David Southgate

The dot.com era may be over but the hangover from hiring and firing so many employees, so quickly still lingers. By applying some SCM principles to your labor pool you can avoid this boom/bust cycle in the future. Through a labor supply chain initiative mandated at the end of 2003 by CEO Sam Palmisano IBM […]

With hidden costs, rising government fees, and increased regulation around hiring foreign workers, IT executives should beware. The H1-B employment visa for foreign nationals is often characterized as a boon for companies looking to hire ”affordable” help, and a bane to technology workers at home. Controversy and public policy aside, H1-Bs have potentially costly surprises […]

More technology executives stay in their current jobs out of fear, not loyalty, and this ungrounded apprehension may be holding back many executives from otherwise promising careers. “People are slightly risk diverse,” says John Piot, CEO and co-founder of Impact Innovations Group, an IT consulting and staffing firm headquartered in Dallas, Texas. A 2004 Network […]

Can your IT operations be at their peak without diversity? Compared to other industries, IT’s record with race-bias lawsuits might not be the worst, but if CIOs aren’t tracking diversity, their IT organizations may be at an even costlier disadvantage. All things being equal in terms of skills and abilities, IT staffs that are racially, […]

For IT executives wanting to be at the top of their game, executive coaches can be a tremendous tool for enhancing job performance. In the eyes of their superiors and teams, IT leaders must be infallible, with little room for doubt, error, or hesitation. Yet IT executives may not always be as comfortable or confident […]

Being the boss is tough enough but when subordinates are also friends, the working relationship may suffer unless you take a few basic steps to avoid the pitfalls. To IT managers and executives, the idea of being friends with their subordinates is a no-man’s-land, rife with questions: Will employees be respectful in the morning? Will […]

When an unemployed IT manager looks at the career path ahead, a poor personal financial situation might force him into the first job that comes along — whether it involves tech skills or not. But from the career perspective, is taking just any job a wise move? Career experts and tech managers themselves say honest […]

August marked the fourth consecutive month when companies announced fewer than 100,000 layoffs for U.S. workers, a trend not seen since 2000 and one that might point favorably to economic growth and an uptick in employment, according to a monthly report from international outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas, Inc. From May to August of […]

Trying to land a job interview these days can sometimes feel like a game of poker. Even if you’ve gotten lucky, with so many competing players, the odds seem stacked against you. If the job interview might not turn into a job offer, however, it is possible to reap some financial rewards. A career coach, […]

Techies wanting to obtain IT management executive positions sometimes turn to graduate school and MBAs as means of scaling the career ladder. But as the degree becomes more common place, an MBA may not be enough to differentiate a job candidate. In 2000, 112,258 people earned MBAs, 20% more than in 1995, according to data […]