Ensight – Jeremy Wright

John Locke doesn’t agree with my statements on security over productivity.

Risk management is a large component of IT management, so this is nothing new. I wasn’t aware that security had ever superceded productivity . . . . the job growth numbers (or lack thereof) suggest otherwise.

The job growth numbers have nothing to do, in my opinion, with IT productivity. It isn’t that suddenly thousands of apps have been released which make millions of workers more productive.

No, the productivity increases are because of a sagging job market. People work harder when they fear for their jobs, and they work hard when they are told to. Perhaps a small portion could be attributed to new applications in the workplace, but if so I’d love to hear John tell me which ones have resulted in a 40% boost in productivity year-over-year.

I’d also love for him to sit in on the boardrooms I’m sitting in on. Talk of the IT town? Viruses. Spam. Spyware/malware. Sure, the programmers and some managers talk about making peoples jobs easier, but the fact of the matter is that IT spending is, by and large, driven by how much whining users do to upper management. And, in most companies, that whining isn’t about productivity lost. It’s about popups. Spam. Viruses. The poor coffee.

Then again, maybe I’m reading John’s comments wrong, and maybe I even have the wrong perspective.

Until recently, though, most of the push on IT in the companies I’ve worked in and for has been to improve on the big 3: Spam, Security, Email.

That is quickly changing, though, and that’s what I’m loving. Ideas from within IT are now being heard. Improved paging systems, reporting, cost management , etc. These projects are not just going through, they are going through with full support of management.

A new thing. And a welcome thing.

The security focus was nice, but really, there’s only so much you can do with security before you’re starting to triple-dot I’s and double-cross T’s.