Technology News You Can Use

October 2008 – Issue XXXX

In This Newsletter

• Social Networking
• Make the Most of a Speaking Opportunity
• Managed Services Market
• Password Security
• Contact Us
• Archived Tech Newsletters
• IT Resource Guide

We are proud to publish the 40th volume of the eTech Newsletter.

Click here to see our first publication from June 2004

At this time, we'd like to express our sincere thanks and appreciation to Katrina Mukherjee, 2004 Editor, for taking the Tech Council's idea and making it a reality.

Social Networking Marci Parrish, TechniSource, A Division of Spherion

The concept of professional networking is as old as the cocktail party, but using  online technology for this purpose is still growing in popularity and new rules are being created and learned daily about how to navigate this world.  Originally launched as a means of social interaction between younger audiences, Web-based social networks have now achieved a grown up status as a great way to share more sophisticated content with others and stay connected to peers-personal and professional-on the Internet.
            For employers, social networks also offer a new strategy for coping with the current economic pressures and ongoing talent shortages.  These challenging times are forcing employers to be more creative in their recruitment efforts in order to find the best possible candidates.  With more employers turning to social networks as a recruiting channel, they have become a terrific medium for building  careers. But be careful, your current employer can find you as well.

Social Networking and Career Development

Social networks provide a fresh avenue for professionals to make new contacts without spending so much time attending mixers or scheduling lunches.  That’s because they offer the ability to reach a universe of individuals who might be able to make valuable introductions or recommendations for you.

Instead of hunting for a specific job, members of the network, look to reach out and expand their network ­ in turn expanding their job opportunities.  Often, building connections with other members, results in accessing top jobs that aren’t published in classifieds or traditional job postings.

The concept behind using social networks to find a job is easy: The more connections you make within the network, the more friends-of-a-friend you can meet, and the better your chances of finding an employer or key contact who can make an introduction that might result in an employment opportunity for you.

Three Social Networking Sites to Explore
           If you have not already done so, there are three major social networking sites you should explore right away if you are serious about expanding your network of professional contacts and building your career development options:

1.       LinkedIn

Take a few minutes to search LinkedIn and I'm sure you'll find lots of contacts from your current and prior employers, clients, vendors, and schools. All those contacts have the potential to help you grow your career or find a new job.  In addition, it can be a good source of employment references, as well as reference checking.  You can also search the Jobs section of LinkedIn by keyword and location or used the Advanced Search option to search by more specific criteria.  The truth is that LinkedIn has reached a point where it's almost unprofessional not to be on LinkedIn. There are members from all 500 of the Fortune 500 companies in 130 different industries.

2.      Facebook

Social networking is not only a great way to market yourself – it’s also a great way to learn about prospective employers who are seeking to find you.  In fact, you might be surprised at some of the companies that have Facebook corporate profiles.  Ernst & Young, for instance, has an extremely robust presence on Facebook, which offers professionals a wide range of valuable information “on topics such as applying and interviewing for careers” with the global firm.  As with other major employers, they are cognizant of the fact that they need employees, and they are willing to think outside the typical recruiting box to attract this generation of job seekers.  These Facebook profiles will provide you with specific information on how to contact the employer or recruiter should you wish to create a dialogue.

3.      MySpace

In addition to companies that use career networking sites, like LinkedIn and Facebook, to recruit, there are employers who use MySpace to scope out candidates for employment.  These companies look through the right lens, understand the communication skills of this generation and are willing to set aside their biases in order to find a terrific candidate.  Don’t worry about scrapping personal interests or hobbies from your profile (assuming there is nothing offensive or inappropriate) because most employers look holistically at the entire candidate and are interested in what they can learn about you as a person. For example, a cutting edge employer, especially in less traditional industries, may not mind a creative profile and will understand the distinction between that person's private life and the employee they may hire.

Conclusion

As with traditional “cocktail party” networking, social networking works best when you don’t really need it to pay off for you.–Let the people seek you out and use it as a long-term career development safety net, rather than a tool for a quick-hit job offer.  So forward-thinking technology professionals won’t wait until they need their social network to get it started, embrace this exciting technology wave and build yours now.

