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Technology News You Can UseFebruary 2007 – Issue XXIIIIn This Newsletter
Letter from the Chair, Zandra Pulis, CPS EnergyGreetings, Thanks for checking out this month’s Tech Newsletter! I trust you’ll find it chock full of interesting and valuable information. In this issue, you’ll learn some good, practical tips on presenting IT to your Board and senior management, as well as how you can use the power of internships to shore up your company’s talent. Also of great value is Eric Cerynar’s article on protecting your trade secrets – grab your highlighter, there are some really good suggestions on ways to keep your secrets secret. There’s even a human interest component in the newsletter: thanks to Matt Reedy for his article on the One Laptop Per Child Project – the vision and fruition of the project are truly inspiring! So what are you waiting for – read on, enjoy, and learn! Zandra Pulis CPS Energy
Presenting IT to your Board of Directors, Mel Indyk, Indyk and Associates
My friend of 20 years, George Colony, Chairman and Things
Your
When strategic projects require substantial IT contribution, you may be invited to make a direct appeal for board support of that investment, explaining current problems, proposed solutions, and cost/benefits. For example, the total project bill for a firm integrating its revenue processes after multiple acquisitions may require board approval for system consolidation, IT staffing reduction, or new software purchases. Your presentation to the board should be brief---lasting no more than 10 minutes with an additional 5 minutes for questions—and should avoid technology jargon, architecture diagrams, and three-letter acronyms. Ideally, the presentations should be simple and graphical, with your voice-over commentary relating the content to problems and opportunities the board will recognize and care about. To meet these criteria—whatever type of presentation or topic that is requested—your presentation to the board should contain around eight slides as follows: Presentation segment—Linking IT with key business strategies. The Description of the business strategies should be listed then the IT principles driven by the business strategies. Another Presentation segment may be the Status and proposals with the Description showing an Update, or a brief Review. The last Presentation segment may be Critical success factors with Description showing Executive support, Funding, and Next steps. Finally, IT execs rightly note that when business execs allow IT ignorance in their ranks, ignoring technology’s potential and failing to listen to advice from experienced IT staff members, the firm is a big loser. George (Forrester) recommends assessing IT knowledge in the areas of costs, impacts, benefits, IT business plans and demand management. .Top Internships: A Win-Win Approach to Solving the Talent Shortage by Bruce Howard, Career Services, UTSAYou cannot pick up a business periodical today without reading about the talent shortage in this country. Every business is realizing that the baby boomer generation is going out the back door to retirement and there are not enough new employees entering the front door to replace them. All organizations must have people to manage and operate the business and fortunately there is a way to generate that “pipeline” of talent for your company. By investing time in developing a student internship program for your company, you will find a new source of human resources. To prepare for this initiative, you will want to focus on the following issues in developing your internship program to make it successful. Make it a real job If there is anything that turns off a student intern quicker than taking away their iPod, it is having them file, fax and fumble with papers all the time. Students want to engage in meaningful work, something that directly contributes to the success of the company. They have listened and learned various theoretical principles in school and now they want to apply them to the real world. Have a job description prepared before you begin the search for an intern. Meet with your other employees to ensure they agree with the tasks you anticipate the intern to be responsible for completing. And then select someone to be the intern’s supervisor. Just as in a “real job”, the intern will need support, direction, help with prioritizing tasks, etc. so the supervisor selected must be prepared to assume this very important role. Training, training, training, Don’t plan to scrimp on the training of an intern. If you invest the time up front, they will be a more productive employee and will consider their position important and relevant to the team. Interns today want to experience new things and training will