Mark Benioff called the iPad “the most successful electronic device ever,” and even suggested that business leaders could run their entire enterprise from an iPad using web and cloud-based services.

Gartner senior analyst Leslie Fiering, who presented at the conference, said that with the iPad, Apple has hit upon a “sweet spot” in terms of screen size. In a complementary video, she says she polled symposium participants on how many had been “forced” to support iPads because C-level executives brought them in. “Between a third and half of them raised their hand,” she says in the video.

Watch the video here.

Top Five Tips for Managing Mobility

IT leaders: If there’s one thing you need to know, it’s that mobility is a critical IT initiative. And NetworkWorld’s Johna Till Johnson says it deserves being treated as such.

In this article, Johnson offers tips on how to maximize the success of your wireless and mobility initiatives. Among them: formulating a mobility strategy, planning increased support for iPhones and reducing support for BlackBerry devices.

In addition to tips, Johnson offers this advice to IT leaders: “It’s important for IT organizations to have a clear vision of how they view mobility’s role inside the enterprise. Mobility is one line item in the IT budget that’s held steady or grown over the last three years, even as other line items have been reduced by 20% or more. One reason is the increasing ubiquity of mobile devices in daily life; employees are simply more used to conducting their lives via these devices.”

Bring Your Own Technology to the Office: What You Need to Know

And even though the world needs no more convincing that mobility equals productivity, IT hasn’t quite caught up. (They have a few nagging concerns, like security risks and enterprise invasion.)

With this piece, IT World offers tips on how to get the go-ahead to use your iPad for work. It makes no promises, but it will at least get you closer.

In reality, business cannot be put on hold while users adjust to a new software version.

At PC Helps, the Office 2010 calls have quickly increased from a trickle to a stream. Most are coming from customers whose IT departments skipped an Office 2007 migration and were holding out for 2010. As with 2003-to-2007 migrations, 2003-to-2010 promises to throw a few challenges the way of end users and IT departments. Adjusting to the new ribbon interface is often the first obstacle. Once users adjust, plenty more follow.

Below we present the top five end user challenges so your IT department knows what to expect during the migration crunch.

1. Adjusting to a materially different interface

The “ribbon” and other new aspects of the Office 2007 interface reflect major changes in the look and feel of the core Office applications. In Office 2010, these differences carry forward and are coupled with the incorporation of the ribbon into Outlook, impacting usability of this critical communications application.

User confusion and frustration is almost guaranteed when attempting to learn and work with the ribbon for the first time. Basic functions that were performed without effort in the past, such as opening and closing files, managing day-to-day calendar and meeting entries, and applying formats, require a relearning process with the new application versions. For some users, relearning these basic functions is fairly straightforward, and for others it takes a more effort and help. More complex tasks in PowerPoint, Excel, Word or Access often require a combination of training and support in the migration process.

2. Recreating and reformatting important documents

As with any new or changed software, incompatibility with prior versions may require users to manually rework documents. Compatibility of versions has been a focus for Microsoft over the years, and improves with every new release. But users don’t always follow the best practices when creating documents, and end up with versions which are not automatically converted with an upgrade.

Files received from outside the organization in older formats may not open properly and need some rework or, sometimes, may need to be resent. Files with links, Access databases (especially if they integrate with other systems or use extensive code), and custom animations in older PowerPoint versions may be corrupted or impacted by compatibility issues. In cases where users have documents they regularly use, often containing complex formulas or formatting, and which need to be updated to the new versions, there can be a significant amount of time spent on reformatting and recreating documents.

3. Dealing with deadlines and urgency

In reality, business cannot be put on hold while users adjust to a new software version. Critical deadlines loom, and day-to-day urgent matters still need to be handled. During a migration, end users may find themselves stymied by lack of familiarity with a new Office application just at a time when they are facing these deadlines.

Of particular note among these end users are administrative support staff, who are often managing calendars and communications for managers and executives. Downtime is not an option for them either. In these circumstances, self-help, training and tutorials often compound frustration.

4. Using Office across a range of mobile devices and computers

The proliferation of new and different mobile and computing devices is changing the corporate computing landscape. (See Oct. 8’s blog post for recent stats about the iPhone and Android in the enterprise.) Employees now access standard Office applications across a range of devices and often from remote locations. Adapting to and syncing upgraded software and OS versions impacts end users in these mixed environments.

For example, to edit documents in the new Office 2007 file formats on a Windows Mobile device, an Office Mobile upgrade is required. Many users are not aware of this and don’t understand why they cannot successfully use the application. Another example, this one from the Apple side: The settings to sync an Entourage calendar to an iPad are not entirely obvious, and end users must also make sure they have the latest updates from Microsoft.

