BISSG Past Meetings

Software as a Service 

Howard Smith,
CTO Computer Sciences Corporation,
author of 'Business Process Management: The Third Wave'

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Software as a Service (SaaS) is the IT industry's new term for what used to be called the rental model of software via Application Service Providers (ASP). A sea of services has opened on what some call Web 2.0. Has anything really changed, or is SaaS going the same way as ASP?

Powerful SaaS application providers, such as Salesforce.com, are gaining ground against on-premise software packages. SaaS does appear to be more than a new way of billing the customer. It's about using smart infrastructure and processes to give customers what they want, as early as possible, even before they have thought of it. CIOs worldwide are adopting SaaS and in-sourcing new capabilities to complement their existing IT infrastructures.

Yet things are not all plain sailing, and by looking under the hood, there are challenges yet before software can truly be bought as simply as turning on a service - even if that really is what the end users are asking for.

Howard Smith, CTO of Computer Sciences Corporation European Group, and who publishes a well known blog on SaaS (http://saassightings.blogspot.com) led a discussion about the future of IT service delivery.

Geospatial Information Is Everywhere - But where are the benefits of integration with your IT?

Dan Rickman, Independent Consultant

A joint event with Geospatial Specialist Group

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Integrating Geospatial Information (GI) with your existing information systems is increasingly straightforward - this talk addressed the factors which you need to consider when deciding when to do this and some of the issues which you will encounter when doing so. 

Almost all organisations have geospatial information (GI), about customers, assets, distribution, logistics and infrastructure.  Geographic Information Systems have been around for over 20 years yet they are still seen by many senior executives and CIOs as 'silo' applications, for example specialised engineering systems, rather than systems which can be at the heart of key business processes alongside and integrated with CRM and ERP.  This view is now beginning to change and the shift is being driven by a number of key business and technology drivers.  Major players such as Google and Microsoft are investing heavily in geospatial information and systems and system integrators are now discovering that customers are expecting them to provide GI-related skills. 

The business drivers relate to better understanding and integration of geography within their business process, which will enable improved customer service and reduce operating costs through better design, and use of, key infrastructure.  Furthermore, whilst the 'traditional' users of GI systems have been local authorities and utilities, there is a significant potential in a wide range of other areas.  As GI moves into the mainstream, the wider IT industry will gain significant benefits through being able to provide better integrated and more effective information management to the wider organisation.  The presentation will explain the benefits, drivers and issues related to GI systems.

Dan Rickman is vice-chair of the BCS Geospatial Specialist Group.  He has over 20 years experience of Geospatial Information Systems and as strategist, technical consultant, project manager, business analyst, systems analyst and systems developer.   A significant proportion of this work has involved establishing the business case for Geospatial and related systems through identifying the key business drivers for GI.  He has undertaken GIS-related assignments for a wide range of public and private sector organisations including utilities, local and central government.  He has produced guides to GI systems and standards for the NCC, Association for Geographic Information (AGI), Office for Government Computing (CCTA).  He is a member of the Ordnance Survey sponsored Digital National Framework Expert and Technical Groups.  Dan has presented papers on Geospatial issues at a range of events including the BCS Data Management Specialist Group, AGI and European conferences and published articles on a range of GI-related issues.

The Development of Business Imperatives for Electronic Publishing

David Penfold, Edgerton Publishing Services

with Electronic Publishing Specialist Group

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It is only within the last few years that electronic publishing has been profitable. And, even now, there are areas in which the business case is hard to determine. This talk looked briefly at the history of electronic and digital publishing and then at its growth from an academic tool into a commercial necessity. This included a brief look at CDs and DVDs, with the main focus on the Internet, the World Wide Web and content management, both within the commercial publishing industry and within a much wider business context. The talk ended with a look into the future at the Semantic Web and at what is described as Web 2.0.

David Penfold has worked in publishing for over 35 years. Since 1989 he has had his own consultancy, Edgerton Publishing Services, and projects have included project management of the SuperJANET demonstration project on electronic journals in 1993, moving Macmillan's journals to SGML, the Hutchinson Encyclopedia on the Web, a study of electronic journals and participation in the European study 'Multimedia Rights Clearance Systems'. He has been a reviewer and evaluator for the European Commission and has written several books (including part of the BCS series on ECDL) and many articles. He was Chair of the BCS Electronic Publishing Specialist Group until earlier this year and is a member of the BCS Learned Society and Knowledge Services Board, chairing the working party on web content in 2002. He is now a Senior Lecturer at the London College of Communication (formerly the London College of Printing), part of the University of the Arts London, teaching mainly on the MA in Publishing and supervising several Knowledge Transfer Partnerships.

Wireless Cities and Digital Communities

Stuart Pass

The digital community vision is becoming a reality with a number of key wireless city deployments in place and many more planned for 2007, and benefits for local authorities, citizens and businesses alike. The key foundation to providing true mobility is a comprehensive broadband wireless infrastructure, delivered on standards-based technologies. There are many challenges to providing this infrastructure, and choosing the correct deployment model for the business need is crucial, along with considerations for operational support and security. Stuart Pass gave an update on Intel digital communities work in the UK and how technologies such as WiMAX are delivering a foundation for providing new and exciting services.

Stuart Pass, Senior Consulting Engineer for Intel Solution Services, delivers network solutions for wireless and mobility projects, helps to align the division's solutions with the broader Intel strategy for mobile solutions, and runs the UK Intel Solutions Center labs and infrastructure.

With 15 years of industry experience, Stuart joined Intel from Oracle Corporation where he was a Network Technician responsible for designing and implementing IT network solutions and providing third-level support. Stuart holds an HNC Qualification in Electronic Engineering and is a Cisco Certified Network Professional.

Business IT Law

Scott Singer, Partner, DentonWildeSapte

Current market practice has increasingly moved towards lengthy IT contracts for anything but the most minor projects. However, numerous traps for the unwary lie buried in them. This talk was aimed both at users and suppliers of IT, and highlighted key issues for both to beware of.

Project implementation: How is delivery of projects on time incentivised?

Off-shoring: How is this dealt with in contracts? How are the risks, and benefits shared?

Performance frameworks: How is steady-state performance measured? How can it be incentivised, and what measures are employed for sub-standard performance?

Data Protection: What is it? What sort of contracts will it be relevant to?

Warranties: What sort of warranties can be expected?

Benchmarking: What are the issues? Can it work?

Termination: What rights to the parties have to bring the project to an end?

Scott is a partner in the Technology, Media and Telecoms department at Denton Wilde Sapte, specialising in technology, intellectual property, data privacy and outsourcing law. Scott has many years' experience advising on IT and outsourcing transactions, software law, and the exploitation of databases and acts for a large number of leading IT users and suppliers. Scott is also an expert in intellectual property law, where he has advised leading rights owners on the exploitation, maintenance and protection of brands and industrial property rights and on the protection of new ideas, as well as advising some of the world's largest rights users on the spectrum of rights licensing and acquisition issues. He also regularly advises on all aspects of data privacy law. Scott has an LLM in IT law, and in the 1980s worked as a computer programmer.

