Midmarket IT team : How to create one!

24 October 2017

Within the consulting aspects of Embedded’s world we are often invited into clients to review the performance of their technology in its mission of supporting the business processes. For our smaller clients, this is usually a big decision to take but is driven by a combination of real technology problems and a lack of any internal skilled resource to support / drive their technology agenda.

The conclusion is usually to get the skills needed to understand, represent and manage technology into the company. These skills need to be broad and experienced, and cost money, however without them technology sits out of focus of the business and ends up being under invested and unmaintained, which will just lead to problems in the long term. Being out of license compliance, having unsupported versions of hardware or software, suffering performance problems; all of which can hinder your business processes on which technology sits. The case for IT resources is stronger now than it ever has been in history as technology is an enabler to competitive edge within every industry.

Read more ...

Introducing : Embedded Directory

27 September 2017

This time next week I’ll be launching my new website, the Embedded Directory. It intends to be a Directory of UK IT and Telecoms Companies, indexed in a way that allows Clients to identify the right partner to work with based on skills, service capability, geography, target market, accreditations. Clearly it’s going to take some time to get traction, but I feel like I’m having a go at fixing a problem in the marketplace.

It all stems from my 25+ years in the IT and Telecoms industry. On numerous occasions, I have been involved in Client situations where they are unhappy with their existing IT or Telecoms supplier. Either the supplier doesn’t have the right skills for their business, or they are too small/big for them, or they just aren’t very good at managing the relationship.

Read more ...

Avoiding the noise of our industry

06 October 2017

I have made no secret of my frustration with the IT Channel in the UK. It is fragmented, disorganised, difficult to navigate and not particularly useful. If its purpose is to deliver vendor product to clients then it sort of works, but if its purpose was to support clients in a quest for understanding how to consume technology then I think it fails spectacularly.

Read more ...

Bitcoin: The Emperor's new currency?

08 September 2017

This week I have been amazed at the amount of people who have asked me about Bitcoin. “Are you involved?”; “Would you be a Bitcoin miner?”; “What’s a good wallet for Bitcoin?”. Entirely out of the blue I think I’ve had about 5 different unconnected conversations with people suddenly showing an interest in the cyber-currency. But why now? And why at all?

Read more ...