Stories about: Boss

Anyone who has worked in IT for more than five minutes knows that the field has been in a dramatic transformation for the past 10 years, invading and conquering other organizational domains such as communications and security, while also wrestling with the new issues that technology has wrought such as employee mobility. In most organizations, IT has had to transform itself from a bunch of techies installing and troubleshooting equipment to a key enabler of business strategy and competitiveness.

Recently, I discussed some management strategies and skills that can help you in your pursuit of a network manager position.

Mission statements help define an organization's direction and inspire employees to achieve corporate goals. Unfortunately, countless mission statements are meaningless, forgettable and totally ineffective. Many are merely an uninspiring collection of buzzwords that could have been written by Dilbert's boss. If that describes yours, you have work to do!

Fresh Start for Disabled Veterans

Whether you were born in the swinging sixties or are part of the slacker generation, some security experts say generational social influences can give you bad habits and make you an office liability.

Bruce Marcus, the executive vice president and CIO of The McGraw-Hill Companies, answers questions about moving into leadership positions, dealing with a difficult boss and the impact of the economy on IT.

The Boston Police Department has demonstrated its Web 2.0 savvy by using blogging software and online video to highlight the case of alleged kidnap victim Reigh Rockefeller. While the department's blog has only basic features and does not permit discussion of the case, updates relating to the kidnapping have been posted within hours of new developments and information on the blog has been reposted by local and national media organizations.

Ever pass by a co-worker's unattended computer and consider taking a peek at her e-mails? Or have you ever thought it would be a funny prank to figure out your cube mate's e-mail password and break into his work account to mess with him?

You've worked your way up the ladder, from cable jockey to network technician to network administrator.

Y2K had come and gone, and in February of 2000 I was summarily laid off with a group of about 150 other folks, none of us aware that we'd been secretly hired as temp help in case Y2K went badly. It was 3 days before my son was born, and I needed a job (I mean, have you seen the COBRA rates?). I took the first thing that was offered and started the following week with an IT consulting outfit. It was a lot more driving than I wanted, and the clients were never closer than 50 miles from me, but it was a job, and I was still looking. After about three months, I had another offer coming together from somewhere else and was looking forward to a change when I was dispatched to a business that was a compound first name. I'll change the name, but it was like "JoeBob." I'd heard the name but was unfamiliar, and after the long haul there, I was surprised to find a big hole in the ground.

"We have come into real contention [for mindshare] in the enterprise," said Tim O'Reilly, CEO at O'Reilly Media, in his keynote address at OSCON, last week's Open Source convention in the US. "So we should be patting ourselves on the back, right? I'm not so sure."