9 lessons from Google, Jim Lecinski, managing director for Google

Jim Lecinski, managing director for Google. broke down his company’s innovation strategy into nine notions. Each notion contains an important lesson that all professionals can learn from.

1. Innovation, not instant perfection. Google believes in launching new products and ideas early and often, rather than trying to perfect those ideas behind closed doors before releasing them to the public. Then, customer feedback and popularity prove which projects are most successful.

2. Share everything you can. Small teams that communicate openly have proved the best results for Google. They believe in transparency in the workplace so that everyone knows what everyone else is working on. (Scary, right?) They have a computer program where employees can look up names and see what others are working on, so if they have an idea to contribute they know who to talk to.

3. You’re brilliant, we’re hiring. When Google interviews employees, Lecinski said they set the bar very high. They focus more on hiring generalists rather than specialists, as they have found generalists are more valuable and can contribute ideas to different parts of the company.

4. Allow employees to pursue their dreams. Lecinski said Google allows its employees’ time in a 70/20/10 model. Seventy percent of the time they work on Google’s search and ad flagships; they develop new programs like Images, Desktop and Finance 20 percent of the time; and 10 percent of the time employees are allowed to pursue their own high risk/high reward projects. Lecinski said Google Earth is a result of one of those projects.

5. Ideas come from everywhere. Sometimes Google turns to the public for new ideas. The Google mastheads, which are customized for holidays and events, are taken from non-employee submissions. One of the mastheads was designed by a 12-year-old girl.

6. Don’t politic – use data. With all the ideas floating around Google, the best way to determine which may work is to use supportive data. As Lecinski said, “Data beats opinion.”

7. Creativity loves restraint. Again, Google has to have some way to keep all of the employee-generated ideas streamlined towards the company’s goals. “Let people explore, but set clear boundaries for that exploration,” Lecinski said.

8. Get users and usage – the money will follow. This goes back to one of Lecinski’s larger points, “respect for end users,” but is a principle to follow in any form of business. He says to focus on creating things that are innovative and useful for people, not something you can sell.

9. Don’t kill projects, morph them. Google doesn’t waste ideas. Instead, they try to change and transform them into something the company finds useful.

10 most important reasons why happiness at work is the #1 productivity booster by Alexander Kjerulf, Chief Happiness Officer

Here are the 10 most important reasons why happiness at work is the #1 productivity booster.

1: Happy people work better with others
Happy people are a lot more fun to be around and consequently have better relations at work. This translates into:

• Better teamwork with your colleagues
• Better employee relations if you’re a manager
• More satisfied customers if you’re in a service job
• Improved sales if you’re a sales person

2: Happy people are more creative
If your productivity depends on being able to come up with new ideas, you need to be happy at work. Check out the research of Teresa Amabile for proof. She says:

If people are in a good mood on a given day, they’re more likely to have creative ideas that day, as well as the next day, even if we take into account their mood that next day.

There seems to be a cognitive process that gets set up when people are feeling good that leads to more flexible, fluent, and original thinking, and there’s actually a carryover, an incubation effect, to the next day.

3: Happy people fix problems instead of complaining about them
When you don’t like your job, every molehill looks like a mountain. It becomes difficult to fix any problem without agonizing over it or complaining about it first. When you’re happy at work and you run into a snafu – you just fix it.

4: Happy people have more energy
Happy people have more energy and are therefore more efficient at everything they do.

5: Happy people are more optimistic
Happy people have a more positive, optimistic outlook, and as research shows (particularly Martin Seligman’s work in positive psychology), optimists are way more successful and productive. It’s the old saying “Whether you believe you can or believe you can’t, you’re probably right” all over again.

6: Happy people are way more motivated
Low motivation means low productivity, and the only sustainable, reliable way to be motivated at work is to be happy and like what you do. I wrote about this in a previous post called Why “motivation by pizza” doesn’t work.

7: Happy people get sick less often
Getting sick is a productivity killer and if you don’t like your job you’re more prone to contract a long list of diseases including ulcers, cancer and diabetes. You’re also more prone to workplace stress and burnout.

One study assessed the impact of job strain on the health of 21,290 female nurses in the US and found that the women most at risk of ill health were those who didn’t like their jobs. The impact on their health was a great as that associated with smoking and sedentary lifestyles (source).

8: Happy people learn faster
When you’re happy and relaxed, you’re much more open to learning new things at work and thereby increasing your productivity.

9: Happy people worry less about making mistakes – and consequently make fewer mistakes
When you’re happy at work the occasional mistake doesn’t bother you much. You pick yourself up, learn from it and move on. You also don’t mind admitting to others that you screwed up – you simply take responsibility, apologize and fix it. This relaxed attitude means that less mistakes are made, and that you’re more likely to learn from them.

10: Happy people make better decisions
Unhappy people operate in permanent crisis mode. Their focus narrows, they lose sight of the big picture, their survival instincts kick in and they’re more likely to make short-term, here-and-now choices. Conversely, happy people make better, more informed decisions and are better able to prioritize their work.

So how do you get to be happy at work? There are two ways, really:

1. Get happy in the job you have. There are about a million things you can do to improve your work situation – provided you choose to do something, rather than wait for someone else to come along and do it for you.