Experiences with Project & Portfolio Management Systems

Adrian Pyne, Secretary of ProgM

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Portfolio Management systems are fast becoming to organisations what fingerprint and DNA databases are to CSI (forensic) units in the USA and UK. But their purchase, implementation and use are as much under scrutiny as forensic expert systems. They have the ability to provide organisations with major benefits, but also the ability to cause chaos, anger, frustration…and career damage. So join me in “CSI London”, to discuss with me lessons I have learned from the procurement, design, configuration and operation of such systems over a number of years.

Adrian Pyne is secretary of ProgM, the UK’s Special Interest Group for Programme Management. He has more than 15 years’ experience of running programmes, and the design, build and operation of enterprise and other programme offices. Adrian is also co-author of the Gower Handbook of Programme Management.

Wit nor Wisdom – Business Process Modelling

Jon Holt, Director of Brass Bullet Ltd

Process modelling is one of those subjects that is often mis-understood. Consider the analogy of a magician performing a card trick - the process is easy to follow but impossible to replicate from the audience's point of view.  To replicate such a magic trick it is necessary to understand several different views of the trick, rather than simply looking at it from the audience's point of view.  A full understanding will require some degree of domain knowledge concerning magic and sleight-of-hand, and insight into the hidden complexities behind the trick and a knowledge of the mis-communication devices employed by magicians.  The challenge, therefore, is in creating an accurate and concise model of a process - a task that is plagued with complexity and difficulty in understanding the often-buried processes and communication trails that exist.  This lecture introduces a framework of views that are considered essential in order to fully understand any process. The approach discussed here has been used in industry and has been adopted by the BSI (British Standards Institution) for process modelling.

Jon Holt is the founder-director of Brass Bullet Ltd, a software and systems engineering consultancy company based in Swansea, South Wales, and is a Fellow of both The Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) and BCS.  Jon has been working in the field of process modelling, in particular using the Unified Modelling Language (UML), since the mid-1990's. He has worked with many organizations including: professional bodies such as the IET, the BSI and BCS; major industry, in the fields of defence, aerospace, rail, automotive, and communications; and academic institutions such as UCL and the University of Wales; as well as a number of government organizations and other non-engineering related groups.  His other interests include card magic and Tae Kwon Do.

Please attend our short and sharp AGM; we will be reviewing the year, including summarising our financial status. We also need to elect our Committee and would welcome some fresh blood.

This is also an excellent opportunity for you to raise topics that you would like discussed in our next season. If you can recommend an excellent speaker, please let us know.

Virtually There

BRUCE DAMER – Virtual Worlds expert & author of “Avatars”

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Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

IAN HUGHES – Metaverse Evangelist, IBM
Dr. JIM PURBRICK, Software Engineer, Linden Lab

A special event to mark the 50th anniversary of the BCS

In collaboration with the London Regional Branches and coordinated by the BISSG and the BCS North London Branch.

Do you know that there’s an increasing range of Avatar-based virtual worlds (graphical worlds featuring 2D and 3D representations of people) that allow users  to assume multiple identities and roles, and also to design and build their own landscapes and environments?

Their fast-growing virtual populations involve participants from all over the ‘real-world’. As well as social interactions, virtual worlds now facilitate advertising and business opportunities and are attracting major media coverage plus the attention of business leaders, e.g. at the January 2007 World Economics Summit in Davos.

At this fascinating event we learned more about:

• the history of 2D and 3D graphical worlds, starting with the first avatars in Maze War in the mid-1970s
• Second Life (created by Linden Lab), the leading example of the current evolution of virtual worlds.
• how leading global organisations are using virtual worlds to collaborate internally,and market externally.

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Invisible Architectures

Jenny Ure, Research Fellow in Management of Technology

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"Our Just In Time manufacturing system works well in Germany. Why not in Brazil? It’s the same technology - so what’s the difference?"

CEO, German automotive manufacturing company

Invisible Architecture addresses 'socio-technical systems' and uses practical examples to highlight the potential for harnessing 'soft' factors to competitive advantage, and the pitfalls of ignoring them. A range of cases were presented to illustrate how the alignment (or misalignment) of people, processes and technology can impact on system performance. Many managers stress the lack of training on 'soft' issues, despite the fact that much of their day is spent dealing with them. The session included case studies of e-business portals, supply chains and other networks to highlight the recurring socio-technical problems that CEOs and managers face, and some of the generic solutions which are emerging. As part of the session, there was an opportunity to break out into groups and try to find solutions to some of the typical socio-technical problems the management and the technical team had to address when designing and rolling out an Intranet in a large UK company.

Jenny is a psychologist by training and co-wrote the book Invisible Architecture while a Research Fellow in the management of technology at Edinburgh University Management School. She was recently a Visiting Research Fellow at Curtin University of Technology, and has worked in a range of Universities in the UK and abroad researching, developing and evaluating collaborative, networked systems in education and business. Her current research looks at knowledge management in the design and management of complex 'socio-technical' networks such as portals, intranets and supply chains in the financial services, software design, and the oil and gas sectors. She has a particular interest in strategies for the design and management of systems which align social, technical and organisational architectures to competitive advantage – 'building the technology around the social process.'

Getting your head round your Business Processes

Martyn Ould, Independent Consultant

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We have plenty of reasons for getting a real understanding of how our organisations work: quality management, process improvement, designing and changing processes as our organisation changes, and formalising our processes before we commit them to ‘process enactment systems’.

Yet the traditional methods and notations at our disposal are simply not up to the job of helping us get our arms and heads around the big, complex, distributed, collaborative, mobile, and highly concurrent processes that we operate.

The Brave New World of Business Process Management Systems has brought this into sharp focus.  BCS Fellow Martyn Ould has recently published a new approach to business process management that gets to grips with these challenges and he will be outlining the approach in this session.

Martyn Ould read Maths at Cambridge but was never going to be a 'real' mathematician. Spurning a lifetime in accountancy, he threw himself into computing and worked his way through ICL, Logica, Praxis (where he was Technical & Quality Director), and Deloitte, finally throwing in the towel of Organisation Man and going freelance in 1998. He is now having fun again. His interest in 'process' started in 1986 and that interest culminated in the publication by the BCS of his book 'Business Process Management – A Rigorous Approach' early in 2005.

Successful Outsourcing - Getting the Process Right

Elizabeth Sparrow, Author & Consultant

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Often controversial and unpopular, outsourcing has never been easy to get right. Recent decisions by Prudential, JP Morgan Chase and Sainsbury's to cancel outsourcing deals and move operations back in-house have led some to declare that outsourcing is finished. But this is not supported by market developments. Outsourcing continues to be big business, even if it is growing rather more slowly today.

We can learn much from the experience of IT outsourcing over several decades. There are well tested processes for determining what to outsource, selecting a service provider, devising a service level agreement and negotiating contracts. All too often however, programme management of these processes is poor.

The key to successful outsourcing is building a relationship with your service provider that works in the longer term, not a quick fix economy drive. This relationship needs to be developed from the outset - it is a critical success factor.

Companies outsourcing hope not only to derive savings but also to get added value from outsourcing deals. Different stakeholders have different perspectives on what this means and how to achieve it. Incentives can play a part. Disincentives or penalties used to discourage poor performance do little actively to encourage service
excellence.

Elizabeth Sparrow is an author and consultant, specializing in outsourcing relationships and change management programmes. In 2004 she chaired the British Computer Society working party on offshoring, which examined the impact of offshoring on the UK’s IT profession. The group’s report was published in November 2004.

