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Expert opinion and lively debate on today's most controversial and critical IT management issues. Learn more...
Our newest resources include:
Business Intelligence: With or Without a Data Warehouse?
Guest Editor: Larissa Moss
In this issue, we’ll look at both sides of the BI debate. You’ll hear from one author who claims the “democratization” of BI has made the enterprise-wide DW irrelevant. You’ll hear from others who predict “serious negative consequences” if organizations abandon the DW — and argue that agile data techniques allow you to throw out the “bureaucratic bathwater” while keeping the DW “baby.” Whether you consider the DW an unnecessary impediment or BI’s best hope, you’ll find plenty of thought-provoking discussion in the April issue of Cutter IT Journal.
Finding a Home for the UI Designer
by Duff Bailey
Despite the immense impact that the user interface (UI) design has on how IT applications are used, perceived, and judged, the discipline of UI design remains a stepchild within the software development process as practiced by most large companies. Typically, UI design is shoehorned between the requirements and design phases. Under great time pressure, a UI designer creates screen mock-ups and perhaps an interface specification that are meant to drive application design and coding. UI designers aren't happy with this arrangement, and complain that the requirements have already defined the UI and all they are doing is making it look pretty. Even as they do that, their output is often derided by application developers as being unworkable. Meanwhile, the sponsor sees the semifunctional mock-up as an indication that the job is almost done.
Project Management 2.0
Guest Editor: Rob Thomsett
Compared to the Dark Ages of the 1960s, when uninformed "senior programmers" thought a Gantt chart was all you needed to manage a project, the state of project management practice should be significantly better today. Universities offer project management programs, we have the Project Management Institute's (PMI) Project Management Body of Knowledge, and a growing number of project managers have been certified by such bodies as the PMI and the Australian and European Institutes of Project Management. To the casual observer, project management has finally arrived as a formal discipline that ensures well-managed projects.
Unfortunately, there is considerable evidence that most organizations still struggle to deliver projects within agreed expectations. Whether the problem is increasing project complexity, the need to prove added value, the growing demands for business ownership, or the pressure for more agile execution, many project managers feel unequipped to deliver projects in a constantly changing environment - despite their formal training.
In next month's issue of Cutter IT Journal, we'll discuss the complex issues surrounding project management in the new global environment. You'll discover how one IT executive is overcoming her PMO's "midlife crisis" by shifting its focus from project execution and metrics to portfolio oversight and business relationship management. You'll learn how your projects can reduce their "Feature-Time-to-Benefit" through a combination of lean, agile, and Toyota Production System (TPS)-inspired techniques. And you'll hear from one author who relates "a typical agile failure story" and argues that we need to go beyond agile project management to ensure that the value project teams deliver represents coherent and complete content. Be sure to tune in next month - the project you save may be your own!
Are organizations better off building BI solutions when they need them and as quickly as they need them ... without a standardized and integrated DW?
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