2. Find a new job where you can be happy. If your current job is not fixable, don’t wait – move on now!

Are You A Great Worker? by Paul T. P. Wong

Here is a set of 21 questions to measure whether you are a great worker, who provides added values to your organization. Reflect on your answers and decide on how to improve yourself:

1. Do you consistently make the extra effort to find better ways to improve your performance at work?

2. Do you dedicate some time to self improvement and self education?

3. Do you always do your best regardless of the circumstances?

4. In the last week, did you ever encourage someone at work, whether it is your co-worker, supervisor or subordinate?

5. Do you often go beyond the call of duty to help someone in your organization?

6. Have you ever used your power or position to make things difficult for other workers?

7. Has anyone ever commented that you are such a positive person or have a very positive influence at work?

8. Have you intentionally done something to make the work place more pleasant and positive place to work?

9. Have you intentionally said something good about your co-worker or boss?

10. Have you take credits for the great ideas from others?

11. Have you ever used bureaucratic control to assert your power?

12. Do you accentuate the positive in every situation?

13. Are you generous in sharing information and other resources with others?

14. Do you celebrate co-workers’ success?

15. Have you ever sabotaged co-workers to make sure that they do not outshine you?

16. Do you love your work in spite of the negative sides?

17. Do you speak up with honesty and respect if senior management plan to do something that may have a negative effect on morale and productivity?

18. Have you ever blamed others for your mistakes or poor performance?

19. Do you frequently provide suggestions to your superior on how to improve the process and increase productivity?

20. Have you ever bad-mouthed your co-workers in order to make yourself look good.

21. Do you do everything within your power to contribute to corporate success, even when your efforts are not recognized or rewarded?

A.R. Rehman & You

A.R. Rehman has practically become a living legend in the music industry. With success following him with every passing year, the 43 year old soft spoken maestro still prayers before every composition and chooses to love in all he is and all he does. With a humble beginning to worldwide recognition at the Oscars, his journey has been the path less trodden. Here is following A.R. Rehman to his stardom and leading you to yours.

1.Train well: A.R. Rehman started playing the piano at age of 4. And ever since he has trained under almost every great musician the industry has had to offer. Be aware that learning takes time, money and above all humility. You cannot expect to earn before you learn. And when you do get to learn, take it to the point of mastery like Rehman did. 

2.Go the extra mile when you start: At the age of 19, Rehman used to play the keyboard for Zakir Hussain’s troupe and even after his work, he would stay back in the studio, sitting through other musicians pieces, eyes and ears tuned in, constantly imbibing. How far you want to go in your life is determined by how far you will go in your quest to learn and get better.

3.There is no substitute for experience: Before Rehman composed his first song for films, he had the experience of 300 jingles behind him. And before he composed his first jingle, he had 10 years experience of playing music in concerts, big and small. And before Rehman got his first Oscar, he had 39 years of active music experience behind him. Success is a series of experiences, the more the experience, the closer you are to success.

4.Work comes first, money follows: Even though Rehman’s advertising career was flourishing he accepted to compose music for Mani Ratnam at Rs.25,000. It was a sum that he could make in three days composing ad jingles. But he did the project for the sake of expressing his talent and not for the money. If you want to make a new start, focus on your work, the money will follow.

5.Work your options well: Rehman was a well trained musician but before starting something new he worked his options out well in advance. Before he quit advertising to take up music composition for films he learnt driving so that he could at least temporarily survive as a driver in case the film world ended for him. 

6.Have a work philosophy: Rehman has a very strict work philosophy, "Rather than making money, I believe in making people happy; all other things are secondary.” If your work makes people happy, you are in business and on the path of progress.

7.Treat others with dignity and importance: It is every singer’s dream to work with A R Rehman because he makes you feel like God. His singers even go to the extent of saying that he makes you feel as if you are AR Rehman and he is just an ordinary fellow. When you treat people with importance you put them in a state of peak performance. And when your team, department and colleagues perform well, overall you stand to win too.

8.Get the best out of your team: Rehman tries to extract something extra from every one of his musicians as well as his playback singers. He believes in their additional input. And with that he makes a point to improvise, every single time. Getting the opinions of those involved in your project is the smarted thing one can do to in order to project a master piece to the world.

9.Work with people: According to Rehman his best music comes when there's an exchange of ideas, when there are stories that inspire him. Connecting with people and his team and picking their brains keeps his creativity to the highest.

10.Learn to say no: Rehman’s philosophy is simple, "To achieve something you have to take the risk of offending someone by saying no.” He can only do so many films and can compose only so many songs and has to turn down others because he just can’t do it all. Saying no is important to remain in the business of quality.

11.There is no burnout in work: Rehman believes that a burnout occurs when one is not happy with what he is doing. If you are doing work out of family pressures or financial hassles, keep your eye rested on your passion, and follow it with the first opportunity. Because if you enjoy what you do, you will never want to take a break.

12.Success is a start, not an end: On winning the Oscar’s, which is a lifetime achievement for many, Rehman was humble enough to say "It's a starting point in my career”. When you succeed, you have only started. The true journey of responsibility and creativity begins here on.

by - Priya Kumar, THE ONE MINUTE COACH

Use your voting right for a better INDIA

Did you know that there is a system in our constitution, as per the 1969 act, in section ” 49-O” that a person can go to the polling booth, confirm his identity, get his finger marked and convey the presiding election officer that he doesn’t want to vote anyone!

Yes such a feature is available, but obviously these   leaders have never disclosed it.
This is called “49-O”.

