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It’s been a tough year for IT, and it’s been especially challenging for IT executives hoping to advance their careers. Now that the dust is settling, many IT executives, who have put in their time and worked miracles during the economic downturn, are looking for a promotion.

But it may not happen, and it’s a smart move to assess why, according to an article in Certification Magazine. Here are a few of the magazine’s reasons:

• Your boss doesn’t know you want a promotion because you were not direct about your demands.
• Nobody knows you. No matted how great you are, if your name is not widely know throughout the company that could hurt you.
• You don’t look at the big picture, or you haven’t demonstrated that you have a broader view of the company and your role.
• You are lacking a crucial skill for the position.
• Your boss doesn’t think you’re ready for the next step.

For more on handling the promotion itch:
- see this Certification Magazine article

The IT world has been an amazing boon to business, supplying companies with streams of data and information to assess the marketplace, make strategic decisions and informed judgments. But do we have too much data, and do we know what to do with it all?

The Economist reports that by one estimate, we created 150 exabytes (billion gigabytes) of data in 2005. This year, we will create 1,200 exabytes.

“Merely keeping up with this flood, and storing the bits that might be useful, is difficult enough. Analyzing it, to spot patterns and extract useful information, is harder still,” the magazine notes.

Yet it points out that the deluge of data is transforming business, government, science and everyday life. And the data can be used for good and perhaps for purposes that are less than pure.

At the moment, credit card companies have mastered the ability to gather and make good use of the data in their possession. Retailers, supermarkets, drug makers and other businesses use data mining quite effectively to determine buying patterns and trends, and to target their marketing. But as the Economist notes, law enforcement and intelligence agencies are not linked together as they should be. The same can be said for the emerging electronic health records industry that still has a long way go.

And then there are the risks–data stolen and computers hacked. Rather than owning and controlling their data, people and companies very often find that they have lost control of it or do not know how to use it effectively.

The key, says the magazine, is “learning to cope with the data deluge, and working out how best to tap it.”

For more:
- see this Economist article

We’ve all been there before: You sense your job is on the line. You’re not really sure but you have a feeling that things in your world may change.

InfoWorld.com has put together a slideshow of warning signs to pay attention to if your IT job shows signs of shifting.

Here are a few of them:

• They took away your hot new computer system and gave you an old one.
• Your performance review looks bad, really bad.
• You become an old mentor and the younger staffers in the office refer to you as that “dinosaur.”
• You are pulled off a strategic project and put on a “special” one.
• There’s a digital paper trail noting your every move and what you are doing.

If the signs start appearing, it may be time to survey the landscape and keep moving. It sure will be hard, but we know that you will be able to navigate your way out of a bad situation eventually.

For more on bad signs at work:
- See this InfoWorld.com article

We’ve all had great bosses in the workplace, and most of us have faced terrible ones, as well. It’s often a complicated issue in the IT world, where managers are skilled computer experts but sometimes fail miserably at managing employees and helping them achieve their career goals.

What are you supposed to do when you have the bad luck of getting a boss who cannot help you do the best job you can or get to the next level on your career path? Believe it or not, you are not at a dead end. It is possible to get ahead even when your boss is unwilling or unable to support your ambitions.

Here’s some advice from the experts, according to a CIO.com article:

• Take matters into your own hands. Start working on auxiliary issues within your team.
• Do your own networking. Reach out to other teams to find out what they are up to and how you could be part of their project.
• Be clear on what you have to offer in your drive to get ahead.
• Ask for what you want.
• Stay friendly with the problem boss even if you think it’s hard to even look him or her in the eye.

We’re not even talking about the boss who isn’t competent or the one who has a bad temper. How about the one who plays favorites, often picking the wrong IT worker to do the job?

I have a friend who once worked in an intolerable IT situation. Her boss was a very nice guy but didn’t really know what he was doing. As a result, she was at the office until 10 p.m. every night, trying to do what the boss irrationally wanted. It was tedious and tiring. After a while, the folks further up the ladder realized he was a problem and transferred him to a new, less onerous job.

He was happy. So was my friend who began working with a new boss, a better manager and someone helping her move along on her own career path. Hope you get that lucky.

For more on dealing with a difficult boss:
- see this CIO.com article

Pagers, PDAs and floppy disks are all technologies of the past. But other obsolete technology lingers on. Sometimes it’s the cost of replacement that keeps them alive. Other times, it’s just a comfort level that IT shops are not willing to give up.

CIO.com put together a list of technology that should be retired. Here are some of the website’s picks:

• Fax Machines – You’d be surprised at the number of organizations that tell someone, “Fax it to me.” Faxed documents usually start out in a digital form. Then they are converted to a paper format. Then the fax scans it back into a digital format. What a waste. Time to send the fax machine to the tech museum.
• www – Time to retire this prefix for addresses. The browser fills it in for you even when you don’t type it. So why duplicate efforts?
• Business cards - These are an idea whose time is long gone. Everything is online these days, including business calling cards.
• Landline phones – About the only reason to have one at home is if you live in an area where there are blackouts that take down a cellular tower.