Prior to her freelance career, Elizabeth was a senior IT leader in the public sector and has over 20 years experience of managing multi-million pound outsourcing relationships with a number of different service providers. As IT Director at the Home Office she led a major infrastructure upgrade project and launched an innovative private finance initiative. While at the Crown Prosecution Service, Elizabeth coordinated a substantial change programme involving not only the CPS but also the police service and courts.

Elizabeth’s first book, Successful IT Outsourcing, was published in 2003. Her new book, A Guide to Global Sourcing: Offshore outsourcing and other global delivery models, has recently been published by the British Computer Society.

A Pragmatic Guide to Business Process Modelling

Jon Holt, Director of Brass Bullet Ltd

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The talk introduced the three evils of life, in the form of complexity, lack of understanding and communication problems. It was then be demonstrated that these three evils exist in all systems - the business process being one such process.

The importance of understanding processes, regardless of whether they are formal or informal, high level or low level, was discussed, and some interactive simple examples were used to illustrate some of the problems with processes.

The requirements needed to specify a process with any degree of confidence were discussed. The concept of the 'process meta-model', a way of capturing best and current practice in an organization and using this as basis for a structured approach to process modelling was introduced. The focus was the importance of different views of the same process model and the consistency of the model, not only within itself, but also with other, external processes.

The approach described in the talk is an industrially-proven approach that uses open standards for modelling and that can be applied to: business processes, technical & management processes, standards, procedures, work instructions and even tacit process knowledge inside people's heads.

Jon Holt is the founder-director of Brass Bullet Ltd, a software and systems engineering consultancy company. He is a Visiting Professor at Penn State University, USA, and a Fellow of the BCS and The Institute of Electrical Engineers. Jon works in the field of process modelling, in particular using the Unified Modelling Language (UML) and has applied these techniques to many organizations ranging from small to medium sized enterprises (SME's) to large multinationals in many different sectors.

IT in the NHS

Jean Roberts, Chair of the BCS Health Informatics Forum Policy Task Force

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The domain of health in England is in constant flux, through strategic and management changes to the NHS and through a major innovative informatics programme (NPfIT) called 'Connecting for Health'. In parallel to this the BCS Health Informatics Forum, along with partners, recognized that informatics in support of health had a significant role to play, and there was a need to recognize the fitness to practice of professionals working both in and for the NHS in this environment. BCSHIF is instrumental in spreading the word about health informatics, professionalism and as a channel for constructive criticism of ongoing initiatives. Many of the hot topics in the IT industry per se apply to the health domain, perhaps with a different spin – offshoring, change management, standards, benefits realization, end user enablement and privacy issues. Jean highlighted the progress made so far, outline the lessons learned and commented on how these initiatives contribute synergistically.

Jean has been working in the health domain for over thirty years, nationally and internationally with eclectic experience in strategic health initiatives, knowledge exchange, management of complex programmes and projects, in informatics and ehealth business areas, in addition to academic contributions, marketing, communication and promotion of informatics to support care delivery and management. She is a Fellow of the British Computer Society, is Policy lead for BCSHIF and a Founder Council Member of the UK Council of Health Informatics Professions. Her current activity includes informatics consultancy and academic roles in research and teaching in the Lancashire School of Health and Post-Graduate Medicine.

Process Innovation: BPM and modern TRIZ

Howard Smith,
CTO Computer Sciences Corporation,
author of 'Business Process Management: The Third Wave'

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Business Process Management Systems (BPMS), from companies such as Intalio, ActionTech, Metastorm, Lombardi and others, and emerging from Oracle and Microsoft and other industry giants, provide a new way to develop IT applications based on business process models. This approach has many benefits, including a much reduced 'process design to production time and resource cost', as well as closer alignment between the business and IT organizations.

However, a BPM solution does nothing to help business or IT achitects dream up new processes (other than to provide the operational dashboard from which we can judge current performance.) So now that BPM solutions give us a fast-track to new IT-enabled processes (an improvement over 're-engineering') we also need methods to help re-design and re-invent existing processes. New methods, including Modern TRIZ, and P-TRIZ can help.

In this presentation, Howard Smith, author of the best-selling book, 'Business Process Management: The Third Wave', will give an overview of the BPM space and an introduction to TRIZ methods applied to Business Processes. A practical tool demonstration will be available on the day.

How clinical care processes can be supported by IT

Dr Glyn M Hayes, Chair of the BCS Health Informatics Committee

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Clinical care has become more complex, more sophisticated and more risk prone as medicine has developed.  It is now much more of a team effort rather than just one doctor doing everything.  It is also much more evidence based but no clinician can keep up with the increasing knowledge base.  Medico legal issues dominate much of the practice of medicine and patient expectation is at an all-time high.  In this changing world, IT is the only way in which modern care can be delivered.  Many think of IT as just supporting the administrative and management aspects of health.  While these are important, the improvement in individual patient care that IT can bring is the most valuable aspect of health informatics.  The current National Programme for IT is based on this premise.  Billions of pounds are being spent trying to achieve it.  The talk will outline the possibilities for IT supporting clinical care but also the risks to such investment if the basic principles of business processes and the human aspects of the use of IT are not considered.

Dr Hayes, Fellow of the BCS, became a principal in general practice in 1973. He developed an active interest in computers in 1978 when he installed one of the world's first full consulting room systems into his practice. He was a founder member of the Primary Health Care Specialist Group of the British Computer Society, becoming Chair in 1985 and currently President. Dr Hayes has been involved in medical computing at all levels, his particular interests being the structure of electronic medical records, the use of computers during the clinician patient encounter and how to ensure medical computer systems improve individual patient care. He has been a member of most of the national bodies concerned with primary care computing and now has a vested interest in how IT affects direct patient care. He lectures internationally having been chair of the International Medical Informatics Association, Working Group on Primary Care. He has also published widely on medical computing, medical legal issues and the structure of the Electronic Medical Record. He is currently the chair of the Health Informatics Committee of the British Computer Society.

Getting your head round your Business Processes; Riva - Part 2

Martyn Ould, Independent Consultant

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We have plenty of reasons for getting a real understanding of how our organisations work: quality management, process improvement, designing and changing processes as our organisation changes, and formalising our processes before we commit them to 'process enactment systems'. Yet the traditional methods and notations at our disposal are simply not up to the job of helping us get our arms and heads around the big, complex, distributed, collaborative, mobile, and highly concurrent processes that we operate.

The Brave New World of Business Process Management Systems has brought this into sharp focus.  BCS Fellow Martyn Ould has recently published a new approach to business process management – the Riva method – that gets to grips with these challenges. He introduced the approach at the November session and expanded on its application to real-world situations in this follow-up session.

Martyn Ould read Maths at Cambridge but was never going to be a 'real' mathematician. Spurning a lifetime in accountancy, he threw himself into computing and worked his way through ICL, Logica, Praxis (where he was Technical & Quality Director), and Deloitte, finally throwing in the towel of Organisation Man and going freelance in 1998. He is now having fun again. His interest in 'process' started in 1986 and that interest culminated in the publication by the BCS of his book 'Business Process Management – A Rigorous Approach' early in 2005.