provide them with the ability to branch out in the company later on if opportunities come up. Training sessions will also allow you to evaluate the intern’s abilities and technical skills so you may determine if they have the potential for other jobs. Remember, training an intern does not have to be a chore. It can be a great way for you and your other employees to develop and hone your own management skills. Plan ahead Most students start looking for internship opportunities way before the school semester begins. Meet with your company’s management team early to determine if there is a need for an intern in helping them accomplish their operational goals and objectives. This need will help drive the creation of the internship program and provide a means to identify what resources are needed for under the current business plan. Early marketing of the internship opportunity will also help you attract the more qualified talent as these are the students who have their own goals thought out which may include an internship experience. Get what you pay for Interns may be cheap, but they are typically not free. Most internships are paid and usually at a current market rate for the type of work the student is performing. Other factors that influence the pay rate are the number of hours a student intern works each week and any special technical skills that may be required for the position. True, there comes a time when a business or organization is unable to budget any type of direct salary for the internship, but a stipend for covering expenses or possibly a scholarship donation to the student for future education expenses would be appropriate. Many students must work to help pay for their college expenses so they will be looking for paid positions when they began their search for an internship. It may appear that having an intern in your business is a bargain but they are far from without cost. Finding, training and managing an intern is a job in itself. However, if you do it right, you will have an energetic, enthusiastic employee to help you grow your business. Doing it wrong will just bring you more headaches. You are not alone however in this endeavor as most college and university career centers have personnel on staff to help you with development of a program as well as providing a means to locate potential candidates. Use this resource to help you prepare a winning scenario for you, your business and the future workforce. One Laptop Per Child – “It’s an education project, not a laptop project” Matt Reedy, Armida TechnologiesBegun by former MIT Media Lab Director Nicholas Negroponte, the One Laptop per Child (OLPC, also known as the “$100 laptop”) project has the lofty goal of providing “children around the world with new opportunities to explore, experiment and express themselves.” Since the turn of the 21st century, a rapid convergence of progressively lower-cost computer hardware, sophisticated easy-to-use software, and a growing awareness of the so-called “digital divide” between the West and poorer third-world countries has been occurring, creating an opportunity for social change. Because “a computer uniquely fosters learning by allowing children to think, and then think about thinking, in ways that are otherwise impossible,” an idea was born to provide a very inexpensive yet powerful computer to millions of children in underdeveloped countries. The project gained momentum when Negroponte, in January 2005, sketched out his idea for an inexpensive portable computer to his friend, Hector Ruiz, CEO of computer chip maker AMD. Mr. Ruiz responded with enthusiasm, and soon, News Corp. and Google joined AMD as founding members of the project. To date, the project itself has received at least $29 million in funding from these members and more. While Negroponte was not exactly sure how the price of a laptop could be driven down to $100, he knew that he could rely on market forces that, when faced with a compelling grand vision, could apply vast resources to solve this challenge. The computer needed to be rugged, portable, battery-operated for long periods of time, wireless, have a lifetime of up to 5 years, and be intuitive for children to learn and use. The OLPC computer, known as XO, has evolved into a device about the size of a textbook and lighter than a lunchbox. A unique design and hinge mechanism allow the laptop to be configured as a standard laptop, an e-book for reading, or a gaming device. It uses NiMH batteries and sophisticated battery management software. Where power is not available, the XO can be hand powered by a crank, a pedal, or a pull-cord. It uses flash memory instead of a mechanical hard drive to minimize failures. Its plastic enclosure is thicker than that of typical laptops to improve durability.
