Hello, ROI and the Technology Leader's Role

Thanks for joining me "on10".

I’ll let loose over the ensuing weeks with tidbits about me, who I am, why any of you should care, and what I care about. With luck, you’ll find it relevant, smart, funny and engaging. If you don’t, I’ll know why the admins quietly revoke my privileges; and all my posts land in the bit-bucket.

I am not a well practiced blogger. My personal blog doesn’t have a single post. This could be good for you. It could also be a train-wreck in the making. In either case, it should be entertaining for all of us.

Let’s get started…

Technology in the classroom takes many forms. I wish I could save $1M a year with ideas as simple as this (however difficult they may be to actually implement).

Here's another take on near-term ROI when making technology investments that enable and support the “mission systems” of schools and colleges.

Speaking of technology projects aligned with the requirements of the institution instead of being done for their own sake, this snippet from Christopher Koch on cio.com.au articulates well what I think about when pondering the ideal corporate or institutional CIO…

Gaining credibility as a business strategist requires that CIOs shake an old habit: their self-identification with technology. "You have to be allied with the company first and technology second," says Dow Chemical's Kepler. "You have to be viewed by the CEO as someone who defines success not in terms of technology implementations but in terms of success for the company." That means subsuming a passion for technology to a passion for business. "You have to be seen as being dispassionate about technology," says Kepler. "If you're going to take a risk on building an untested enabling technology, you have to have a great understanding of the business. The high failure rates of new technologies come from missing the connection between the success of the technology and the goals of the company."

I know it speaks in terms of "business" (and I hated being preached to about what I could learn from the "private sector"), but tell me it doesn't make a mountain of sense in the academic world...