Implementing IT Governance using Control Objectives for IT (CobiT)

Dr John Mitchell, LHS Business Control

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When two or more CIOs are gathered together the conversation invariable revolves around two topics: how well are they doing in comparison to their peers and how can they prove to their CEOs that they are providing value for money whilst balancing risk against opportunity? The answer to both these questions sits at the centre of the IT Governance debate. The theme of this session was to outline what IT Governance is and then provide a framework for its implementation based on an international open standard.

Dr John Mitchell is the Director of LHS Business Control which is an independent consultancy, founded in 1989, which specialises in corporate governance, business control and fraud investigation. Dr Mitchell is a Chartered Engineer (CEng), a Chartered Information Technology Professional (CITP), a Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA) and a Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE). He is also a fellow of the British Computer Society (FBCS) and a fellow of the Institute of Internal Auditors (FIIA). He holds an MBA from Middlesex University where he majored in Financial Control. Prior to forming LHS, he was Deputy Chief Internal Auditor at British Telecom and before that he was Computer Audit Manager at British Gas. With his qualifications and experience, he is highly accomplished in corporate governance, business control, computer security, system development, capital expenditure control, dispute resolution and the business implications of safety critical systems.

Six Sigma Warts & All

Stephen Jarman, Catalyst Consulting Ltd

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The discussion gave a balanced picture of the application of Six Sigma, where it has worked well and why - as well as where and why when is hasn't. Although the speaker believed passionately that Six Sigma is the 'best show in town' when it comes to process improvement, there are also some examples of where the philosophy 'it'll be alright on the night' has come unstuck.

In particular we considered:

• How and why Six Sigma has been so successful at companies like GE
• How it differs from other approaches and why that makes Six Sigma so successful in many organisations (the 'management technology of Six Sigma')
• Some varied examples of success
• The essential pre-requisites for success
• Examples of problem cases
• inadequate measurement systems
• senior management impatience for results
• insufficient resources & funding
• Examples of new learning
• Re-invigorating 'Workout'
• 'virtual' Six Sigma
• Simplified Design for Six Sigma

Steve has over 20yrs experience in the Quality field in hi-tech organizations and manufacturing. His special expertise includes Quality Management Systems, Six Sigma and Problem Solving.

He recently joined Catalyst Consulting following a successful period as a Six Sigma Black-Belt with Sun Microsystem’s Computer Server Development Team near Camberley. In that role Steve led the application of Design for Six Sigma throughout Development organizations within Europe. He was also the Six Sigma Black Belt for a number of key problem-resolution activities, including rescuing a delayed key product-release through the application of DMAIC methodologies.

Steve has a Degree in Electrical & Electronic Engineering is a member of the Institute of Electrical Engineers.

Iterative Project Management: A Scalable Approach to Managing Software Development Projects

Ian Spence, Principal Consultant, Reqtrix Limited

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Iterative software development methodologies offer many benefits for modern software development projects but are often pigeon holed as only being suitable for certain kinds of small-to-medium sized projects that are prepared to adopt a very technologically focussed, informal, hands-off management approach. Based on many years of experience working with project managers on iterative software development projects, this presentation presented a scalable iterative project management approach - based upon the Unified Process project lifecycle - that allows iterative software development practices to be successfully applied to all sizes of software development projects. It focused on how to apply iterative project management practices to different sizes of project, how to scale the project management practices to meet the needs of the organisation (including their adoption within a PRINCE2 environment) and how to get started in their application.

The Principal Consultant of Reqtrix Limited, Ian Spence has over 19 years experience in the software industry, covering the complete development lifecycle; including project management, requirements capture, architecture, analysis, design and implementation. He has over 10 years experience of iterative project management and with Kurt Bittner wrote the book Use Case Modeling (Addison-Wesley 2003). Ian and Kurt are currently working on a follow up book, provisionally titled 'Managing Iterative Software Development', from which this presentation is extracted.

Committee Meeting only

Six Sigma: The DMAIC Process - Define, Measure, Analyse, Improve, Control

Stephen Jarman, Catalyst Consulting Ltd

The session in November 2004 provided an introduction to the nature and scope of Six Sigma. In this follow-up session, Steve looked at some of the Six Sigma tools and techniques and discussed their use in an IT world.

Steve recently joined Catalyst Consulting following a successful period as a Six Sigma Black-Belt with Sun Microsystem's Computer Server Development Team near Camberley. In that role Steve led the application of Design for Six Sigma throughout Development organisations within
Europe. He was also the Six Sigma Black Belt for a number of key problem-resolution activities, including rescuing a delayed key product-release through the application of DMAIC methodologies. Steve has a Degree in Electrical & Electronic Engineering and is a member of the Institute of Electrical Engineers.

Benefits Realisation

Adrian Leach, Parity

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This talk provided a thorough overview of a benefits realisation framework. It discussed some problems with benefits realisation and how an IT project can be migrated to a business/service change programme. Adrian also discussed the factors influencing the achievement of benefits – organisation, people and procedures, programmes of interdependent projects and services and how to evaluate business change initiatives. He outlined roles and responsibilities for achieving benefits – business sponsor, service manager, programme manager and project manager.

Adrian has an ICT background of almost 36 years. He has worked in over 30 countries with almost 300 different organisations. He has been involved in, consulted on, or been responsible for all aspects of the IS Applications and Service Delivery lifecycle including Programme, Application, Project, Relationship and Service Management through to Information and Operational Systems Auditing.

He is the Parity Training Principal Consultant for Business IT Alignment products which cover:

• IS Strategy Management
• Performance, Quality, Governance and Readiness Management
• Applications and Transition Management
• Business Process and Business Change Management
• Integrity, Continuity and Security Management
• Value Management
• Consultancy Relationships and Advisory Management
• Business and IT Architectures management
• Centres of Excellence

Introduction to Agile Systems Development

Brian Swan, Exoftware

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The introduction gave attendees a basic understanding of what Agile software development is and how it is developing within the software development community. The presentation focused on a real case example to show exactly how Agile software development works.

When discussing Agile it is sometimes difficult to explain how a requirement is tracked from initial requirements through to implementation. Using a real user story from a current Exoftware development project, Brian gave the story of a story - from initial user story presentation, estimation, scheduling, delivery of acceptance tests, and implementation through Test Driven Development.

Brian Swan is an Agile mentor with Exoftware. Brian has extensive experience in both the technical and management aspects of Agile. He has successfully led a variety of teams transitioning to Agile as well as trained both developers and managers in Agile thinking and practice.

Brian also has a depth of technical experience specifically in sectors such as financial services and telecoms. His work with Exoftware and Agile has taken him to a variety of companies, where he has consistently and positively impacted development teams. Brian's previous experience
includes lecturing at Napier University in software development and human and computer interaction. To contact Brian, email him at bswan@exoftware.com

Machiavelli and Change Management - A Personal Case Study

Anthony Butler

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It is now some 500 years since Nicolo Machiavelli composed his immortal treatise on politics entitled 'The Prince', which was first published in 1515. His famous comment on change: "There is nothing so dangerous or doubtful of success than to initiate a new order of things." needs to be taken to heart by any aspiring project manager.

This talk demonstrated the aptness of Machiavelli's views to modern Business/IT project management by charting the implementation path of a web project. The aim of this ground-breaking project, now successfully achieved, was to create a 'Kent Business Passport' across a range of business support websites in Kent.

