As the number of Web pages grows exponentially, it becomes increasingly important for enterprises to differentiate themselves from the competition. In a world where the competition is just one click away, organizations need strong identities that provide existing and potential customers with the confidence that their needs will be met in the most convenient, reliable way.

There was a good article by Bob Tedeschi in the New York Times (" Retail Battle Returns to the Bricks," http://www.nytimes.com/2000/11/20/technology/20ECOMMERCE.html) that discussed how retailers were sleeping more easily these days, now that they no longer worry about being "Amazoned." It's just one of a couple of dozen articles I've been read

We all know about the demand on IT resources and the resulting need to ensure that the projects we work on are business-justified. Yet we continue to commit valuable team resources to projects that have questionable business cases (if they have one at all).

What do "egoless programming" and "pair programming" have in common?

While the rest of technology marketplace has been in the toilet, Microsoft has been chugging along. Maybe not at a record pace, but it's been minting money. Last time I looked, Microsoft had over $40 billion in cash. Pretty good in a really down market.

"That one decision-gradient diagram was the most important piece of the two-day consulting session," said a product development VP client recently.

"It's difficult to speed up development when management takes weeks to make key decisions," laments a Dublin, Ireland, development group whose company executives are in Silicon Valley.

I met with some IT managers recently to discuss concerns over a decision to revamp enterprise-wide business processes and systems. These managers did not make this decision, yet they were responsible for implementing it. They felt that deploying a software package as a way to revamp their business was an ill-conceived strategy and that the project plan was not viable.

The Object Management Group (OMG) has just announced that it's back in the conference business. It will sponsor INTEGRATE 2001. The conference, which aims to attract about 2,500 attendees, will be held in New York City on 19-21 September 2001.

We often experience depression after a success. As IT managers, we can accept these postsuccess blues and deal with them, or we can ignore them and suffer the consequences. We need to plan for success and for the blues that can follow.

It's been said that the great science fiction writer Isaac Asimov had 10 typewriters in his basement for the multitude of writing projects that he engaged himself with. It's also been reported that the average person can effectively handle only about four concurrent tasks at once, with the maximum being about seven. Clearly, Isaac Asimov was a rare exception in humankind.

When lives are at stake, it pays to learn quickly. The US Army -- in fact, most military and police forces -- uses the concept of an After Action Report (AAR) to promote learning and knowledge transfer. In her recent book, Common Knowledge, author Nancy Dixon characterizes AARs as a form of Serial Transfer of knowledge -- that is, transferring information within a single team, over time.

This is the fifth and last Advisor in my series on risk management.

A couple of weeks ago I wrote an Advisor on the role of people in facilitating flexible e-business systems. A couple of months ago, I wrote an Advisor on the role of expert system and neural network techniques in e-business systems. During this past week, I've been reading a good book that I want to recommend to readers.

More than once, after a brief, preliminary requirements meeting, I have been asked, "So, you know what we want, right?"

A recent survey by Cutter Consortium found that the number-one problem with outsourcing a Web-based project is inadequate project management.