XO’s software uses portions of Red Hat's Fedora Core 6 (Linux) and five programming environments: Python, Javascript, Csound (a programmable music and audio environment), Squeak (a version of Smalltalk) and Logo. The computer will include a web browser built on Xulrunner (used by Firefox), a document viewer, a word processor, an RSS reader, an email client, chat client, VOIP client; a journal, a wiki with WYSIWYG editing; a multimedia authoring and playback environment; a music composition toolkit, graphics toolkits, games, a shell and a debugger. The current user interface, called Sugar, starts up in a basic home screen with a stick-figure icon at the center (representing the user), surrounded by a white ring, containing the applications the user is running. The entire desktop has a black frame with more icons; programs are launched by clicking an icon within the black frame. These computers, now costing about $150 but expected to decrease in price with mass production, are in various stages of testing. The machines are being made by Quanta Computer Inc., and countries that purchase them will get models that are tailored to their own languages. The software is evolving quite rapidly through assistance from the open source community. By July 2007 or so, many million are expected to reach the already-committed countries of Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Nigeria, Libya, Pakistan, Thailand and the Palestinian territory. Governments or donors will buy the laptops for children to own, along with associated server equipment for their schools. While the prospects for the success of this project are being debated, along with the question of whether or not the money should be spent on more basic things such as food and shelter, one must be impressed with Negroponte’s vision and drive to execute this mission. Regardless of the outcome, everyone worldwide will benefit from the improvements in technology that are required to bring One Laptop per Child to fruition. Web sites: Protecting Trade Secrets from Former Employees Eric Cernyar, Gunn & Lee, PCMost employers, and technology companies in particular, have trade secrets that they want to safeguard from exiting employees. A trade secret is “any formula, pattern, device or compilation of information which is used in one’s business and presents an opportunity to obtain an advantage over competitors who do not know it.” In re Bass, 113 S.W.3d 735, 739 (
For information to qualify for trade secret protection, a company must take steps to keep that information secret. For something to be a “trade secret,” it must be information that “is not generally known or readily ascertainable by independent investigation.”
What can a company do to guard its trade secrets from an exiting employee? If there is no written confidentiality or non-compete agreement, certain “default” rules apply. By default, an employee has a (1) continuing duty of confidentiality, even after the employment ends, regarding his employer’s trade secrets, even if the employee never signed a confidentiality agreement; (2) right to go into competition, and may even plan and take active steps to go into competition while still employed, without disclosing his plans to the employer – provided he does not appropriate his employer’s trade secrets, solicit his employer’s customers while still working for the employer, or carry away confidential information; and (3) right to use in subsequent employment the general talent, knowledge, skill, and experience he acquired during employment. See Johnson v. Brewer & Pritchard, P.C., 73 S.W.3d 193, 201-202 (Tex. 2002); Hill v. Mobile Auto Trim, Inc., 725 S.W.2d 168, 172 (Tex. 1987); Miller Paper Co. v. Roberts Paper Co., 901 S.W.2d 593, 600-601 (Tex. App. - Amarillo 1995, no writ). However, as a general rule, in the absence of an enforceable agreement not to compete, a former employee – after he leaves his employment – may solicit the former employer's clients, provided that he does not use confidential information to do so. See Sands v. Estate of Buys, 160 S.W.3d 684, 687 (
An employer can better protect itself by obtaining signed confidentiality and non-compete agreements from its employees, before they leave. See Williams v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 882 F. Supp. 612, 616 (S.D. Tex. 1995) (“Unsigned handbooks are generally regarded as insufficient memoranda of an employment contract and may not satisfy the Statute of Frauds.”). The confidentiality agreement should broadly define what the employer regards as confidential or proprietary information. The non-compete agreement should be carefully drafted to comply with the Texas Covenant Not to Compete Act’s criteria for enforceability. See Tex. Bus. & Comm. Code §§ 15.50-15.52. To be enforceable, the restrictions set forth in a non-compete agreement must be reasonable with respect to time, geographical area, and scope, and must not be greater than necessary to protect the goodwill or other legitimate business interest of the employer. Also, the non-compete agreement must be supported by consideration – for example, by furnishing the employee with trade secrets – and designed to enforce an “ancillary” obligation by the employee – such as the employee’s obligation not to misuse or disclose the employer’s trade secrets. It is important that a non-compete agreement be tailored to the particular employee or job description. Non-compete restrictions that might be reasonable for a company’s salespersons may not be reasonable for the company’s accountants or engineers. If a court finds that a non-compete agreement is overreaching, the court will reform the agreement to make it reasonable and may award the employee his attorneys’ fees in defending the action to enforce the agreement. See id. § 15.51(c). In Rimkus Consulting Group, Inc. v. Budinger, 2001
For more information, or assistance in drafting these agreements, employers should solicit the services of an experienced intellectual property attorney.
Technology Chair, Zandra Pulis, CPS Energy
Newsletter Editor, John Tomblin, DataTitan North Chamber Contact |
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