The talk also detailed the technical strategy adopted, commented on experiences with Open Source software, and showed some excerpts from the system in operation.

Anthony Butler is a business and IT professional with wide experience in the public and financial services sectors, including over twenty years experience in securities and life assurance. He is particularly interested in the impact of technology on business, and in the strategic planning and management control of IT. He initiated and chaired the DTI-sponsored expert systems work in insurance (Aries at City), assisted in the founding of several UK computer performance groups, and managed the development of the Laurel Online web system for assisting companies in gaining Investors in People Recognition.

Currently he is eBusiness Manager with Business Link Kent at West Malling, responsible for all Internet and website matters. He is a Fellow of the British Computer Society and a Chartered Information Systems Engineer.

Getting Value for Money from IT

Roger Lee, KPMG IT Performance Advisory Services

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Nobody would disagree that to achieve value for money from IT is a goal for most organisations. However, experience is that few people try to measure value or even define it. Most of the focus recently has been on reducing IT cost. To achieve value for money from IT, the business and IT have to work together. The presentation looked at a framework for designing and assessing value for money and applying it in practice.

Roger Lee leads KPMG's IT Performance Advisory Services in the UK and he has worked with many international blue chip companies to help them provide greater value for money from IT.

Naked Objects - An Open Source Framework for Building OO Business Systems

Richard Pawson and Dan Haywood

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Naked Objects is a radical approach to business systems design and development, supported by an open source framework. Core business objects such as Customer, Product and Order are exposed directly and to the user instead of being masked behinds the constructs of a conventional user interface. Coupling Naked Objects with a set of customisations to Together Control Center benefits both the development process and the developed product:

• the 'naked' objects form a common language between users and developers
• the development cycle is dramatically reduced
• the resulting systems treat the end-user as a problem solver (not a process follower)
• the resulting systems are easy to enhance, making them a good fit for agile development methods.

In this talk they showed Naked Objects and Together Control Center in action, and contrasted the result with more conventional systems built following the contemporary dominant design.

Richard Pawson is the inventor of the naked objects concept, and with Robert Matthews co-authored 'Naked Objects' (2002) and founded www.nakedobjects.org. He has worked in IT since 1977, since 1990 focusing on research into agile software development and object-oriented design in particular. He has spoken at conferences and events in 21 different countries, and acted as retained advisor to senior IT management of large corporations and government organisations.

Dan Haywood has worked on large and small software development projects since 1989, for Accenture and Sybase UK. Since 1998 he has been an independent consultant, trainer and technical writer in Java, J2EE, UML and RDBMSs. He is also an expert on Together Control Center having co-authored with Andy Carmichael 'Better Software Faster' (2001), addressing the effective use and customization of Together Control Center.

Project Management in a RUP Environment - Iterative Development With Use Cases

Ian Spence, Rational

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Joint session with PROM-SG.

The IBM Rational Unified Process (RUP) is one of the world's leading software development processes. It is currently being adopted as a standard by many organisations in order to reduce the time-to-market for software development, increase the productivity of the software development teams and increase the quality of the software delivered. RUP is characterised by its use-case driven, architecture-centric, iterative approach to software development, characteristics that impact upon the management of the project as well as the more technical software development disciplines. This presentation explored how to plan a project based on RUP using a use-case based approach. Patterns for planning iteration in each phase were presented, providing attendees with a simple and practical approach to organising the project work. The application of RUP within a PRINCE2 environment was also discussed.

The speaker, Ian Spence, is a Senior Consultant in Rational UK's IT Business Change Practice, where he assists organisations in the creation and execution of change programmes to improve their software development capability. Ian has been at Rational for 6 years where he has specialised in the large-scale adoption of the Rational Unified Process and the iterative, use-case driven, architecture-centric approach that it recommends. Ian has over 18 years' experience in the software industry, covering the complete development lifecycle, including requirements capture, architecture, analysis, design, implementation and project management.

Web Services: Emerging Standards and Management Implications

Joost Koedijk, KPMG

The 'British Clippers' Project Management Case Study

Stephen Carver, ALS Consultants and Cranfield Business School

Because of the file size, and because it's "in the way he tells them", there is no download for this talk.

This was a cautionary tale of how two swashbuckling heroes - Sir Richard Branson and Sir Chay Blyth - learnt the difference between Project Management and Enthusiasm Management. The idea was brilliant. The Americans love everything British and they love Tall Ships. Why not combine the two and create a floating Harrods and take it over to the U.S! The concept was brilliant, the enthusiasm was overwhelming, the teamwork was magnificent - however, the planning was negligible. A lovely tale of how even good ideas can fail if you call in the Project Manager too late!

Stephen has enthralled and entertained audiences worldwide with his marvellous stories of how real organisations sometimes get their projects wonderfully right - but more usually hideously wrong! The key to Stephen’s captivating style is his ability to show how the lessons learned from these riveting stories can be put into everyday practical use within organisations. Not only is he a successful Masters qualified Project Manager in his own right but he is also used to speaking to some of the most demanding audiences as a lecturer in Project Management at Cranfield, one of Europe’s top business schools.

IT Vendors and Suppliers - Are they destined to hold the whip hand forever?

David Roberts, Chief Executive, The Corporate IT Forum

Supply is driven by demand in all market sectors - except IT, where demand is driven by supply and, sometimes, the withdrawal of supply. It is unique in that business-critical decisions about procurement and deployment are weighted by deliberately-curtailed product lifecycles, and made in the boardrooms of the suppliers, not the purchasers. So what action should the IT user community take to redress the balance of power?

David Roberts founded The Corporate IT Forum in 1996 and, as its Chief Executive, is responsible for identifying and meeting subscribers' needs, and ensuring that all Forum activities are topical and relevant. His role includes presenting the collective industry voice of computing infrastructure to vendors, governments and businesses.

The Corporate IT Forum is a knowledge pool of 3000 senior corporate IT professionals from the IT functions of 147 organisations - including more than 50% of the largest 100 companies on the London Stock Exchange - representing a combined IT spend of more than £20bn per year. We focus on sharing experiences, knowledge and understanding of the direction, management and practice of IT to solve real IT issues.

Data Protection after Soham and British Gas - The Role of the Law and IT

Scott Singer, Senior Solicitor, Denton Wilde Sapte

A PDF copy of the presentation may be requested from Scott.

Scott considered:

• What should organisations do when law appears to be telling them one thing but common sense suggests another?
• What really are organisations' obligations under data privacy law?
• Who can organisations share personal information with?
• How do computer systems impact the situation?

Scott specialises in data privacy, technology, and intellectual property law. Scott has advised numerous data controllers and data subjects on all aspects of data privacy including global data transfers, data sharing, sale and purchase of databases, subject access rights, employee monitoring and data protection policies. Scott is also experienced in advising on IT transactions, software law, the exploitation of databases. He also advises on intellectual property law, in particular as it applies to the protection of ideas, technology and brands. Scott has a Masters degree with distinction in IT law and has been a tutor on the LL.M in IT law at the University of Strathclyde since 1999.

Capability Maturity Model - Establishing Good Habits

Colin Brown, Freelance Consultant

All IT organisations are continually under pressure to increase their ability to meet their timescale, scope, budget and quality commitments.  The CMM is a proven model that uses a combination of industry-wide and your own existing best practices to achieve and sustain these improvement goals.  Although the CMM provides a roadmap for adoption, as with any useful tool, a clear understanding and good judgement are required to formulate an approach that reflects the specific needs and characteristics of your organisation.  The session explored the aims and benefits of the model and showed how these can be realised. 