Why should you go and say ” I VOTE NOBODY”… because, in a ward, if a candidate wins, say by 123 votes, and that particular ward has received “49-O” votes more than 123, then that polling will be cancelled and will have to be re-polled. Not only that, but the candidature of the contestants will be removed and they cannot contest the re-polling, since people had already expressed their decision on them.

This would bring fear into parties and hence look for genuine candidates for their parties for election. This would change the way; of our whole political system…. it is seemingly surprising why the election commission has not revealed such a feature to the public….

Please spread this news to as many as you know…
Seems to be a wonderful weapon against corrupt parties in India … show your power, expressing your desire not to vote for anybody, is even more powerful than voting… so don’t miss your chance. So either vote, or vote not to vote (vote 49-O) and pass this info on…

Use your voting right for a better INDIA
For more info  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/49-O

“Chanakya Niti” - Developing Leaders

Chanakya was an ancient teacher / trainer from India who transformed one of his students “Chandragupta Maurya” as a great king from scratch. Chandragupta Maurya was the grandfather of the great king “Ashoka”.

Chanakya had also played the role of a strategic leader to ensure defeat of Alexander when the latter had attacked India. Chanakya has shared his knowledge and philosophies through his huge literatures which mainly include the books popularly known as “Chanakya Niti” and “Kautilya’s Arthashastra”. “Chanakya Niti” can be considered as his overall management philosophies which have many verses in Sanskrit language.

RAJYA-MULAM-INDRIYA JAYAH: Those who have complete control over their senses can become great leaders. To ensure the same we should learn to keep control over our ‘Mind’ which manages our thoughts, speech and physical actions. Our senses are influenced by Material Desires. Our true inner self, the soul is linked to the body through mind. Meditation helps in self-realization, which helps in controlling senses utilization, by developing control over mind.

JIT-ATMA SARVAYEH SAMYUJYET: The super souls, who are self-disciplined and self controlled, lead their life with an objective of serving others in a selfless state of mind and achieve great success for all forms of lives across the globe. Thus indirectly the ones who are short visionary, greedy and selfish; they ill affect the wellbeing of the world at large.

NASTY-AHANKAR SAMAH SATRU: There can be no other enemy as dangerous as our own ego. The ego of material achievements like money, fame, power etc. are related to our current form of life as a human-being which is temporary in nature. We are spiritual beings having physical existence until we achieve salvation. We should keep ourselves detached from the trap of ego attracted by our material achievements related to our current form of material life.

SARVA- JAYATYA KRODHA: The one who can conquer anger can conquer everything.

PRIYA-VADINO NA SATRU: The one, who speaks politely and pleasantly, makes no enemies.

SARVASYA BHUSHANAM VINAYA: The best ornament of all is humbleness.

SAT-YEN DHARYATE LOKAH: The commitment to truth leads to real success and true happiness across the globe forever.

NASTI DEHINA SUKH-DUKHA-BHAV: Happiness and sorrow are two sides of a coin i.e. our life. Success and failure are parts of the life cycle. Our failures teach us to be careful the next time by not repeating the same mistakes again. Success in one commitment may guide us to succeed in other tasks which are yet to be performed in life. Learn from past failure and success, but live in present. This will help us to plan for the future in a much better way.

TRUSHNAYA MATI-CHHADHYATE: Influence of extreme material desires destroys the conscience. The one who gets trapped by extreme materialism can not understand the power of spiritual intelligence and gets biased only towards illusory and deceptive material intelligence.

DUKHANAM-AUSHADHAM-NIVARNAM: The final solution to all the worries, problems and formalities attached to material forms of lives is only Salvation / Moksha / Nirvana. Salvation is the peak of spiritual growth. It is the ultimate peace and happiness for the completely enlightened soul having no “KARMA” balance. It’s our permanent liberation from the slavery of temporary material forms of lives on material planets Viz. Earth, Heaven and Hell.

VIDHYA-ARVYAPITA KHYATI: Knowledge fetches respect and real success. Learning is a continuous and never ending process. We should always be ready to learn with an open mind.

YATHA BIJAM TATHA NISPATI: We reap what we sow i.e. Law of Karma.

Dhoni's Success Principles

Mahendra Singh Dhoni is a great inspiration to me. I am always on the look out for people who rise in ranks, faster and stronger than others do. 

When India won the Twenty20 world cup, what touched me most despite the fact that the boys played well, was Dhoni’s heart winning performance and speech. Following up on Dhoni I found an underlying success philosophy which can easily be applied by anyone who aspires for greatness in his or her field of endeavor.

Success is the Sweetest Revenge: 
Before the Twenty20 world cup finals, Ravi Shastri had expressed his doubts on India’s victory because he felt it was pre mature for Dhoni to be the captain and it was a team of youngsters. This came from the fact that the world cup was lost by a senior team. With the victory at the Twenty20 Dhoni proved Ravi Shastri wrong and took great pleasure in quoting him at his speech after the match. It does not matter what others predict about you, everyone has the right to their opinion, and success is the sweetest revenge to shut people up, temporarily :O)

Take responsibility for your vision:
Dhoni knew that at the Twenty20 no one expected them to win, and so his philosophy was that they could actually play and have fun and make this their best game. I have heard many a professional say that their seniors don’t encourage them or push them forward. They use this excuse to remain where they are and lay the responsibility of their success and progress on everyone but themselves. Dhoni led his team to success, by taking up the responsibility of their victory, when no one else had faith in them.