Many help desks have altered their policies to allow outside devices but are not able to offer support for these non-company issued devices. End users often search on their own for “how-to” support in online help communities and in-product menus. Even worse, they attempt workarounds that bypass updates and patches altogether, forgoing improved functionalities or simply not making full use of the devices or applications.

5. Finding help when it’s needed

According to a May 2010 Gartner report, one of the Windows 7/Office 2010 migration pitfalls to avoid is not seeking professional help early enough.

“Don’t underestimate the requirements for skills and services. It is often common to enlist an external service provider, especially for help with design and planning features,” writes Gartner researcher Michael Silver in Computerworld article about the report. “In addition to proper training for technical staff, make sure the service provider is contracted to transfer sufficient skills so staff can manage the new environment after the cutover.”

In addition to help with migration design and planning, help is needed on the end user side as well. As the migration process unfolds and users begin incorporating new or upgraded software into their everyday routines, it is essential that they quickly master tasks and processes relevant to their specific jobs in the new software environment. It is also important that they have access to additional help if they need it – which may be at points before, during or beyond the migration dates. Issues and causes users experience related to finding help include:

• Training was taken at the time of the upgrade, but a particular application or function has not been used since, and the user has forgotten how to use it. (Classic “use it or lose it” scenario.)

• Training and tutorials were planned by the user, but not completed due to limited time availability, and user now has an urgent need. Executives and higher level staff, or personnel who spend most of their time on the road, frequently experience this situation.

• General training and help tools may not be specific enough to the users’ particular needs.

• For a variety of reasons, in-product help and search tools do not provide the help needed, or are considered inadequate by certain user groups.

• Some personnel may rely on an assistant for support, and with that person unavailable, may not know how to access certain critical documents or handle certain tasks.

When employees find themselves in these situations, they often need help right away. They can’t afford the downtime associated with submitting a help desk ticket or waiting for next-day follow up. If they can’t get the application expertise needed from the help desk, they will seek out help from their co-workers, struggle with generic help menus, look to hand off the work to a delegate if they have one, or just not complete the task.

Can your company afford that?

(Jen Sweeney)

For further reading:

From NetworkWorld: 5 tips for a smooth Windows 7 migration

From Computerworld/Gartner: Pitfalls to Avoid on the Road to Windows 7 and Office 2010 Migration

An IT department that points and laughs is hardly encouraging learning and business alignment.

The piece highlights the fact that the help desk, despite the growing importance of IT/business alignment in the enterprise, remains in the “condescending gatekeeper role.”

As evidence, Wailgum includes a video that features Andy Bitterer, co-chair of Gartner Group’s BI Summit, doing Jay Leno-style “man-on-the-street” interviews in London. Among Bitterer’s questions to the masses: “Do you use a database?” “Do you know what Business Intelligence tools are?” “Do you know what OLAP is?”

Honestly, does this Gartner bloke really expect everyday people to know what these things are? As Wailgum asserts, Gartner conference attendees may find it amusing (ha, look at the stupid users!), but it really demonstrates how out of touch IT is with its customers.

This paragraph, in which Wailgum describes IT’s image problem, is particularly illustrative: “A technological arrogance that lurks behind and manifests itself in arcane techno mumbo-jumbo and smug conceit, that, for lack of a better word, really pisses off end-users and has turned them against IT departments.”

Nicely put, Wailgum.

What’s really troubling about the five-minute video, however, is the fact that a number of the interviewees seem to be lying when the say they do know what OLAP and BI are. Perhaps they feel compelled to pretend they know, even though they clearly have no idea.

Feigning knowledge to avoid appearing ignorant happens in the workplace all the time. And an IT department that points and laughs is hardly encouraging learning and business alignment. Such a help desk delivers only lost productivity, and a whole lot of errors.

I don’t find that funny at all, and neither should a CIO.

FOR THE RECORD: OLAP stands for Online Analytical Processing (Wikipedia page here); and Business Intelligence, or BI, uses technologies, processes and applications to analyze mostly internal, structured data and business processes (Wikipedia page here).

MORE INFO IN: Desktop Application Support | Contact PC Helps

When scaled across an entire company, misprinted print jobs cost a corporation dearly.

Sure, big picture savings are great. But the best way to approach recession survival is by starting small. Although an extra printout or two may seem minuscule, when scaled across an entire company, misprinted print jobs cost a corporation dearly.

In the spirit of frugality, here are two PC Helps tips published by IT World that promise printing efficiency.

1. How to Master Excel Spreadsheet Printing
2. How to Create a New Print Style in Outlook

Enjoy, and print responsibly. Got any efficiency tips? Send them our way.

MORE INFO IN: Desktop Application Support | Contact PC Helps

The papers are saying that productivity is on the rise, that the fat officially has been cut from corporate America. Good news, right?