Colin Brown is a freelance consultant and PLC Associate and has a wide experience in the financial and retail sectors in implementing the CMM in the UK, Europe and India.

Resolving Conflict

Dave Liddle, Total Conflict Management

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The presentation examined the destructive and constructive nature of conflict. It examined the causes and effects of conflict at six different levels: people, culture, leadership, the environment, power and politics and change.

The presentation introduced participants to a structured definition of mediation and considered the underlying philosophy of the approach. This was followed by an examination of the process of mediation and its many applications. Discussion within the group covered the benefits of mediation to a variety of stakeholders.

Content Management

Mayank Ladd

Mayank is Chair Elect of the proposed BCS Content Management Specialist Group

Content Management (CM) is the first strategic Information Management investment of the new Millennium, say Strategy Partners (in "Content Management Europe 2001-3"). Studies indicate most organisations hold between 1-10% of structured data e.g. in databases while the remaining 90-99% is content - e.g. text, images and emails. Given that IDC predicts that annual storage requirements will grow at more than 80% per annum, there will be 7.5 times more data to be managed in 2003 than there were in 1999 and over 90% of this data will be unstructured. Content Management is about managing millions of pieces of content - structured or unstructured - whether they are sections of electronic manuals, components for a website, or just general company documentation including e-mails. This is becoming an increasingly difficult and challenging task. Content management tools make this much easier.

Mayank Ladd has spent his entire professional career working across a spectrum of information management, document management and content management roles, from programming image analysis tools to his current role of Electronic Document and Records Management Programme Management for a key UK Government Agency. His extensive project-based experience has included PRINCE2 project management, system selection, systems analysis, scope studies, architecture and functional specification and acceptance testing. He has considerable experience in Document Management, Content Management, Records Management, Workflow, Portal, Imaging and e-Business disciplines gained through working with leading organisations including EDS's Document Management Services Group and Tower Technology, a leading Document Management vendor. More recently, Mayank has set up his own specialist company, CODO, that offers independent and unbiased advice and services in Information Management. Mayank is also an Associate for one of the leading European independent Information, Document and Records Management services company, In-Form Consult (IFC). He has currently applied to be Chair of the new Content Management Specialist Group within the BCS and is actively looking for people to get involved at any level.

Embedded Workflows and Straight-through Processing

Keith Hales, SODAN

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The talk explored the origins and development of workflow and process management, and considered the advantages and disadvantages of embedded workflow and straight through processing, compared with total abstraction of processes from applications.

Keith Hales is the MD of of SODAN, founded in 1991, an independent workflow consultancy. He is also the author of SODAN's annual report, 'Workflow Management Products', and publisher of the monthly newsletter 'e-business Workflow', and 'Business Process Modelling Tool Products' report.

Programme Planning Meeting

Model Driven Architecture: Beyond UML

Allan Kennedy, Kennedy Carter

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Model Driven Architecture (MDA) is the Object Management Group's architectural framework for all its standards, the most widely known of which are the UML and CORBA. MDA is not revolutionary but rather it consolidates many advances in model driven development within the OMG's standards framework. Key concepts of MDA include: (1) modelling of business processes in the form of "Computation Independent Models"; (2) formalisation of system behaviour in "Platform Independent Models" (PIM's) which can be targeted at multiple middleware platforms; (3) automated derivation of "Platform Specific Models" from PIM's. Allan elaborated on these themes and reported on the current status of MDA at the OMG and on recent work with the OPEN Group to combine MDA with TOGAF - The OPEN Group Architecture Framework. Allan also presented an overview of a successful MDA project - the mission computer for the F16 fighter aircraft.

He recommended a book by David S. Frankel (Model Driven Architecture: Applying MDA to Enterprise Computing).

Allan Kennedy is the Managing Director of Kennedy Carter Ltd, a UK firm that has pioneered the technology of executable modelling and is the originator of the iUML modelling tool. He is co-chair of the Object Reference Model sub-committee of the OMG which is the body responsible for the official definition of MDA.

Lessons from the Battle of Hastings

Stephen Carver, Cranfield

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1066 - THE BATTLE OF HASTINGS: Almost a thousand years have passed since this battle changed the course of England’s history. Recent research has uncovered a wealth of new data that shows that the battle was won not by the best warrior, or even the best leader, but rather by the best project manager! This lively and entertaining case study showed how a project manager from 1066 can still teach present day managers a few tricks. It also raised the topical subject of how "company cultures" often find it difficult to manage their project managers after the project is over!

Stephen R Carver, BSc MSc CEng MAPM AMBA: Stephen is not only a sought after speaker but also a Masters qualified Project Manager with strong business and financial expertise. After graduating, he gained 10 years' project experience working in the oil business and then undertook a specialist MBA in Project Management at Cranfield School of Management. On completion he worked for Virgin as Project Manager for their unique undertaking to build a 350 ft clipper ship to promote British exports in the USA. Following this assignment, he worked directly for the chairman of a multinational projects company as Head of Project Strategy. Presently one of the top-rated lecturers at Cranfield School of Management, he also runs his own Project Management Consultancy (A.L.S.). Stephen runs seminars, PM courses and undertakes conference keynote speeches worldwide. He has an enviable reputation for his fast moving, stimulating and fun approach. The key to Stephen's captivating style is his ability to show how the lessons learned from these riveting case studies can be put into everyday practical use within organisations.

Partner Relationship Management

Teresa Cottam and Therese Cory, Chorleywood Consulting

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Teresa Cottam is the Director of Publications and Research at Chorleywood Publications, a publisher of reports and magazines specialising in customer care, business and operational support systems for the telecoms industry. Chorleywood also produces and researches the Global Target Locator database and the newsletter Billing Plus.

Teresa has over eight years' experience in telecoms industry research and before joining Chorleywood worked for Ovum. She has also worked in traditional and online publishing. Teresa specialises in content issues and has undertaken consultancy in content strategy and information architecture. At Chorleywood she has harnessed her knowledge of content, telecoms and IT to write the Pricing and Billing for Content series of reports.

Teresa talked about wholesale content billing and how this is challenging the telecoms industry. She began with a brief overview of how the industry has changed and why, and then talked about how wholesale billing has evolved from a simple biller-keeps-all model to a complex revenue-sharing arrangements. She related this to weaknesses in legacy systems, highlighting opportunities for operators and vendors. As wholesale content billing is all about partnerships, this led into Therese's talk about managing partnerships.

Therese Cory began in the IT industry as a software quality manager, but has for ten years been an independent IT and telecoms analyst. She is an associate of Chorleywood Publications. She has authored a series of reports entitled 'Partner Relationship Management'.

Her talk analysed the case for partnering in the technology/telecoms industry, what type of IT support is needed, and gave some examples of commercial products as well as types of alliance in the industry.

An Introduction to Data Privacy

John Hull, Partner, Denton Wilde Sapte

Data Privacy in Practice - Current Issues in Data Protection and Privacy

Anne Hinde, Assistant Information Commissioner of the Information Commissioner's Office

The BISSG AGM will take place 17:30 - 18:00, ahead of the main event and in a separate meeting room.