Respect and Recognize your team:As a captain Dhoni has tremendous respect for his team and his players. Even on winning he addressed Yuvi as the Trump Card of the team. I have seen seniors hog the glory of their teams success by themselves. Dhoni knows that what leads the team to victory is the team, not necessarily the captain. And he is humble and fair enough to put the credit where it really belongs.

Do your job right:
I love Dhoni’s attitude where he was aware that he didn’t have good bowlers like Bentley, but he banked on Jogender Sharma. Even though others said he was slow, Dhoni stuck to his belief that to win you don’t have to be quick or extra ordinary. If one bowls in the right places it will add to the victory of the team. Dhoni is amazing, he believes that you don’t need extra ordinary talent to be a winner; you need to play the right game. When you do your work well, and well enough consistently, victory will always be yours. A lot of people use lack of talent and expertise to remain in mediocrity. They feel they are too old, too young, too slow, too fast, too fat, and too thin, as excuses for their mediocre thinking. If your mind is made up, then nothing else matters. Dhoni’s belief is a true example of that.

Make peace with the consequence of your decision:
I also love the fact that once Dhoni makes a decision he is willing to live with the consequence. He made a decision that Joginder bowl against Harbhajan Singh. He was prepared to win with it and prepared to lose with it. I feel that is an amazing attitude. A lot of people make decisions and then they are not at peace with the results. If you can make peace with failure before you play to win, nothing can take victory away from you.

Convert Pressure into Passion:
At the Twenty20 finals, Dhoni He didn’t want the team to work under pressure. He told his team this in every meeting, “Guys we are out here to enjoy. We will give our 100% and whatever is the outcome, I don’t care about it.” There was no fear amongst the youngsters, which was so refreshing to see. He told Yuvi that even Australia was under pressure because they have the reputation of winning. He took the pressure and converted it into passion, and we saw that so evidently on the field. Take all of your pressure and steam it off in fun. Having fun doesn’t mean being irresponsible, it means working with your best self. 

Win more than you lose:
When Dhoni was asked, how he plans to maintain his position of India’s captain, he said, “We will win more matches than we lose.” He didn’t say that he will win them all, because he knows that losing is a lesson towards winning. A lot of us drive ourselves crazy by expecting to win every time we get on with our work. There will be good deals and bad deals, good days and bad days; success is about creating the good ones more often than the bad ones.

Be consistent in your performance:
When you go out and deliver your best, there is a catch. You now have to deliver excellence consistently and it also raises the expectations of your seniors. Dhoni is every aware of that after his mega innings at Vizag against Pakistan. He knows that he gave his 100 percent in that and that it was his BEST performance. He also knows that has raised the expectations of his fans from him to deliver that consistently. And he is working hard on himself to deliver to that expectation. No matter how hard your day, be consistent in your delivery if not better. 

All training is useful: 
Dhoni started out as a footballer and that training helped him in cricket too. There is really no waste in practice and knowledge, it’s like a universal formula, Success in one area, training in one area always finds use in another. There are no wasted moments or experiences in life. You can use success strategies of one area to help you win in another. Dhoni is an expert in that. You have surely been a success at some area or the other in life, use those principles and duplicate it in your work. One lady won the national level badminton championship, the principles she used to win the championship can easily be translated to her work profile. Try it, if it works for Dhoni, it will work for you.

Physical Fitness is important for success:
Dhoni attributes his success a lot towards his physical fitness. And it is true for anyone, if you are not fit; you can’t be a hit at anything that you do, period. With people taking their bodies for granted, they expect their mind to work magic. The mind lives in the body, to deliver peak performance in any area of work, you need to be physically fit.

Repeat your success:
Dhoni always aspires to out do himself. He sets a record for himself and then aspires to beat it. His philosophy is that if he can score just one more run like he did 148 in Vizag, then he can continue to be his best. He feels that if he can do it once, he can do it again! That’s the spirit. Whenever you deliver work well done, your next strategy should be to repeat that as many times as you can. Repeated success is true success. If you can do it once, you sure can do it again.

Work your way up:
Dhoni climbed the ranks. He is a true example of rising to the top,
Dhoni is an aggressive right-handed batsman and wicket keeper. Dhoni is one of the wicket-keepers who have come through the ranks of junior and India A cricket teams to represent the national team He worked his way up and was consistent in his performance that was the crucial key to his selection in the Indian Cricket team. Don’t be afraid to start at the bottom, that is a more stable way to the top, to have been through every rung.

Constant and Never Ending Improvement:
Dhoni believes in constant and never ending improvement. Success and victory don’t go to his head. When he wins he celebrates and then right after that gets down to practice on how he can do better in order to maintain his score if not beat it. Success is not an accident, it is a planned event, “My mind is constantly working on how I can get better at my game. My mind never stops.” Says Dhoni. Finding better and new ways to do the same thing that you are doing will keep you creative and excited. Either you are improving or you are deteriorating, progress is success.

Exuberate Enthusiasm:
Dhoni is always bubbling with enthusiasm. His spirit is evident in his voice and his face. It’s great to see someone so alive and so passionate about his game. Today what meets the public eye is the glory, but what they cannot see is that there was also a road full of obstacles that led there. It sometimes is a dark lonely road and you have only your own desire and courage that will bring you to the light. Dhoni, a Ranchi boy who through his sheer courage and focus made the country proud is an example of the unshakeable enthusiasm and spirit. Make enthusiasm and excitement a daily practice.

