kdr ebusiness

Like many people I tend to use Google as my primary method for searching the internet.

However, I came across a Search Tool called Inquisitor today. Following a brief test of how it works I can say that my first impression is very good.

As you type your search term into the box, Inquisitor predicts and displays matches in a list. You then select the Search engine you would like to search against, i.e., Google, Yahoo, A9 etc.

Anything that makes it easier to find what you where searching for has got to be worth trying out.

NOTE: As of the time of writing, this tool does not work in the Internet Explorer Browser, so if you want to try it, you will need to use the Firefox Browser.

Tags: Google, searching, Inquisitor, Yahoo, A9

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Today’s announcement of a serious vulnerability in Microsoft Word get’s my attention.

Most email systems now routinely block unsafe attachments, but when it comes to Word Documents, these are let straight through. They have become a vital part of doing business.

If you want to protect your company from this threat then you need to ensure that your systems are up to date (patched) and that you have the latest anti-virus signatures installed. You should have a patching policy to cover this.

but

the best defence you have against this and future threats is a well trained and security aware workforce. I’ve written about this before - invest in your staff to improve security.

Tags: vulnerability, Microsoft Word, attachments, security

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Long established companies often end up with numbers of legacy systems running on lots of different servers. The management of these servers ends up becoming more expensive than necessary.

When Windows NT was the operating system of choice for many IT departments, Microsoft recommended that one server per service was the best approach. This mindset is still in evidence within many organisations today.

Now that there are robust Virtualisation technologies, IT departments need to re-examine their approach. Virtualisation allows multiple servers to run on a single box. The right strategy can produce significant savings on maintenenance costs and disaster recovery charges, as well as reductions in floor space, power and air-conditioning requirements.

You can also benefit from improved systems performance, and less downtime. If it’s not already part of your planning cycle, you should review your server requirements at least once per year.

Related Article: Cost saving idea: Storage and Backup

Tags: legacy, management, Microsoft, Virtualisation, strategy, maintenenance, disaster recovery

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[From Wikipedia…]

Change management is the process of developing a planned approach to change in an organization. Typically the objective is to maximize the collective benefits for all people involved in the change and minimize the risk of failure…

…Many technical disciplines (for example Information technology) have developed approaches to formally control the process of making changes to environments.

…Change management can be conducted on a continuous basis, on a regular schedule (such as an annual review), or when deemed necessary on a program-by-program basis.

Its most common uses are in information technology management, strategic management, and process management. To be effective, change management should be multi-disciplinary, touching all aspects of the organization…

You can read the full Wikipedia article here.

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Being Short-sighted, a trip to the swimming pool was always a challenge as it was difficult to see where I was going. Then I discovered that you could get prescription swim goggles, so I bought a pair. All was well until a year later the nosepiece broke. Faced with the prospect of spending another £40 on a new pair I decided to see if I could find spare parts.

A quick Google search turned up the Manufacturer who happened to be a Taiwanese company trading under the brand SAEKO. Manufacturers don’t often deal direct with end customers, but I sent them an email to see if they could help me to find out where I could get spares from. Imagine my surprise when I got a reply in under one hour telling me they where sending me replacements by airmail.

Now the thing is I didn’t include my home address on the email. Instead they must have taken a look at my website (I always include a link in my email signature) and got my mailing address from there. As promised, seven days later a nice selection of replacement parts arrived in the post.

I think that is exceptional customer service! And it’s a great example of going the extra mile to keep a customer happy.

What changes would you need to make to ensure your company is as responsive as this?

• Can you ensure emails are answered in one hour?
• how about the same day?
• Do you measure your response times?

What is the benefit to Saeko for being this responsive?

Well I can think of a few:

• They demonstrate that they care about their end customers
• They gather feedback about their product
• They have created another product champion - me!

Tags: swimming, prescription, swim, goggles, SAEKO, customer service

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Here’s a couple of articles about customer service from last week that made me sit up and take notice. Do these articles make you think of anyone you know? Should you do something about it?

Larry Galler takes a critical look at companies who employ grumps in customer service roles. His suggestion? Don’t hire a grump to deliver great customer service.

How often have you had to endure the ordeal of being served by a grump? It’s the wrong person in the wrong job. It makes one wonder how that person got hired for that job, who trained them, and whether the company really cares about having happy customers.

Seth Godin has an unusual suggestion for difficult customers - fire them.

If you treat a customer like he’s wrong, he’s going to leave, and probably tell a bunch of other people. Before you take that route, be direct, straightforward, polite and firm, and decline to sell to them.

Tags: customer service, customer

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[from Wikipedia…]

Knowledge Management (KM) refers to the ways organizations gather, manage, and use the knowledge that they acquire.

A Knowledge Management Program introduces into an organization a range of specific processes and practices for identifying and capturing knowledge, know-how, expertise and other intellectual capital, and for making such knowledge assets available for transfer and reuse across the organization.

Knowledge management programs are typically tied to specific organizational objectives and are intended to lead to the achievement of specific targeted results such as improved performance, competitive advantage, or higher levels of innovation.

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When considering any changes to the way your business operates, you should always start with a clearly defined set of business requirements.

A good business requirement should have the following attributes:

• Has a clear objective
• Possesses a measure of performance
• Should be high level
• Defines the expected benefits

It is particularly important to describe tangible and measurable benefits for your business requirement before you undertake the project to deliver it.

So here are some simple illustrative examples of business requirements that are Good, Bad and Ugly:

Good: We need to improve our system response times by 50%. This will increase the productivity in our back-office by reducing the amount of time spent waiting for information to display.

This has a measurable objective, and describes the expected benefit. It avoids going into too much detail and is therefore sufficiently high level. This could be improved by specifying actual productivity gains.

Bad: Our systems are slow, we need to make them quicker so that staff spend less time waiting.

This has an objective, but there is no measure of performance so there is no way to determine afterwards how effective the benefits are.

Ugly: We need to make our systems faster.

This type of requirement would have an unscrupulous vendor rubbing his hands with glee – you might end up spending a great deal more than you had to. And with no actual measures in place you might end up with a smaller improvement than was actually needed.

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Virtualization allows multiple virtual machines (VM), with different operating systems to run in isolation, side-by-side on the same physical machine.

Virtualisation allows complete systems to be moved rapidly from one physical machine to another providing near-zero downtime for testing, consolidation and maintenance purposes.

Tags: Virtualization, Virtualisation, consolidation

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