Tag Archives: Networking

What will your next network look like?

My latest feature for TechRepublic includes conversations with five IT experts who demonstrate how the next-generation network needs to be flexible, responsive and ready for changing business demands.

It’s one thing giving your employees access to information on the move, but it is quite another to create the type of network that can cope with the continuing demand for data and devices, both now and in the future. How can CIOs create an information network that can deal with the evolving requirements of internal and external customers?

Analyst Ovum estimates 70 percent of large companies have extensive networking requirements, with CIOs at such firms recognising that increased complexity in business applications is pushing the demand for a more sophisticated management approach.

“Apps are cascading through the organisation in every way, from workflow and testing through to e-commerce and billing,” says David Molony, principal analyst at Ovum. “CIOs now have to deal with the interconnectedness of machines. And it means IT leaders are looking for more flexibility and responsiveness in the networks that their businesses use.”

To read the rest of the feature, please click here.

Is the PSN really a shortcut to shared services?

While the network of networks for public sector organisations is gathering pace, my latest piece for Guardian Government Computing examines the obstacles that could lie ahead for greater take up of shared services:

In austere times, the sharing of services – from back office processes to communications infrastructure and software – is viewed as a simple way to cut duplication and generate efficiencies.

But cost-cutting aside, the take up of shared services may get a further boost from the PSN (public services network). It is anticipated that as many as 80% of public sector employees, or four million individuals, will be using the PSN by the end of 2014, and the two key frameworks that govern the network of networks are expected imminently.

The government hopes the PSN will provide a significant support for the shared services approach, helping organisations to change the way they work together. If that vision is to become reality, there could be more than one bump in the road, according to chief information officers (CIOs). Linda Herbert, director of IT at the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS), recognises the timing of the PSN is expedient.

To read the rest of the feature, please click here.