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Mid-Market CIO Panel: Tips and Techniques for Improving Vendor Relationships

July 15, 4:00 PM - 5:00 PM U.S./Eastern (GMT-4)

We'll highlight relationship priorities and best practices identified in a Council study, and we'll interact with a CIO panel on the approaches they've used to improve strategic vendor partnerships.

Secrets of Successful Vendor Contract Negotiations for the Mid-Market

Sept. 10, 2009, 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM U.S./Eastern (GMT-4)

On this free public Council teleconference, Matthew A. Karlyn, attorney at Foley & Lardner in Boston, will share tips on negotiating tactics and new, creative contract terms to help mid-market CIOs make better deals.

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Leaders Need a Work-Life Balance

I enjoy exercising on a treadmill, even though I know that no matter how fast I go or how long ...

 

June 15, 2005CIO

I enjoy exercising on a treadmill, even though I know that no matter how fast I go or how long I run, I will end up in the same place. At least I have the consolation of being more fit and healthy after my exercise. If only the same were true of the leadership treadmill. We run from the break of dawn until the stroke of midnight, instantly available to one and all. We are exhausted physically and mentally. We have taken no time to think strategically about the future, or even to reflect on the short term.

As a result, we are depleted—that is, less focused, less energetic, less decisive—as leaders. We have to get off the treadmill, or else we’ll be unable to see our priorities, facilitate results and enable the development of our people.

There are a variety of phenomena that have driven us to this state. Economic pressures, once cyclical, have been an ever-present part of business for at least the past decade. Meanwhile, technology has had an impact on the pace of our days. Cell phones and BlackBerrys have increased our mobility, but they also pressure us to respond to every little thing. I once heard a presentation about a phone system that can get a message to you by any device. I thought, Great, now we can have a corporate version of hide-and-seek! Whether we gain productivity or lose it depends on whether we use technology to enhance our lives or allow ourselves to be abused by it.

Stop Running

You know you’re stuck on the treadmill when "irritated" defines your attitude. Your work suffers. You rush through budget preparation, and must do it over when it doesn’t meet corporate guidelines. You have systems that never met business needs because requirements planning was given short shrift. Eventually, your people lose any sense of when a task is urgent, and they discount the importance of activities that never seem to be completed.

Time-pressured decisions (and the behavior that accompanies them) will erode your effectiveness and your sustainability as a leader. Yes, the world seems to demand a short-term focus, but at the same time, we are expected to deliver the results of long-term thinking.

Start Getting Somewhere

Your health, your peace of mind, maybe even your job are at stake—unless you get control of your life. When children are young, we discipline them with "time-outs" in the hope that they will reflect on their behavior and change their ways. We may need executive "time-outs" to gain the distance needed to rediscover or reevaluate what is important in our lives.

 
 
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WHITE PAPERS

Enterprise Performance Management

15 years after "The Performance Measurement Manifesto" was published by the Harvard Business Review, companies continue to redesign how they measure their business performance.
 

The Future of Collaboration

Oracle Beehive is the only unified collaboration solution built for the enterprise.
 

Exclusive Economist Intelligence Unit Research

Find out why - and how technology can help balance centralized control and individual autonomy.
 

ERP at the Speed of Light

Without the right strategy and tools, implementation acceleration carries the risk of abbreviated end user training and change management, over-engineering of business processes, and other problems that can lead to higher over-all cost of ownership and the erosion of business benefit.
 

5 Tips for Data Loss Prevention Solutions

RSA® The Security Division of EMC has identified 5 key considerations to help organizations simplify the evaluation process for selecting a DLP solution that is right for their business.
 

Communications Transformation Platform

The Communications Transformation Platform enables you to provide the services your customers demand - faster, cheaper and with less risk.
 

WEBCASTS

Management Excellence: Linking Process, Operations for Agility and Profit

Linking Process, Operations for Agility and Profit
 

Managing Client Systems in the Enterprise

Keeping client systems costs under control is just one of the many initiatives IT must address when trying to manag...
 

IT Consolidation Made Easy

The Primary IT Initiative for Reducing Costs
 

Webcast with Dan Vesset: Investing in Business Analytics Technology

What exactly is business analytics and why should you care? Dan Vesset of IDC and Gaurav Verma of SAS answer this a...
 

Capitalize on Your SAP Content

After 18 years of partnership and over 3,000 successful customer deployments, Open Text has become SAP's premier pa...
 

Enterprise Cloud Computing: Ready for Primetime?

The progression toward enterprise cloud computing is happening today, as industry leaders deploy technologies that ...
 

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