There will be a limited number of places for this talk; booking is essential. Please email Stuart Pollard.

Anne Hinde will be talking on:

• The latest data privacy issues, including subject access rights, global data transfers and employee monitoring
• Enforcement and investigation
• The future role of the Information Commissioner's Office.

Anne Hinde is an Assistant Commissioner in the office of the Information Commissioner. She currently has responsibility for promoting the Information Commissioner’s policy on implementation of the Data Protection Act 1998 and ensuring compliance with the Act by data controllers within the financial, insurance and general business areas of the private sector. Since joining the office in 1990, Anne has worked on strategic policy, international issues and Freedom of Information policy. In 1998 she was seconded to the Home Office where she was a member of the Bill team for the Data Protection Act 1998.

John Hull will introduce Anne by giving a brief synopsis of some key issues of concern in the field of UK data privacy law. John is the head of Denton Wilde Sapte's Information and Privacy Group. He specialises in data privacy, intellectual property and IT law. He has a long-standing interest in legal aspects of privacy and data protection and is the author of the leading text 'Commercial Secrecy: Law and Practice' published by Sweet & Maxwell. He is an acknowledged expert in the field, and has also been the lead partner in a number of leading cases in the technology field including Cantor Fitzgerald -v- Tradition (UK) Ltd (1998) and Dranez Anstalt -v- Zamir Hayek and others (2002).

Culture and Communications - The Space Shuttle Case Study

Stephen Carver of Cranfield School of Management

Stephen R Carver, BSc MSc CEng MAPM AMBA, is not only a sought after speaker but also a Masters qualified Project Manager with strong business and financial expertise. After graduating, he gained ten years project experience working in the oil business and then undertook a specialist MBA in Project Management at Cranfield School of Management. On completion of the MSc, he was recommended by Cranfield to Virgin as Project Manager for their unique undertaking to build a 350 ft Clipper ship to promote British exports in the USA. Following this assignment, he worked directly for the Chairman of a multinational projects company as Head of the Project Strategy Department. Presently a Consultant Lecturer in Project Management at Cranfield School of Management, he specialises in the application of Project/Change Management within the service sector and has recently undertaken consultancy and training assignments with companies such as Royal Mail, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, BP, Wincanton Logistics, St Ivel, and ING. He has an enviable reputation in the industry for his fast moving, stimulating and fun approach.

The Sales Process Entry Dilemma

Colin Bromley, Director of Change and Common Services, Legal & General

• Why consider both offline and online entry for sales people?
• What are the implications for sales people and the selling process?
• Which costs more to develop?
• What are the technical issues, why does it hurt?!
• What's the long term strategy?
• Why does this cause organisational stress?
• Is there a 'silver bullet'to these issues?

Colin Bromley can best be described as a Programme Consultant, having been involved in projects most of his career. His roles have ranged from managing systems development, with some 400 people, to running £10m+ business change programmes, many within the Sales arenas leading the e-Commerce revolution. His current assignment is at Legal & General, managing all change programmes within the IT Department. These range from Intranets and development re-engineering to implementing technical strategies.

Bridging the Gap between IT and Business

Ade McCormack, Founder and Principal, Auridian Consulting

IT isn't delivering to the business. This talk focussed in on the need for better communication across the IT-business divide. Ade considered:

• how IT departments can address this through better PR and user focused development
• how users can play their part in becoming better technology influencers.

Ade has spent 18 years in IT. He writes as an industry/technology commentator in a number of technology periodicals, including a monthly column in Computing.

Ade has worked for Ferranti (developing real-time systems for the Royal Navy) and Logica, before founding Auridian Consulting to focus on bridging the gap between business and technology.

Auridian has circa 300 clients including: CSFB, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, HSBC, Carlton TV, Granada TV, NTL, BT, GlaxoSmithKline, CalibreOne.com, Manpower, Adecco, DVLA, Nestle, Unilever, Diageo, Accenture, Andersens, Merrill Lynch, Lastminute.com...

What's So Good about Facilitated Workshops?

Richard Allen, Independent Consultant

Have you noticed that best-practice approaches to systems development, including RUP (Rational Unified Process) and DSDM (Dynamic Systems Development Method), advocate facilitated workshops? Is this just new packaging for old-fashioned meetings? Or is it true that they can help produce faster results, more co-operative teamwork and better decisions? What difference could workshops make to your projects? Come along to experience the workshop format for yourself, and discover the benefits others have found from using workshops appropriately.

Over his last two decades working in systems development, Richard has seen all sorts of approaches to requirements gathering, decision making and team-building.

As a DSDM project manager and RUP business analyst, trainer and facilitator, he now uses facilitated workshops in IT contexts and in general business. His clients include UBS Warburg and JP Morgan Chase.

IT Investment: Is it Complete Bollocks?

Dan French, MD, Intraspect Europe

We continue to invest in IT way ahead of growth, at least in large companies. In general, this systems investment is centred on creating applications that capture business events in the form of summarised records - i.e. transactions. When did the CEO, Marketing Director, etc. last use the ERP application, the HR application, CRM...? People who create revenue and make key decisions don't use this record base. By contrast, if we invest in IT that brings together people, process and expertise - aligned with strategic objectives - we can achieve dramatically greater benefits. And this new approach is particularly essential in a true eBusiness world.

Dan French has had twenty years' of experience working with blue chip companies while at James Martin Associates, Texas Instruments, Sterling Software and now Intraspect. Intraspect Software Inc. provides web-based applications to support business processes that need to connect people, work and expertise. Enterprises gain competitive advantage by rapidly deploying these collaborative applications that bring products to market faster, improve employee productivity, enhance customer/supplier/partner relationships, etc. Intraspect's customer base includes Bank of America, Barclays Global Investors, KPMG Consulting, EDS, Sun Microsystems, Siemens, Ogilvy & Mather, One2One, Banner PR and Daimler Chrysler.

Fighting Conflict with Common Sense

Elisabeth Somogyi, Independent Consultant

The presenter was Elisabeth Somogyi who chairs the BCS BISSG. As a management consultant, Elisabeth has dealt with many commercial conflict situations. She is trained in both commercial and personal dispute resolution and also worked as a volunteer neighbourhood mediator, resolving conflict in large council estates.

Web Enabling a Business including HCI Strategy & Design

Vanessa Donnelly, IBM

A full abstract is available.

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With the promise of such business opportunities as access to millions of customers, global reach, no expensive high-street storefronts to maintain, and no expensive staff required to keep your customers happy, the Internet can seem too good to be true. And for many businesses, it is, because they haven't successfully created an e-business solution that can realise these benefits. However, when the business model is sound, when the products are good, and when the right technology is in place, then a highly usable website can be an effective cost-saving, sales-generating interface between the customer and the business. How can a business ensure that these success criteria are achieved?

When business websites are being designed, the need for a business analysis is widely accepted. But what about an analysis of your users and the information that should appear on the website? This presentation showed what is involved in successfully moving a business onto the web, with particular focus on the crucial analysis phases which must take place at the start of the project, where the major design and development decisions are made. It explained how to design for people using people. It showed how a business can greatly increase the likelihood of e-business success by investing in an understanding of the goals, tasks and capabilities of the website users.

