Quanta Blogs

"ITSM isn't Formula One. In ITSM you can make reliable services fast, but you can't always make fast services reliable..."

I’ve always known that the relationship between management, control and customer satisfaction is sometimes difficult. It hasn’t always been clear to organisations that you can have one without neglecting the other and, in fact, it’s not one or the other, but which order should we tackle them in. After all, ITSM should ideally help us to deliver all of the above but doesn’t always manage it.

'I'm not sure if it matters if you are a supply chain supervisor, a project manager, a military commander or a technical team leader, I think this course, more than any other I have done, reinforces the values and strengths you need to be a great leader in whatever field you choose.' 

IT Support Manager, Reed Elsevier Technology Services

Find out more about the Leadership in Action Programme

We all know as a coach our role is to create awareness and enable our coachees to see new options without being prescriptive or leading. So why is it so hard to bite our tongue and hold onto our ‘advice’ when coaching?

I have trained many managers and budding coaches where the common question is always the same – ‘How do I stop giving them advice?’ Understanding this in a logical way seems easy, they can all tell me why it’s important the client comes up with their own way but demonstrating this through practice seems to be a lot harder.  

I found you can sign up for a free 1 month trial of Windows Azure this week and was impressed with its ease of use. You have to enter a credit / debit card and be careful not to let your trial over run. The phone support was very good - I got a call back within 1 hour after I raised an issue and the support staff assured me (azured me?) that when the trial period ends Microsoft  will not charge me unless I explicitly opt in to a paid scheme.  If I don't opt in they said they will keep my set up / data for a period afterwards in case I want to change my mind.

The problem with IT security is in the name: traditionally it focussed too much on technology, concerning itself with controls and mechanisms, forgetting the very reason behind it: safeguarding organisational assets. The net result being disproportional protection measures: either safeguarding every asset which bore a high cost, or insufficient protection failing to save valuable assets - their value only realised once a security incident occurred.

Within traditional project management, we're all familiar with the time-cost-quality diagram. Let's consider that we want to build a stadium; the features are fixed and agreed on at the start. Let's consider for example that we'd like a stadium with 20,000 seats.  It's the time and cost which no matter how well they're estimated will be the variables; there might well be a delay in delivery of concrete which is likely to extend the duration of the project or the price of steel has suddenly gone up which will increase the project's cost.

With technology moving at such a fast pace, the saying: 'there's an app for that' can most definitely be applied to project management. Here are a few online tools we've handpicked which should make your project management life easier:

For managing the whole team

Helping people and businesses achieve extraordinary things is what we stand for - and this by no means stops at training. We are passionate about helping businesses grow as in turn it keeps people in employment and strengthens the British economy.

Do you like the idea of Agile but don't know your Scrum from your Kanban or your AgilePM from your PRINCE2 Agile?

Fear not - we've put together a small set of multiple-choice questions asking you about how your team currently handles projects. Our Agile Assessment Methodology Tool will indicate what mix of Agile methodology is best-suited to you and your team.