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Making the Most of a Speaking Opportunity, Matt Scherer, Scherer Communications

If you are speaking to thousands, or the local Rotary Club, there are now some excellent, easy ways to publicize it. Bill Leake, the chief executive officer at Apogee Search, and the program chair for the upcoming Austin Innotech eMarketing Summit , suggested that all speakers consider these suggestions for creating "buzz" about their program.

So, here's the start of a checklist for all who want to maximize their reach through on-line tools for their speech:

1) If you have a Twitter (www.twitter.com) account, be sure to twitter about the speech about a week before the event. And, the day of the event, make sure to use this social marketing tool to publicize it. And, of course, after the end of the talk, a short comment about the results would also help.

2) Don't forget your LinkedIn (www.linkedin.com) profile.  If you have a blog or another online press release, create a link to this profile - the more links to your presentation, the higher it will appear in Google search results.

3) If you blog, make sure to add some background on the talk for your readers. Then, link that blog to your Twitter and LinkedIn account.

4) There are three online calendar programs. By using Zvent, (www.zvent.com) Eventful (www.eventful.com) and the Yahoo calendar, you can increase your visibility.

5.) Oh, and don’t forget to record your speech on DVD and “post it” to your blog.  It’s a great way for people to see you in action.

And of course, there are traditional public relations programs such as sending a news release to your local business editor. Most have calendars that publish events, especially if the program is relevant and timely and the cost to attend is reasonable.

Finally, if you are too busy to handle most of this, ask a trusted administrative assistant or your public relations/communications department to help get the word out for you. Or even better, ask your kids!

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Small-Medium Business  (SMB) IT Infrastructure Managed Services Market, Mel Indyk, Mel Indyk & Associates

SMB’s are comfortable paying a provider to fix their hardware or networks if they break, but the idea of contracting for IT infrastructure support before trouble appears is a foreign concept. The SMB  IT infrastructure managed services market has been hyped by vendors as the next big opportunity and has attracted providers from many quarters including hardware vendors, value-added resellers, distributors, and telcos. This market is projected to reach $4.3 billion by 2013 with most of the opportunity skewed to smaller firms of 20 to 99 employees.

The sheer number of companies in the one-to-nine and 1-19 employee segments gives them the appearance of an attractive opportunity. But small Average Deal Sizes, ( ADS’s), and buyer reluctance to commit to contract lengths of greater than one year will make this segment unattractive, especially to providers with high sales costs. This market is best served by providers with extremely low cost of sales and large economies of scale in service delivery. Segment characteristics show a high IT dependency, depending on industry, where they have servers and networks but relatively simple IT infrastructures. They have little or no full time IT staff.  IT support is done on an ad hoc basis. Their IT budget is relatively small, and managed services are a luxury.

Savvy providers can operate profitably in the 20-to-99 employee segment.  Companies in this segment have sufficient complex IT needs to make outsourcing mundane maintenance tasks desirable. Their level of IT dependency makes it relatively easier for providers to prove the business value of managed services.  This segment is most easily reached by VAR’s and managed service providers (MSP’s) that serve as the “trusted  IT advisor” and are intimate with their clients' IT support needs . There is usually one full-time IT staff member who is a generalist and is faced with increased IT complexity and dependency. They have an IT budget, but they manage spending carefully. Their buying behavior is based on value, and they want business class products and services.

Buyers of IT Managed Services have the following concerns and habits in buying IT managed services (use these findings in preparing for your sales offers):

The managed services value proposition is poorly understood because the term is so widely used by providers in their messaging . The buyers have difficulty understanding what “managed services” actually means.  The steep education curve means longer sales cycles for vendors.

Because buyers don’t get the managed services value proposition, they use third party IT support on an as-needed basis, and they are reluctant to spend on services that have no immediate, tangible value.

If there is an internal IT staff, they have fear of outsourcing their own jobs.  This will force providers to sell to business decision-makers. Something that technology driven VAR’s are not comfortable doing. This is less a problem in the sub-20-employee segment, which typically does not have full-time IT staff,

Buyers want to selectively outsource parts of their infrastructure. Selective outsourcing will occur because financial considerations and/or real need.  While selective outsourcing lowers buyer risks, it means smaller deal sizes for service providers.