Success takes time:
When Dhoni was given a chance in the one-day series in Bangladesh, though he did nothing extraordinary in the three ODIs against Bangladesh, it was only a matter of time before he exploded on the big stage, and that happened at Vizag . So success doesn’t come instantly. There will be hitches and glitches and bad games and not so good games. You have to be at it until you strike the balance and then maintain it. Life is always a learning experience and success is about putting that experience to get better.

Self Confidence Helps:
Self-confidence has always been a trade mark of Dhoni’s personality. I have always seen him very confident and aggressive. And it applies in his batting as well as wicket keeping. Self confidence is a learnt personality trait; it comes from constantly challenging oneself, winning or losing, not being the criteria. Self confidence comes in facing one’s fears and moving ahead despite any and every odd. Challenge yourself daily, to be bigger and better than you are today.

Be the best in all your roles:
Dhoni is a pro at multi tasking. He is an ace batsman and also an ace wicket keeper. So can you imagine the level of practice he needs to do in order to achieve mastery in both? It’s like having a group of companies under your umbrella and make them all work. It’s like excelling as a CEO and excelling as father. It’s a full game when you excel in all your roles. Dhoni believes that he can't afford to be less than 100 percent in any of the two roles. He feels they complement each other and give him his identity.” Same way, one has to give 100% in any and every role that they play. All roles shape our identity.

Focus on your performance:
When Dhoni aspired to play test cricket, his focus was “I think if I perform well, and maintain my form, I will definitely get a break in Test cricket.” A lot of people want many things in life. Their focus becomes the achievement and they feel that it must be served to them just because they want it. To achieve your desire you need to perform well and maintain your form. You get noticed for your performance not your potential and Dhoni put his potential into performance and earned his space in test cricket.

Have a role model:Dhoni has a role model, the famous cricketer Gilchrist, do you? How arrogant can someone get not to acknowledge that they need a helping hand, a little guidance and a role model? All successful people have had someone they looked up to. They have followed enough to be good leaders themselves. Leaders are not born, they are followers who find their own identity in the journey, and hence lead by their own transformation. In today’s world of abundant negativity and insensitivity, a role model is so important for one to stay focused on his task.

Be superstitious about goodness:
And there is always room for superstition. Superstition that anchors you to success, for that matter anything that anchors you to success is good. About a year ago Dhoni decided to change his hairstyle completely. Besides giving him a distinct personality, he feels the new hairstyle brought him luck as well! It’s ok to have superstitions that support one’s mind towards success. Goodness is any form can never do any harm.

 -- By Priya Kumar -  THE ONE MINUTE COACH

Join today Contact Center Architect Group

http://contactcenterarchitects.com It is a Professional Group of Qualified Contact Center Architect who is having exposure & expertise of Contact Center Technologies across the platform.

Provide value-added services to members and the entire user community irrespective of any product. Create a forum where all members may share successes, issues and concerns related to Contact Center Technologies irrespective of any product.Provide an environment for accurate and timely spreading of information about products and services offering across the globe the contact center vender of service providers.

Provide a canal for members to receive important information regarding changes in the industry.- We hope you enjoy Contact Center Architects Portal!
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Provide value-added services to members and the entire user community irrespective of any product.Create a forum where all members may share successes, issues and concerns related to IP Telephony Technologies irrespective of any product.Provide an environment for accurate and timely spreading of information about products and services offering across the globe with the IP Telephony vender of service providers.Provide a canal for members to receive important information regarding changes in the industry.- We hope you enjoy IP Telephony Architects Portal!
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Being a leader and being successful at the same time,

Being a leader and being successful at the same time, at the workplace, requires some characteristics.

Excellent communicator: This helps in making points clearly and being comprehensible to all.

Motivated and innovative: Leaders have to be charged up always so that they can motivate others to do better. They must be innovative and be able to think out of the box. Also, they must have quick fix answers for small problems.

Confident: The confidence of the leader instils confidence in the people. But confidence should not be mixed with arrogance. Leaders are essentially humble and ready to help always, which makes them approachable.

Trust: Last but not the least, the leader has to have the repute of being trusted and on whom the people can keep their faith. Similarly, leaders should always trust and repose faith in the people.

Govt allocates $450 Mn for Bangalore's upgrade

Bangalore's infrastructure development in this fiscal's state budget, tabled by chief minister B.S. Yeddyurappa here Thursday.Yeddyurappa, who also holds the finance portfolio, said Bangalore would require a whopping Rs.360 billion to tackle its infrastructure problems over the next five years.

"Such a huge investment can be made possible through the state government, public-private partnership and support from the 6.5-million citizens of Bangalore," Yeddyrappa said.Of the Rs.18 billion, Rs.7 billion will be allotted to the Bangalore metro project, Rs.3 billion to the municipal corporation, Rs.2.4 billion for improvement of roads, Rs.1 billion for drinking water supply to the extended areas through bore wells, and Rs.250 million for improvement of traffic management."We will also develop a 65-kilometre outer ring road at a cost of Rs.30 billion under a build, own and transfer (BOT) basis. For smooth traffic flow in the gridlocked roads, 10 flyovers and under-passes will be built at Rs.3.5 billion," Yeddyurappa said. To ease the traffic congestion and provide adequate parking space, about 40 multi-storeyed parking facilities will be constructed on a public-private partnership (PPP) basis.

The Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) will invest Rs.7 billion to provide roads, drainage and drinking water facilities in the extended civic areas, he said.

"BDA will also form three new layouts to allot housing sites for citizens on priority," the chief minister said.Of the three proposed layouts, the Nada Prabu Kemegowda layout will be formed to provide about 60,000 sites, with 20 percent of them reserved for low-income groups.As part of infrastructure development, the state government has appointed the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) as adviser to implement the 40-kilometre high-speed rail link project - connecting the city and the newly opened international airport at Devanahallion - on a PPP basis."Though 34 percent of the state's population lives in urban areas, accounting for about 80 percent of economic activities, the civic infrastructure has not kept pace with the phenomenal increase in the population and the level of economic growth," Yeddyurappa said.

To develop urban areas across the state, the plan outlay for the sector has been increased to Rs.50.41 billion this fiscal from Rs.29.23 billion last year.
This was the Bharatiya Janata Party government's maiden budget.

http://www.siliconindia.com/shownews/43988/1

ITIL Essentials Study Guide Introduction

Service Support Functions:

• Service Desk

• Incident Management

• Problem Management

• Change Management

• Configuration Management

• Release Management

Service Delivery Functions:

• Availability Management

• IT Services Continuity Management

• Capacity Management

• Financial Management

• Service Level Management

Configuration Management

Objectives:

• Providing information on the IT infrastructure

o To all other processes

o IT Management

• Enabling control of the infrastructure by monitoring and maintaining information on:

o All the resources needed to deliver services

o Configuration Item (CI) status and history

o Configuration Item relationships

Tasks:

• Identification and naming

• Management information

• Verification

• Control

• Status Accounting

Asset: Component of a business process like people, accommodation, computer systems, paper records, fax machines, etc.

Configuration Management Database: A database, which contains all relevant details of each Configuration Item (CI) and details of the important relationships between CIs. A Configuration Item (CI):

• Is needed to deliver a service

• Is uniquely identifiable

• Is subject to change

• Can be managed

A Configuration Item (CI) has:

• a Category

• Relationships

• Attributes

• a Status

Variant: A Configuration Item (CI) that has the same basic functionality as another Configuration Item (CI) but is different in some small way (ex: has more memory) Baseline: A snapshot of the state of a Configuration Item and any component or related Configuration Items, frozen in time for a particular purpose (such as the ability to return a service to a trusted state if a change goes wrong)

Configuration Management supports all other processes!

Scope vs. Detail

Relationships – Common Types:

• Is a component of

• Is a copy of

• Relates to

• Relates with

• Is used by

Service Desk

Objectives:

• To be the primary point of call for all:

o Calls

o Questions

o Requests

o Complaints

o Remarks

• To restore the service as quickly as possible

• To manage the incident life-cycle (coordinating resolution)

• To support business activities

• To generate reports, to communicate and to promote

Different Desks

• Call Center: Handling large call volumes of telephone-based transactions.

• Help Desk: To manage, coordinate, and resolve Incidents as quickly as possible.

• Service Desk: Allowing business processes to be integrated into the Service Management infrastructure. It not only handles Incidents, Problems and questions, but also provides an interface for other activities.

Service Desk Essentials:

• Single point of contact / Restore service ASAP

• Tasks: Customer Interface, Business Support, Incident Control & Management Information

• Concentrates on incident lifecycle management

• Incident: Unexpected disruption to agreed service

• Priority determined by business impact and urgency

• Correct assessment of priorities enables the deployment of manpower and other resources to be in the best interests of the customer

• Escalation and referral

Incident Management

Objectives:

• To restore normal service as quickly as possible

• Minimize the adverse impact on business operations

• Ensuring that the best possible levels of service quality and availability are maintained according to SLAs.

Incident: Any event which is not part of the standard operation of a service and which causes or may cause an interruption to or a reduction in the quality of that service.

Work-Around: Method of avoiding an Incident or Problem.

Service Request: Every Incident not being a failure in the IT Infrastructure.

Problem: The unknown root cause of one or more incidents.

Known Error: A condition that exists after the successful diagnosis of the root cause of a problem when it is confirmed that a CI (Configuration Item) is at fault.

Impact on the business + Urgency / Effect upon business deadlines = Priority

Category: Classification of a group of Incidents (Application, Hardware, etc.)

Escalation (Vertical Escalation): escalates up the management chain.

Referral (Horizontal Escalation): escalates to a different knowledge group. Routing.

Incident Life-Cycle

• Accept Service Event, Register and Consult the CMDB

• Classification

• Solve

• Closure

Reporting is VERY important.

• Daily reviews of individual Incident and Problem status against service levels

• Weekly management reviews

• Monthly management reviews

• Proactive service reports

Problem Management

Objectives:

• Stabilizing IT services through:

o Minimizing the consequences of incidents

o Removal of the root causes of incidents

o Prevention of incidents and problems

o Prevent recurrence of Incidents related to errors

• Improving productive use of resources

Tasks:

• Problem Control

• Error Control (including raising RfCs – Request for Change)

• Proactive Prevention

• Identifying Trends

• Management Information

• Posit Implementation Review (PIR)

Goal is to get from reactive or proactive. Stop problems from occurring / recurring.

