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Forsythe Authored Articles


2008 Articles

The New IT Alignment Gap
Cindy Elzinga, Senior Vice President, IT Strategy
Baseline 11.26.2008
The gap between application development and IT operations management is escalating. With the rise of new technologies, the lack of energy spent on maximizing existing IT infrastructure, the lack of coordination between application groups and operations, and the lack of retiring legacy systems and older software, the IT alignment gap is showing signs of being widened by IT itself.

Getting the Best from a Network Implementation Services Provider: Finding and Choosing the Right Firm

Raymond Nahorniak, Director, Solutions Delivery
Internet Telephony 11.01.2008
Ask the manufacturer for recommendations.The manufacturer typically has a stake in ensuring that their products will be implemented effectively, and thus are careful in qualifying the partners they recommend. Ask members of your user group community: Who has had a similar project delivered? What was their experience? Do the appropriate manufacturer support relationships exist if their assistance is required? Ask for what you want: Narrow the selection to two candidates and begin the quote process with both using a non-mission critical project. How does each provider respond?

Finding the Right Service Desk Software
Eric Nelson, Master Consultant
Cathy Parmly-Basnett, ITSM Consultant
ITSMWatch.com 10.10.2008
With the adoption of ITIL soaring into high gear, the evolution of the service desk technologies to support the services delivery is a critical step. Vendors are racing to develop service desk technology that align with ITIL processes in order to provide additional value and enable organizations to transform their IT departments into service organizations. Service desks are no longer confined to basements or considered an afterthought. They are an integral part of organizations' successful delivery of business services, providing maximum value.

Leasing 2.0: It's Time for Some Changes
John Carcone, Senior Vice President, Financial Services
World Leasing News 09.18.2008
John Carcone, senior vice president of financial solutions at Forsythe, takes the leasing industry to task for a history of customer –friendly practices among some lessors that have given leasing a bad name. He also offers some concrete remedies.

The Business Transformation Value of IP Telephony
Anthony Iadisernia, Director, Network Solutions
Internet Telephony 09.01.2008
Increased productivity and customer satisfaction are the top priorities for any business today. To accomplish this, people need the ability to work seamlessly with one another, both within organizations and across networks of partners, suppliers and customers. Organizations attempting business transformation are finding that a key to improving productivity, business responsiveness and innovation is to deliver a variety of collaboration tools while accommodating work style preferences.

Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery: How to Prepare Your Business
Michael Croy, Director, Business Continuity Solutions
eWeek.com 07.24.2008
Companies frequently don't like to think about business continuity, disaster recovery, the expense of hot sites or even off-site storage. But, as Michael Croy explains, you have to ask yourself how much you're willing to lose. If you can't afford to lose it, then BC/DR is for you.

Optimize Your Data Center Migration with ITIL
Mike Tainter, Director, IT Service Management
ITSMWatch.com 07.21.2008
Businesses today are in constant motion, and growth often necessitates bigger data centers and greater capability. Migration of a data center is a major challenge—an exercise in process maturity, project management and business continuity. Using ITIL best practices can lead to a streamlined migration and deliver greater maturity in the new environment.

Worth the Bandwidth after All: Rethinking Web 2.0 Collaboration Tools
Joel Pogar, Director, Network Solutions and Security Practice
Internet Telephony 07.01.2008
Every business wants a competitive edge. There is always a demand to use technology for faster communication with more data. However, the greatest business tool of tomorrow is not more speed, more storage or faster processing; it’s Web 2.0 applications that leverage the power of collaboration.

Tech Road Map: EKMI
David Brown, Managing Consultant, Security Advisory Services
InformationWeek.com 06.28.2008
Information security pros do put stock in encryption--it was named the third-most-effective security practice in our most recent Strategic Security Survey, behind only firewalls and antivirus products. However, there have been obstacles along the path to ubiquitous encryption of data, including weak ciphers, deployment and integration issues, and, perhaps most notably, key management.

