Put on your seat beat

The world is NOT flat; the pancake will NOT be flipped. Instead the world will take on a multiplicity of shapes and will look more like scrambled eggs!

The IT Services world is about to go through a shocking change

Why? Dialtone. Well, ok maybe wireless dialtone. Ubiquitous,low cost access for a myriad of reasons and from a plethora of devices. So far, not rocket science.

What's really going to change the world? MY KIDS and others like them! They live in a different world than do I. Their expectations are instantaneous; their communications, annoyingly continuous. Try having a 5 minute conversation without interruption; impossible, can't be done!

The 20'somethings will be running the world shortly and we better get ready. Their pace is frenetic; their social networking will carry over to the way they solve business problems.

So if you don't yet feel like a dinosaur, get ready, you will. As for me, I'm a RAPTOR and I'm after YOU!

by Robert Stafford on 09/02/09

Bob's blog:

Bob's blog about Facebook potential offers some intriguing possiblities. I think the major concern is usually how to do keep your personal information secure. If you are a food stamp, Family Services,etc etc client - how do you ensure that the world isn't peaking in your portfolio?

Bob has answered this question - it can be made secure. If he is indeed correct, then I vote for Facebook applications.

As a volunteer in the Upper Valley in NH, we see the same sort of disconnect - families moving in and out of the state but no way to get the vital information needed to help them. Again, security is the big issue. This came up in Jerry's roundtable last year - we heard several CIOs talk about promising possibilites for information sharing that were halted for fear of security leaks.

by martha parker on 09/02/09

Shared Services in Tax Collection (Michoacan, Mexico)

Definitely, the crisis is forcing us to review our processes looking to making them more efficient.

In the revenues matter, we are adapting the samples of the Shared Services Summit sending all the tax collection to the banks:

1.- Processes
1.1 To generate the “receipt”(with bar code):
1.1.1 Through internet
1.1.2 At government’s office
1.1.3 At the bank
1.2 To pay the receipt:
1.2.1 By the internet using your credit card
1.2.2 By the internet with a wire transfer
1.2.3 In the bank cashier
1.3 To pick up the “product” (driver’s license, birth records, license plates, etc.)
1.3.1 Directly in the government’s office with your printed and paid receipt

2.- Advantages
2.1 Service
2.1.1 More options for tax payments (nowadays 113, with this project more than 500 bank branches )
2.1.2 Appropriate enlarged schedule to the client's necessities
2.2 Economic
2.2.1 Zero expenses in cash carry.
2.2.2 Low travel expenses (form the 113 municipalities to the capital city)
2.2.3 Income increase
2.2.4 Better qualification form Fitch, Standard & Poor’s and Moody’s = less interest rates for our debts
2.2.5 Employees cannot finance themselves with government's revenues
2.3 Operation
2.3.1 Less Valued Forms to preserve
2.3.2 Accounting on line
2.3.3 Less risk of cash handling
2.3.4 Reduction of corruption
2.3.5 Security that the money is incoming to the Government’s account
3.- Stages
1st Stage: Land Registry Direction, Public Records Direction and Incomes Direction, (starts November 1º)
2nd Stage: The rest of Government units (finished December 31)
4.- Participant Areas
4.1 Areas with payments reception
4.1.1 Ministry of Finance
4.1.1.1 Incomes Direction
4.1.1.2 Cadastre Direction
4.1.1.3 Inspection Direction
4.1.2 Ministry of Gevernance
4.1.2.1 Land Registry Direction
4.1.2.2 Public Records Direction
4.2 Support Areas
4.2.1 Ministry of Finance
4.2.1.1 Accounting Direction
4.2.1.2 Legal Direction
4.2.2 Information Technologies Center of Michoacan
4.2.3 Processes improvement Direction
4.2.4 Controller
4.2.5 Press and Government communication diffusion

Comments welcome!

by ALBERTO ANGULO on 09/03/09

The Achilles Heal of Emergency Response Communications

One place in government where IT innovation is an absolute requirement is public safety communications. Most urgently in North America, the critical point of interface between government and the civilian population is in need of an overhaul. Even though we have seen significant innovation in real time personal communications, the place where your 9-1-1 call would be answered, known as the Public Safety Answering Point, remains based on assumptions that are decades old. Today an estimated 90 percent of all calls to the PSAP arrive on voice-only legacy analog circuits.

Problems that exist include the fact that even though it is the lingua franca of a significant and growing segment of our population, including a large portion of the population of people with disabilities, in the entire US an SMS text message for help can be sent in only one rural county in Iowa (http://www.nena.org/tech/story/iowa-call-center-receives-text-message). In only a few places it is possible for a civilian to provide a picture of an unfolding event and that ability is only possible because of workarounds that are outside the normal workflow for emergency response and law enforcement.

May I invite you to link to the ongoing discussion on my blog (http://avayablog.com/guy_clinch.php). There you will find a growing discussion including my original comments and reader responses about the policy and technology challenges facing the 9-1-1 system in North America. The discussion includes how vendor neutral aspects of the potential investment in this area, so critical to all of us, might increase the safety and security of our society.

From the successful beginnings of the concept in the United Kingdom, to the dramatic benefits that the 9-1-1 system has created North America, to the global expansion of the concept that is occurring most significantly in Europe and the Mideast, the benefits of the three digit ability for civilians to easily reach their government is clear. What isn’t clear is how we bring this important functionality into the current century.

by Guy Clinch on 09/08/09

Federal Government "Game Changers"

Recent events suggest two "game changers" going forward, namely finding CIO's that are willing to say that some of their IT investments are "ill-advised" and should be re-assesed or cancelled (e.g. VA), freeing up resources, and finding IT managers that are willing to compare the costs of currrent IT development and procurement to the use of a "cloud computing store-front) (e.g. GSA) to procure IT infrastructure at lower costs.

by Brand Niemann on 09/10/09