17 Feb2011
Written by Dustin Wheeler, CPA. Posted in IT Management
In an MBA class I’m taking at UNLV this semester, one of my assignments was to read the article IT Doesn’t Matter by Nicholas G. Carr, which was published in the Harvard Business Review in May 2003. The title, which certainly provides some shock value, may be misleading without further explanation. Carr doesn’t imply that IT is unimportant in an organization, but rather that it should not be considered a strategic resource.
The most interesting part of the article is Carr’s argument that IT, as an infrastructural technology, is becoming a commodity just like the railways in the mid 1800s and electric power in the early 1900s. As a commodity, IT becomes something that every business has and provides no competitive advantage.
I’m not saying that Carr is wrong, but I have a hard time comparing IT to commodities like railroads and power plants. Unlike other commodities, IT continues to evolve rapidly. For example, the graph on page 10 of the article measures the number of host computers on the Internet as a means to compare it to other commodities. In the changing world of IT, would this be better measured by smartphones, tablets, or another new device in a few years?
The article made me ask myself, “does IT provide a competitive advantage to an accounting firm?” I think it does – perhaps not so much the hardware and software themselves, but more in the way that they are used.
02 Feb2011
Written by Dustin Wheeler, CPA. Posted in Social Media, Tech Tips
It’s frequently asked questions time on Diving into the Details! With this one, we’re not diving too deep.
Having your picture (a.k.a. avatar) appear in my blog comments takes only a couple of minutes. Go ahead, time yourself and let me know if I’m wrong.
- Go to the Gravatar website.
- Create an account.
- Verify your e-mail address.
- Upload a picture, and you’re done!
Gravatar associates your picture with your e-mail address whenever you leave a comment on a WordPress blog (and a few other blog platforms). If you have multiple e-mail addresses like I do, you’ll either want to confirm multiple e-mail accounts with Gravatar or make sure you are consistenly using the same e-mail address when you comment on blogs.
Ready to show off your avatar? Leave a comment below!