Creating an Actionable ITSM Roadmap
Robert Simmons, Master Consultant, IT Service Management
ITSMWatch.com 05.13.2008
One thing to keep in mind while scoping each project is to avoid trying to do too much, too quickly. A large project should be broken into phases wherein critical gaps and quick wins are addressed first. Later phases can then expand upon the successes of earlier phases. As time progresses, continue to review and evolve the roadmap based upon the current conditions, priorities and information at hand.

A Winning Recipe for Successful VoWiFi Deployment and Operation
Darrell L. Epps, Director, Network Solutions
Internet Telephony 05.01.2008
After a rather slow start, voice over wireless LAN services (VoWLAN or VoWiFi) are finally starting to become more mainstream, particularly in industries like healthcare and retail sales where much of the workforce is mobile within a building or campus throughout the work day, but still needs to be able to communicate at any time. However, horror stories of VoWiFi implementations fraught with problems still abound. So how do VoWiFi adopters avoid the pitfalls and maximize their potential for success? Here are some ingredients that will help.

Do You Know What's on the Menu? A Critical Step Toward Delivering Better Service
Mike Tainter, Director, IT Service Management
Forsythe Focus 05.01.2008
Note: This article has also appeared in Mainframe Executive in a slightly edited version, under the title, "Enhancing IT and Business Communications: A Critical Step Toward Delivering Better Service".

Business says “to-MAY to.” IT says “to-MAH-to,” but what are they really saying to each other? IT and business may be able to increase their chances for more successful communications by simply creating a menu. But how? And what exactly does this mean?

From Gray to Great! Rejuvenating Your Aging Data Center
Steve Harris, Director, Data Center Planning and Design
Data Center Journal 05.01.2008
Recent industry estimates have placed the average age of a data center in the United States at eighteen years old. That's right, built in the early 1990s, when the first George Bush was president, the mainframe was still king and the server/ laptop phenomenon had yet to catch fire. The reality is that many data centers in operation today are based on the design standards and innovations of the late 1980s. In other words, aside from increasing interest in “green” data centers, most organizations are concerned about their “graying” data centers.

Core Principles of BC/DR
Peter Laz, Senior Consultant, Business Continuity/Disaster Recovery
Disaster Recovery Journal 04.01.2008
When effective managers are building any kind of program or looking to enhance a current program, one of the questions they ask is, “what do successful programs have in common?” Establishing a business continuity or IT disaster recovery capability is no different. There are common elements that successful programs share. Four of those elements are described.

Use ITIL to Enhance Your Disaster Recovery Capabilities
Mike Tainter, Director, IT Service Management
ITSMwatch.com 02.01.2008
So, you’ve developed and implemented your business continuity and disaster recovery (BC/DR) plan … now what?, asks ITSM Watch columnist Mike Tainter, Director, IT Service Management at Forsythe.

Extreme Makeover Data Center Edition - Part 2
Mark Bolsoni, Product Director, Advanced Network Technologies
Internet Telephony 02.01.2008
Just as IP telephony virtualized the need for PBXs to be situated in every physical office location, the next generation network components are enabling companies to view their data center equipment as true virtualized resources. Last month we considered three network-related elements of the virtualized data center to think about when looking to optimize cost. Here we consider three others.

Incident Response: Communication is Key
David Brown, Managing Consultant, Security Advisory Services
Security Magazine 01.01.2008
When an incident response team is faced with a potential security breach or data loss, there are myriad concerns to address. Many incident management plans address technical issues such as investigation, containment and recovery. But, it is essential that each phase of the plan also covers communication – a key requirement for effective incident response.

When Disaster Strikes Will Your People Be Prepared?
Michael Croy, Director, Business Continuity Solutions
Disaster Recovery Journal 01.01.2008
While many organizations have built plans for the recovery of their IT operations in the event of a disaster, the well being of their most valuable asset – their people – is often overlooked. Within the walls of the data center, we can accurately measure what the impacts of a disaster will be. But the human response to a disaster cannot be predicted.