Depends on what you do next, says Gartner Blog Network’s Mark McDonald in a recent post. Productivity gains are “… a mathematical phantom, particularly if people remain on their current course and speed,” he writes.

“It is the equivalent of losing water weight at the start of a diet.”

That current course he’s talking about is the way many companies made it through the recession – by removing the costs (employees) without changing the underlying process or operation.

Says McDonald: “It is the equivalent of losing water weight at the start of a diet.” And, as any yo-yo dieter knows, you will gain that weight back quickly if you don’t change the habits that got you fat in the first place.

Read his post here.

2. What Recession?

Then there’s that whole other realm, the business of haute couture, which seems to be a barometer of nothing really, especially considering the latest reports. Following the cue of other luxury brands like Christian Dior and Tag Heuer, Versace is jumping into the cell phone game. It will unveil its very own mobile at Paris Fashion Week.

The made-to-order (leather!) gadget will retail for more than $5,500, and will initially be sold only to Versace’s VIP customers. It will debut at Paris’ fashion week, and will be available for purchase in May. According to the gadget reviewers at ZDNet, no word yet on which operating system it will run.

Do you think IT will support it?

MORE INFO IN: Desktop Application Support | Contact PC Helps

Gartner group is calling the new operating system “all but inevitable.” Sounds kind of like the flu.

Here is a sampling of the words that have been used to describe Windows 7: “much better”; “less prone to unexpected delays”; its impact on PC sales “won’t be huge”; and there are “good things to be had” with the new OS.

Sheesh.

In an opinion piece in Tuesday’s New York Times, Robert Cyran and Una Galani write that “if the key to happiness is low expectations, then Microsoft’s customers and investors have it in spades.”

Despite the expectation of underachievement, Microsoft could still end up a winner. The new operating system is an improvement over Vista, and many businesses are due for hardware and OS upgrades. (According to the article, roughly four-fifths of PCs use Windows XP or older operating systems.)

Once companies upgrade and become familiar with 7 (and the new Office suite), they will want new machines, and more Windows 7. Who says losers finish last?

Over at ZDNet, Mary-Jo Foley reports that the revered Gartner group is calling the new operating system “all but inevitable.” Sounds kind of like the flu.

Recap: It’s an improvement over Vista, and it’s unavoidable.

What next?

You can begin deploying, or get ready to think about deploying. If you already migrated to Vista, your costs will not be as high for the final jump to 7. If you’ve bypassed Vista completely, you will face a potentially pricey learning curve – with the new operating system itself, and with the radically redesigned Office 2007 suite.

Don’t listen to the myths and go it alone. Call in a migration partner.

(Be sure to check back tomorrow to download our Windows 7 and Office 2007 migration readiness kit. It’s free.)

FIND MORE INFO IN: Office 2007 Migration Checklist + Tools | Migration Case Study (.pdf) | PC Helps eTraining | Desktop Application Support | Contact PC Helps

What, or whom, to cut is never easy, especially when the software for the upcoming migration has already been purchased. It’s easier to drop services than it is to lay off employees; services don’t have a face or a family. Realistically, however, opting to bring in outsourcers in cash-strapped times or during a software migration provides greater ROI. The difference is substantial. Here’s a comparison:

It’s easier to drop services than it is to lay off employees; services don’t have a face or a family.

Certification level:

• Chances are that if you opt to add full-time employees to your help desk to handle the migration, they will be generalists. For after-hours or 24-7 coverage, they will be no more than junior level employees or administrative staff.
• Adding PC Helps gives you access to certified computer consultants, 24-7.

Advanced support and number of applications supported:

• For advanced support, like working with macros and application development issues, you will have none if you hire full-timers for a migration, and your staff will only be able to support 12 applications on average.
• PC Helps has plenty of developers to go around, and we support more than 166 applications.

Cost model:

• With full-time employees, you will be paying them a fixed rate, plus benefits and overhead. That amounts to about $65,000 annually on average.
• With PC Helps, you pay only for time spent on solutions or actual use.

Response time, abandonment rate and peak hold time:

• With full-timers, the average response time varies, the abandonment rate is 5 percent, and the peak hold time during a migration is nine minutes. Doesn’t sound that bad until you consider the alternative…
• … which is a two-ring response, an abandonment rate of less than .01 percent, and no hold time, even during a migration.

Resolution time and cost:

• With full-time employees, calls take an average of 30 minutes to resolve, and cost roughly $89 per solution.
• With PC Helps or similar best-of-breed support, the average call takes six minutes to resolve and costs less than $25 per solution.

Next post: A side-by-side comparison of temp workers versus best-of-breeds.

MORE INFO IN: Office 2007 Migration Checklist + Tools | Migration Case Study | PC Helps eTraining | Desktop Application Support | Contact PC Helps