Monthly Archives: April 2011

Is Quality Control A Waste of Time?

Posted on April 28, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

If we roll back the clock just a bit, the support services provided by most large corporations lacked any formal quality control. You had people who were dedicated to performing a function, but there wasn’t formal training or process controls. … Continue reading →

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Outsourcing Analysis Part III: Building Your Toolkit

Posted on April 26, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

For the last two blogs we have been building a tool to help you evaluate your current sourcing decisions, in other words where your staff resides and how they are employed (employees, temps, outsourced, etc.) to perform your business functions. … Continue reading →

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Outsourcing Analysis Part II: That’s My Core?

Posted on April 25, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

In our last Blog we talked about how we source for a function, which is to say the process of deciding (and executing) the “how and where” a function is performed. In the last few years the movement has been … Continue reading →

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Outsourcing Analysis Part I: How Far Out Do You Outsource?

Posted on April 25, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

Everyone talks about Outsourcing, but much of the time the talk seems to treat all Outsourcing as the same, with teh assumption that all projects end up with everyone working in a call center in India. Outsourcing predates India and predates “offshoring”. In fact, on of the … Continue reading →

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Grime and Punishment: Why Best Practices Matter (Part II)

Posted on April 21, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

Yesterday we looked at CLI’s (Central Line Infections), a type of infection that results from the use of a Central line, the needle and flexible tube used to insert an intravenous drip bag. CLI’s are extremely dangerous and expensive, infecting … Continue reading →

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Grime and Punishment: Why Best Practices Matter (Part I)

Posted on April 20, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

We’ve had a lot of discussions on this Blog about metrics and best practices. Because they’re very important. Whenever I talk to colleagues who haven’t adopted a policy of best practices, they assume that A) It’s very difficult to identify … Continue reading →

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Tail Of The Dancing Rat: Exposing Services to User Scrutiny

Posted on April 18, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

Metrics are all around us, all the time. In fact, some of them are pervasive we forget that they’re metrics. 20 or 30 years ago, if you were in the mood for something to eat you might go to your … Continue reading →

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A Cloud Story III: Leapfrogging Isn’t Just For Kids

Posted on April 15, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

Perhaps the most important outcome of Cloud migrations, the real game changer, is that Cloud services can level the playing field. This is not necessarily good news for service managers in big firms. Fortune 500 firms are largely in the … Continue reading →

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A Cloud Story II: Data With A Side of Miso Pork

Posted on April 13, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

Yesterday we spent some time going over a brief definition of the Cloud, some of its history and why everyone is scrambling to adopt Cloud services. Today, we’re going to take a practical look at what it means to the … Continue reading →

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A Cloud Story I: The Coming of the Cloud

Posted on April 12, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

We’ve all hearing stories about Cloud based services and how they’re going to change the way we live and work. If you manage services in a large firm you’re probably hearing little snippets here and there about Cloud projects that … Continue reading →

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