Inputs:

• Incident details

• Configuration details

• Defined work-arounds

Outputs:

• Known Errors

• Requests for Change

• Updated Problem Records including work-arounds and/or solutions

• Response to Incident Management from Matching Management Information

Problem Control

• Identification

• Classification

• Assign Resources

• Investigation and Diagnosis

• Establish Known Error

Error Control

• Error Identification and Recording

• Error Assessment

• Recording Error / Resolution (Send out RfC)

• Error Closure

Known Error: An Incident or Problem for which the root cause is known and for which a temporary Work-around or a permanent alternative has been identified.

Proactive Problem Management:

• Trend Analysis

• Targeting Support Action

• Providing Information to the Organization

Known Errors resulting from Development should be made known to the Helpdesk. Reporting is also key for Problem Management.

Change Management

Objective: To implement approved changes efficiently, cost-effectively and with minimal risk to the existing and to the new IT infrastructure. Only approved changes made, risk and cost minimized.

Change Management Tasks:

• Filtering Changes

• Managing Change Process

• Managing Changes

• Chairing CAB and CAB/EC

• Review and Closure

• Management Information

Inputs:

• Requests for Change (RfC)

• CMDB

• Forward Schedule of Changes (FSC)

Outputs:

• Forward Schedule of Changes (FSC)

• Requests for Change (RFC)

• CAB minutes and actions

• Change management reports

Impact of change:

• Category 1

o Little impact on current services. The Change Manager is entitled to authorize this RfC.

• Category 2

o Clear impact on services. The RfC must be discussed in the Change

Advisory Board. The Change Manager requests advice on authorization and planning.

• Category 3

o Significant impact on the services and the business. Considerable manpower and/or resources needed. The RfC will have to be submitted to the board level (CAB/EC – Change Advisory Board / Executive Committee)

Priority Setting:

• Urgent

o Change necessary now (otherwise severe business impact)

• High

o Change needed as soon as possible (potentially damaging)

• Medium

o Change will solve irritating errors or missing functionality (can be

scheduled)

• Low

o Change leads to minor improvements

A change backout plan must always be possible.Change management always ends with a review of the change.

Change: The addition, modification, or removal of approved, supported or baselined hardware, network, software, application, environment, system, desktop build or associated documentation.

Request for Change: Form or screen, used to record details of a request for a change to any CI within an infrastructure or to procedures and items associated with the infrastructure.

Forward Schedule of Changes (FSC): Schedule that contains details of all the Changes approved for implementation and their proposed implementation dates.

Change Management Process

1. Request for a Change

2. Registration and Classification

3. Monitoring and Planning

4. Approve

5. Build & Test

6. Authorize Implementation

7. Implementation

8. Evaluate

Release Management

Objectives:

• Safeguard all software and related items

• Ensure that only tested / correct version of authorized software are in use

• Ensure that only tested / correct version of authorized hardware are in use

• Right software, right time, right place

• Right hardware, right time, right place

Tasks:

• Define the release policies

• Control of the Definitive Software Library (DSL)

• Control of the Definitive Hardware Storage (DHS)

• Distribute Software and Associated CIs

• Carry out S/W audits (using CMDB)

• Manage the software releases

• Oversee build of the software releases

Releases are done under the control of Change Management.

DSL : Definitive Software Library. Reliable versions of software in a single logical location. However, software may be physically stored at different locations.

Release Policy:

• Release Unit

• Full / Package / Delta Releases

• Numbering

• Frequency

• Emergency Change

Version Control:

• Development

• Testing

• Live

• Archive

Process:

• Software Control and Distribution (operational)

• Change Management (control)

• Configuration Management (control and administration)

Only process which creates its own policy.

Availability Management

Objectives:

• To predict, plan for and manage the availability of services by ensuring that:

o All services are underpinned by sufficient, reliable and properly

maintained CIs

o Where CIs are not supported internally there are appropriate contractual agreements with third party suppliers

o Changes are proposed to prevent future loss of service availability

• Only then can IT organizations be certain of delivering the levels of availability agreed with customers in SLAs.

Aspects of Availability:

• Reliability

• Maintainability: Maintenance you do yourself, as a company

• Resilience: Redundancy

• Serviceability: Maintenance done by someone else

Availability Information is stored in an Availability Database (ADB). This information is used to create the Availability Plan. SLAs provide an input to this process.

Unavailability Lifecycle

MTTR: Mean Time to Repair (Downtime) – Time period that elapses between the detection of an Incident and it’s Restoration. Includes: Incident, Detection, Diagnosis, Repair, Recovery, Restoration.

MTBF: Mean Time Between Failures (Uptime) – Time period that elapses between Restoration and a new Incident.

MTBSI: Mean Time Between System Incidents – Time period that elapses between two incidents. MTTR + MTBF.

“An IT service is not available to a customer if the functions that customer requires atthat particular location cannot be used although the agreed conditions under which the IT service is supplied are being met”

Simplistic Availability Calculation:

Agreed Service Hours – Downtime 100

------------------------------------------ X ----

Agreed Service Hours 1

IT Service Continuity Management

Why plan?

• Increases Business dependency on IT

• Reduced cost and time of recovery

• Cost to customer relationship

• Survival

Many businesses fail within a year of suffering a major IT disaster.

