Loraine Lawson

If anything should belong to IT, you would think it would be something as fundamental and technical as integration work. Indeed, one of my favorite themes on this blog is that IT can use integration as a strategic lever. But I’m starting to wonder if that’s an outdated idea. We talk about the democratization of […]

Any time I have to print something on deadline, I wonder if I’d be better off with a typewriter. Inevitably, the printer will not work, and a lot of swearing and frustration will be involved. I’m not alone in thinking that. Technology is a lot of work — yes, even Apples — and some days […]

Five Questions to Ask Before Choosing a Cloud Platform Solution Survey after survey shows that integration remains a serious issue for cloud adoption. Although fewer organization see it as an obstacle, one survey by InformationWeek found that integration of cloud services frustrates organizations—with one-third of respondents refusing to even try integration. Those who do try […]

Big Data: Not Just for Big Business Anymore Big Data analytics is still an emerging area for organizations, so it’s not surprising that a lot of ambiguity arises around the best way to support the strategic use of data. The discussion about how to drive adoption has mostly focused on the pros and cons of […]

It’s not that organizations don’t understand the importance of information governance, because a recent survey by Recommind shows that they do. The survey arrived in my inbox after its release Thursday, and I found the findings puzzling. In the U.S., CIOs and other data management IT workers from 113 midsized organizations responded to the survey. […]

Big Data: Not Just for Big Business Anymore Is there really any point in talking about anything other than Watson today? “Watson Is Going To Be Open For Public Use on the Cloud BAM!” tweeted James Governor, a.k.a. Monkchips of RedMonk, today. That about sums it up. If you’ve read about the new announcement, you’ve […]

A Big Market for Big Data Jobs What if organizations don’t need a chief data officer so much as they need an executive team that understands and relies on data? I stumbled backwards into this idea by misreading a shortened UK CIO headline: “Bank of England doesn’t need a CDO, claims CIO.” As happens too […]

Five Pitfalls to Avoid with Hadoop A data integration sandbox and integrating with Hadoop data through vendor products are among the best practices emerging for use with the Hadoop ecosystem, according to a recent TDWI report. TDWI Data Management Research Director Philip Russom wrote the report on the heels of a survey (registration required to […]

Six Reasons Businesses Need to Pay Attention to Unstructured Data A few weeks ago, I wrote about the Five-Fold Path for Ensuring Data = Information, which I drew upon Buddha’s Eight-Fold Path for inspiration. But to really understand the practices of the eight-fold path, you need to understand the underlying doctrines that motivate it. In […]

Six Reasons Businesses Need to Pay Attention to Unstructured Data Oh, boy, are we headed for a major data management fiasco. ZDNet had the opportunity to attend a discussion by processor maker ARM. The discussion points included a recent survey that queried 779 senior business leaders about their plans for adopting Internet of Things (IoT) […]

Could the integration challenges of cloud computing trigger an organizational shift for IT? IT tends to swing from centralized control to decentralized control every two or three decades, anyway. In times of strong centralized control, which is what we’ve seen in recent times, most of IT will report to a CIO. When the pendulum swings […]

A Big Market for Big Data Jobs As a job title, chief data officer (CDO) generates as much confusion as it does excitement. More organizations are appointing CDOs, particularly in government organizations such as the FCC, the Army and the Federal Reserve. But questions remain about this new role, as IT Business Edge’s Governance and […]