There are plenty of other antiques I would add to this list, starting with dial-up service and desktops. Mobile apps and social networks are making email ancient too.

We understand how difficult it is to get rid of tried-and-true technology, but we’re sure there are better tools on the market and remarkable ones just around the corner.

For more on obsolete technology:
- see this CIO.com article

We’ve been asking for more than a year about what IT jobs will be hot when the recession ends. Now that time is just about here, and we have a general idea of what will be hot.

There is new demand for specialized skills, as well as some tried-and-true ones to keep the shop operating. Computerworld’s survey of the hottest IT skills for 2010 includes:

• Programming/Application Development – These skills are needed to meet the demand for new systems and projects.
• Help Desk/Technical Support - This skill set is at the bottom of the bottom rung, but every IT shop has a strong demand for people who make the help desk hum in 2010. It may be the fastest way to get your foot in the door.
• Networking - There aren’t enough networking professionals out there to handle the growing complexity of networks and the stresses placed on them by virtualization, cloud computing and security demands.
• Project Management - There’s a growing demand for professionals who understand technology and how it fits in the overall business strategy.
• Security - We’re not sure why this isn’t at the top of the list. We would place it as the biggest challenge for IT executives this year. The need for IT professionals to be well-schooled in cybersecurity skills should be at the top of anybody’s list.
• Business Intelligence - BI skills are growing in importance especially for small and midsize companies that don’t have the budget to do a year’s worth of R&D.

For more on IT skills in demand:
- check out this Computerworld.com article

It’s been such a long, tough year for just about everyone, so it’s great that 2009 is finally coming to an end. And it definitely looks like there’s a light at the end of the tunnel as 2010 arrives.

The recession is just about ending–if you listen to the predictions of pundits and experts with their finger on the pulse of IT. And we expect plenty of changes on the bumpy road that IT has been on for the last year.

Here are a few of our predictions for the coming year:

IT jobs – Yes there will be more IT jobs in the coming year as companies rev up their depressed workforces. But it may not be as many as you would expect. Companies got used to doing more with less, and they may carry that lesson with them in 2010. In addition, it looks like there will be more contract work in 2010, not less. A company that got used to part-time help may extend that practice into the next year. So get used to the idea that there may be more part-time work and the scaled-back IT workforce may not be beefed up.

Cloud computing – It’s been on the upswing lately because it saves money. It’s no longer the temporary rage, but a smart move for IT shops to head in this direction. There is a cost attached to it and security concerns, so companies are cautiously looking into the cloud.

IT security – There is a never-ending war cry for help in this critical area. Wherever you look in this past year, industries were hacked by outsiders or from the inside from careless employee habits. The New Year is going to be a time to get smart about security. IT staff will need more training on how to prevent a leak. And companies will be spending a lot more money for the security that prevents a catastrophe. All of this will take profits away from the bottom line, but it’s far better to be overly cautious than careless in today’s world of security failures.

Social networking – Whether you tweet or friend, blog or wiki, there’s a new way of communicating at every level on a personal and business basis. And if you haven’t joined the movement, you are behind the times because email is so yesterday. It’s time for you to investigate this trend, consult with the best and figure out how to get on board. Your customers certainly are looking for social networks and you should be, too, if you want to stay on top of advertising your goods and services, not to mention defining your customers. It’s still a tough road for those of you who are used to email and not social media. It’s time to get with it; It’s essential.

Data centers – They are here to stay, but they will be smaller and likely available in your cloud computing environment. Take advantage of this expansion, and save money to boot.

Mobile workforce – Your workforce is not sitting still in the office. They like working from home or anywhere but the office. A mobile workforce will give you a chance to find better workers who want the flexibility of telework. And it will require you to be uber-secure in making sure your telework ranks are as secure as your office.

Better training – The new decade should signal better training for your workforce, and that means setting up a proactive strategy. Teach your workers not to use P2P sites or their own computers for their work. Train them to avoid opening strange emails with attachments. And make sure they change their password every three months, making them unique and hard to duplicate. There’s plenty of spam heading your way, so it’s essential that your workforce avoid it all. Keep the staff informed about hack attacks and on alert for any strange communication. It might be from their mother, but they should be asking whether it really is before opening an email.

We’re expecting lots of new developments in 2010, and will report them as soon as they happen. Incorporate the caution that you have learned in the past year, but be ready to pass ‘Go’ on Jan. 1, 2010 with renewed vigor.