Buyers do not yet trust service providers enough to adopt managed services. This inhibitor affects small VAR’s and MSP’s most because they lack a track record of managing or meeting service-level agreements ( SLA ’s).  The trust issue also applies to major vendors like Dell and Symantec, despite the strength of their brand.

Therefore let us look at what service providers need to do to sell Managed Services:

1.       Buyers will adopt Managed Services to cope with IT complexity and dependency. They will want to improve the reliability of their critical systems. Insufficient IT resources, increasing IT dependency, and complexity are making buyers in the sub-100 employee segment willing to entrust MSP’s with the most mission-critical pieces of their IT infrastructure like servers, backups, and security.  Managed server and backup services offer providers the wedge in the door for expanding customer relationships, and providers report that cross –selling is a key growth strategy.  This same opportunity does not hold true for 100-to-999 employee segment where IT staff feel they can manage their infrastructure adequately and are less willing to trust a third party with management of critical systems.

2.       Providers need to create service bundles to drive up ADS’s. Bundles will allow service providers to create unique, differentiable offerings. Bundle creation will require providers to broaden their services portfolios and to deliver against SLAs that vary with the bundle.  While bundling can create larger deal sizes, providers must be careful not to price themselves out of the price sensitive sub-100-employee segment.

3.       Providers will learn to market and sell managed services in a market that does not depend on technical  expertise. Providers will hire salespeople from outside of IT and learn to articulate the value of managed services in the context of their prospects’ business needs and current IT support levels. Marketers will have the best success in vertical industries like healthcare, finance, and law.

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Password Security, David Gallant, e-Fense

Network security is a complex process that requires everyone in an organization to do their part to protect the network and its data. The first step in the process is passwords. Passwords are the key to your company's digital kingdom, and good network security starts with a strong password policy that is adhered to by the users and automatically enforced through system controls. One need only read recent headlines about Governor Sarah Palin’s email account being hacked to know the importance of having a good password.  Typically, the weakest links in most network security plans are the users that do not follow your company's policies.  

If a hacker gets a copy of your password file, he/she can typically decrypt it (known as cracking it) in a matter of seconds if it contains weak passwords using tools available on the web.  It can take a hacker weeks or months to crack secure passwords.  To minimize your risk, passwords should follow some basic principles:

1.  Passwords should be long - at least eight characters.

2.  Passwords should never be shared or written down.  Hackers know to look under keyboards, monitors, desk calendars, and other obvious places where users "hide" them. (How many of you are now pulling that little yellow sticky off your monitor?)

3.  The same password should not be used on different accounts.  Users should specifically be advised to not use the same password at work that they use at home.  If one gets compromised, then all their accounts are potentially compromised.

4.  Passwords should be changed periodically.  This is should be determined based on the criticalness of the information on the network.  Every three months is a good starting point - more often if the data is more critical.

5. Passwords should be complex.  Adding a "special character" like the "at sign '@'" or a dash, makes the password stronger.  Requiring a number and capital letter(s) also increases the strength of the password.  

Several years ago I was asked by a client to teach his users the importance of general computer security and in particular, password security. He let me "crack" his password file, which took all of 12 seconds due to the simplicity of most of the passwords.  We noted that nine users from the same section all used the password "vacation."  Most were dictionary-based words that had something in common with the user (easily guessable), and some could not be displayed to the attendees due to their graphic nature.  We used all these points as teaching points.  

Most folks grumble at having to remember a complex, computer generated password and it is burdensome to do so.  However, it’s far more burdensome to have to rebuild your company, your client, list, or your life when a hacker gets into your systems and accounts. In order to help remember all these passwords,  I like to teach  a character substitution process to take a weak password like "vacation" and turn it into a secure password.

Character substitution works on the basic principle that a letter can be replaced by a number or special character that resembles the letter.  For instance, you can replace the letter "a" with the "@" symbol, the "s" with "$" symbol, "O" with "0 (zero)," "l or i" with "1 or !."  By doing this, the weak password "vacation" become "v@c@t10n."  Throw in a capital V and you now have a strong password that is easily remembered.  

Once your co-workers get accustomed to this process, they can easily create their own, easy to remember, secure passwords and reduce the likelihood they develop bad password habits that put your network and your company at risk. 

D@v!d G@11@nt

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