Business Impact Analysis:

Risk Analysis:

• Value of Assets

• Threats

• Vulnerabilities

Risk Management:

• Countermeasures

• Planning for potential disasters

• Managing a disaster

Risk Analysis: Based on the CCTA Computer Risk Analysis and Management Methodology (CRAMM)

Options:

1. Do nothing

2. Manual workarounds

3. Reciprocal arrangements

4. Gradual Recovery (cold standby)

5. Intermediate Recovery (warm standby)

6. Immediate Recovery (hot standby)

Cold start = accommodation. Environmental controls; power and communications Hot start = cold start + computing equipment and software

7 Sections of the Plan:

1. Administration

2. The IT Infrastructure

3. IT Infrastructure management & Operating procedures

4. Personnel

5. Security

6. Contingency site

7. Return to normal

Test and Review:

• Initially then every 6 to 12 months and after each disaster

• Test it under realistic circumstances

• Move / protect any live services first

• Review and change the plan

• All changes made via the CAB – Change Advisory Board

Contingency Plan:

• Assists in fast, controlled recovery

• Must be given wide but controlled access

• Contents (incl. Admin, Infrastructure, People, Return to normal)

• Options (incl. Cold & Hot Start)

• Must be tested regularly – without impacting the live service

Capacity Management

Objective:

To determine the right, cost justifiable, capacity of IT resources such that the Service Levels agreed with the business are achieved at the right time.

Objectives:

• Demand Management

o Business Capacity Management

• Workload Management

o Service Capacity Management

• Resource Management

o Resource Capacity Management

While doing the above, also need to do:

• Performance Management

o Internal and External Financial Data

o Usage Data

o SLM Data / Response Times

CDB – Capacity Data Base – Contains all Metrics, etc. Used to create a Capacity Management Plan. Performance Management Data populates the CDB.

Essentials:

• From Customer Demands to Resources

• Demand Management

• Workload Management

• Performance Management

• Capacity Planning

• Defining Thresholds and Monitoring

Application Sizing: To estimate the resource requirements to support a proposed application change to ensure that it meets its required service levels.

Modeling:

• Trend Analysis

• Analytical Modeling

• Simulation Modeling

• Baseline Models

• Used to Answer the “What If… “ questions

• Data for Modeling comes from the CDB

Financial Management

Objectives:

To provide information about and control over the costs of delivering IT services that support customers business needs. Costing is a must!

Input cost units recommended by ITIL:

• Equipment Cost Units (ECU)

• Organization Cost Units (OCU)

• Transfer Cost Units (TCU)

• Accommodation Cost Units (ACU)

• Software Cost Units (SCU)

Equipment = hardware

Organization = staff

Transfer = costs which IT incurs acting as an agent for the customer, they do not appear as a cost against the IT department’s budget

Accommodation = buildings

Software = software

Different Cost Types:

• Fixed - unaffected by the level of usage

• Variable - varying according to the level of usage

• Direct - usage specific to one service

• Indirect or Overhead – usage not specific to one service

• Capital – not diminished by usage

• Revenue or running – diminish with usage

Charging Objectives:

• Recover from customers the full costs of the IT services provided

• Ensure that customers are aware of the costs they impose on IT

• Ensure that providers have an incentive to deliver and agreed quality and quantity of economic and effective services

Charging and Pricing Options:

Charging:

• No Charging – IT treated as support center

• Notional Charging – IT treated as cost center

• Actual Charging

Pricing:

• Recover of Costs – IT treated as a service center

• Cost Price Plus – IT treated as a profit center

• Market Prices – IT treated as a profit center

Support and Cost centers used “soft charging” in which no money changes hands;

service and profit centers use “hard costing” in which money is transferred between bank accounts Profit centers focus on the value of the IT service to the customer Good Financial Management minimizes the risks in decision making

Main Processes:

Budgeting: The process of predicting and controlling the spending of money within the enterprise and consists of periodic negotiation cycle to set budgets (usually annual) and the day-to-day monitoring of the current budgets. Key influence on strategic and tactical plans.

IT Accounting: The set of processes that enable the IT organization to fully account for the way its money is spent (particularly the ability to identify costs by customer, by service, by activity).

Charging: The set of processes required to bill a customer for the services applied to them. To achieve this requires sound IT Accounting, to a level of detail determined by the requirements of the analysis, billing, and reporting procedures.

Service Level Management

Balance between the Demand for IT services and the Supply of IT services by knowing the requirements of the business and knowing the capabilities of IT.

Objectives:

• Business-like relationship between customer and supplier

• Improved specification and understanding of service requirements

• Greater flexibility and responsiveness in service provision

• Balance customer demands and cost of services provision

• Measurable service levels

• Quality improvement (continuous review)

• Objective conflict resolution

Tasks:

• Service Catalog

• Service Level Requirements

• Service Level Agreement

• Operational Level Agreements (OLA) and Contracts

• Service Specsheet

• Service Quality Plan

• Monitor, Review and Report

• Service Improvement Programs

• Customer Relationship Management

Minimum Requirements for an Agreement:

• Period

• Service Description

• Throughput

• Availability

• Response Times

• Signature

Other Possible Clauses:

• Contingency arrangements

• Review procedures

• Change procedures

• Support services

• Customer responsibilities

• Housekeeping

• Inputs and Outputs

• Changes

Ideally contracts are based on targets in the SLA SLAs must be monitored regularly and reviewed regularly

• Monitor to see if service is being delivered to specification

• Review to see if service specification is still appropriate