I once had a boss who wanted to see his workers all the time. He didn’t want anyone going to a meeting or out to lunch. He wanted to see everyone working at all times.

He would not have done well in today’s telecommuting environment, a trend that is growing by leaps and bounds. For starters, a manager has to trust that the employee will be working and not playing pool or watching TV while teleworking.

And the boss has to realize that it’s practical for a lot of reasons. It unites workers in many disparate places. It saves money–the cost of gathering workers in one place, and it makes for a happier workplace with employees who excel at working offsite, most likely at home.

If you don’t have a telework task force, you better find the time to get one. Any manager, but especially an IT one, needs to address the unique challenges faced by teams working together in a virtual world.

Here are tips from CIO.com on how to make the virtual workplace a better workplace:

• Make sure all team members are in close communication whether they are in Dallas or Detroit.
• Create a collaborative mindset. Eliminate competition among your team and you will have smoother sailing with a common goal.
• Make sure your team knows its goals, where they are going and how to get there.
• Establish clear performance standards. There’s nothing worse than staring at a computer screen, not knowing what you should be doing.
• Email communications to team members so everyone is on the same page.

You may be resistant to telecommuting, but it’s not going away. It’s becoming the norm rather than the exception. As a manager, it’s your time to embrace it.

For more on telecommuting:
- see this CIO.com article

It’s that time of year when we are all looking back to evaluate 2009. What can be categorized as the best of times and the worst? How can we learn from these and what can we change?

CIO magazine came up with one of the best lists we’ve seen: “Top 10 technology stories for 2009.” And it pays tribute to a year of enormous change when the recession cut off many enterprising ideas, social networking came of age and some IT titans took risks in an ever-volatile market.

Here are a few of their top stories:

• Microsoft launches Windows 7, leaving Vista in the dust, thankfully.
• Microsoft buys Yahoo for $44.6 billion; a deal which includes Microsoft’s Bing running Yahoo’s search site. Are you listening, Google?
• Government 2.0 becomes a reality when President Obama takes office. Transparency is in, and information previously hidden in the government’s dark, dank corners becomes easily accessible on the web.
• Steve Jobs makes a comeback again. He went on leave, received a liver transplant and came back to work. A pancreatic cancer survivor, he is a classic example of the bionic man.
• The social networking revolution: Twitter steps in as a communication tool that never existed before, providing real-time information around the world.

While all of the news articles may appear to be just a blip in your world, many of them may have an impact on your IT challenges in the future. It’s like the well-known parable that says, a butterfly that flaps its wings in one part of the world may set off a tornado in another.

For more on best tech stories in 2009:
- see this CIO.com article

If you want to make money in an IT job, become an information security manager according to Computerworld’s latest salary survey. Network engineer/wireless network engineer, business intelligence analyst, software developer and storage administrator/architect/engineer are specialties that are not far behind for the best paying jobs in the business, according to the survey of nearly 6,000 professionals.

The salary increases for these jobs were small this year–ranging from 1.4 percent to 2.3 percent, but career experts say the potential for salaries to grow in these fields is enormous.

Ralph Spencer Poore, chief cryptologist at Cryptographic Assurance Services LLC, a security consulting firm in Arlington, Texas, says he’s not surprised to see “information security manager” top the list of biggest compensation increases.

“It’s a blossoming field internationally and has undergone a great deal of maturing, so there has been tremendous growth as a career,” he tells Computer World. As a result, information security jobs have become elevated in organizations, putting upward pressure on pay.

“If you had the title of information security manager in the ’70s–it was a rare title–you were paid as a programmer. Now you’re at a director’s level, at the vice president level or higher in stature in a company, commanding that kind of salary,” Poore says. But there aren’t enough top security professionals to meet the growing demand, he says, and that pushes up pay, too.

There are plenty of top-paying jobs throughout the IT ranks, according to the survey. Here are just a few:

• Vice president of e-commerce: $124,125
• Internet technology architect: $129,348
• Data warehousing manager: $98,408
• Help desk manager: $70,000
• Communications specialist: $81,594
• Database administrator: $84,120
• E-commerce specialist: $69,05

The next question is how to find these jobs. Not as hard as you think, according to many experts.

“Jobs are simply packaging. You take competencies and cluster them and give them a name. So you want to focus on what needs these jobs take care of, and what are the competencies,” Caela Farren, president of MasteryWorks Inc., a career consulting firm in Falls Church, Va., tells Computer World.

Other skills expected to experience an increase in demand include those dealing with cloud computing and managed services, wireless and telecommunications network engineering, and energy engineering, according to Todd Thibodeaux, president of CompTIA.

While you may not have a crystal ball, it’s probably a good idea to scour the IT landscape to identify what’s hot and what’s not.

For more on the best IT salaries:
- see this Computerworld.com article