Vanessa Donnelly is a software designer and usability consultant with IBM. For the last six years she has been involved in commercial website design and development, both within IBM and as a consultant with IBM customers. Her book "Designing Easy-to-Use Websites" is published by Addison-Wesley.

Have you been involved in mergers and acquisition projects prior to the deal being struck or are you left to help integrate systems and deliver benefits which have been set out by others?

'World Class Transactions', a 2001 survey by KPMG, reported that 30% of deals added value, with 31% destroying value. Why are organisations failing to deliver increases in shareholder value and what is the impact of IT on this? What are these issues and what involvement should IT management have in the transaction process?

In recent years, business reliance on IT systems has been greater than ever and this has resulted in IT having a significant influence on purchase price and post-transaction costs, revenues and cash flows (synergies and integration/ separation projects). Given the importance of IT in the transaction arena, it is inevitable that pre-transaction research on IT issues is paramount to ensure that all key issues are adequately reflected in estimates of purchase/selling price and projections.

Lynn Lawton, a Director in KPMG, who specialises in the information systems aspects of corporate takeovers, mergers and demergers, will discuss IT issues on transactions and the role IT management should play in the transactions arena. Lynn is an International Vice President of the Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA), a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales, a Fellow of the Institute of Internal Auditors - UK and Ireland, and a Certified Information Systems Auditor.

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Wired for Life but where is it taking us?

Speaker Mark Cathcart, IBM Corporation e-business Technology Strategist

Mark Cathcart is technology strategist to IBM Corporate Technology Marketing where he has responsibility for Linux, Open Source, Java and XML. Previously, he was Principal Consultant for OS/390 New Technology incl. Java, EJB, Component Software, e-business et al. His first presentation to IBM on XML was in late-1997, almost two years before the official IBM XML Launch in 9/99. Mark had the first ever demonstration of linking Java to legacy systems at WWW5 in Paris in 1996, and more recently (8/98) was part of the IBM Academy of Technology project to redesign Java for IBM Servers. Mark is a member of the IBM Academy of Technology, the IBM S/390 Software Design Council and an IBM UK Technical Staff Member.

Mark discussed the use of the Internet and emerging technology as tools of the Net generation. He focussed on the trends and directions for technology and how it is likely to evolve in the next few years. Mark also discussed Moores Law and why Intel may have got it wrong; IBM Server technology and the increasingly common and complimentary technology available and their effect on enterprise computing and global digital network. We are wired for life Jim, but not as we know it!

Federated Systems for the e-Business Era

Speaker David Sprott, CEO and Principal Analyst, CBDi Forum

One thing we can all agree on is that e-Business means change. The problem is that the change is ongoing and never seems to stop. Whether it is changes in business process, or as a result of mergers, acquisitions or divestitures, our ability to determine precise business requirements positively diminishes over time. An appropriate response is to consider business systems as federations, collections of tightly coupled modules which are loosely coupled together and thereby easily uncoupled, upgraded or replaced. This presentation presented a framework for planning and management that is designed to enable response to today's business pressures. It is based on the speaker's new book, 'The Adaptive e-Business'.

David Sprott is the CEO and Principal Analyst of the CBDi Forum. The CBDi Forum is the world leader in analytical information and experience sharing on the topic of component based development and integration. The Forum provides comprehensive services to IT middle management (architects, strategists, business analysts, development managers, infrastructure managers and lead developers), which allows them to make effective decisions. The Forum has 3000 subscribers and members world-wide.

E-Commerce: The Legal Issues - Part 2

Speaker Scott Singer, Head of IT Law, Sinclair Roche & Temperley

Delivering in a Wired Marketplace: Efulfilment

Speaker Matthew Peacock Group Chief Executive, iForce

Matthew gave a history of iForce, explaining why it was formed and then spun out of Dataforce. He defined 'e-fulfilment' and why it is different from conventional fulfilment, and showed how iForce matches this requirement and who it does it for. He illustrated his talk with an example of a company working with iForce and their experiences. Matthew commented on the challenges for companies going into e-commerce, both B2B and B2C.

Matthew Peacock started his career in Investment Banking, with First Boston in New York, and BZW in London. He founded Peaco Sport in 1991 and made four acquisitions in five years, turning a disparate group of businesses into an integrated branded performance sports goods company. Peacock founded The Dataforce Group in 1998 with Antony Rice and Andrew Johnson through the acquisition of three businesses in the marketing support services industry. In Autumn 1999 Matthew Peacock and Anthony Rice founded iForce, the UK's leading e-fulfilment business with clients such as QXL, Toyszone.co.uk, 9feet.com, and SkySportsStore.

Programme Management: No Smoke and Mirrors

Speaker Tom Saunders, Calyx Consulting

Tom Saunders, MBCS MAPM, is a founder Director of Calyx Consulting and co-author of 'Managing Successful Programmes' (MSP) for the CCTA. Tom is also a highly experienced project and programme manager, an ISEB Certified Project Manager, a Certified MSP Practitioner, and an Accredited Programme Management Trainer. MSP is the basis for the now well-established certification of programme management professionals.

The title of the talk reflected Tom's passion for cutting away the waffle and false mystique surrounding the programme management discipline. The talk addressed the key topics of programme management, and provided an advanced insight into the work that will form the basis of a professional accreditation scheme for programme managers.

The meeting was postponed at the last moment to April (see below).

Linux and Java: A Marriage made in Heaven

Speaker Mark Cathcart, IBM Corporate Technology Strategy

Both Linux and Java are emerging technologies that are challenging more established operating system and development software. In this session, Mark explained these technologies and why they are highly complementary.

Mark is technology strategist to IBM Corporate Technology Marketing where he has responsibility for Linux, Open Source, Java and XML. Previously, he was Principal Consultant for OS/390 New Technology including Java, EJB, Component Software, e-business et al. He is a member of the IBM Academy of Technology, the IBM S/390 Software Design Council and an IBM UK Technical Staff Member.

Knowledge Management: Aligning it to the Business

Speaker Phillip Webb, Chief Information Officer and Chief Knowledge Officer, DERA, Ministry of Defence

The presentation and discussion addressed DERA's approach to and experiences with knowledge management, including cultural challenges. The initial thinking helped them to understand how the organisation was all about collecting and exploiting knowledge; they make no physical products. From this came the objectives for the knowledge management project. Phillip argued that the behaviour aspects of the project took 50% of the effort - encouraging and persuading people to publish their knowledge. The process made up 30% of the problem, and technology the remaining 20%.

Followed by AGM

The need to integrate applications and processes as well as data has become a high priority for most organisations. However organisations need to be cautious how they respond. Unplanned, ad hoc integration will only add to the chaos. Application Integration is a permanent state that requires architectural foundations that enable continuous, efficient and rapid reaction to seemingly random events. In this presentation, Mr Sprott discussed the drivers and appropriate responses and strategies as well as commented on some of the major players in the market.

David Sprott, Director and Principal Analyst, Butler Group is a well known commentator, analyst and specialist in the area of advanced application delivery. He is chair of the Forum for Component Based Development and Integration.

Electronic procurement of indirect materials has recently become a hot topic. This talk discussed why this is and reviewed how electronic procurement differs from the electronic management of a company's production supply chain. Various architectural options for electronic procurement were discussed together with the associated costs and benefits and the availability of the necessary interface standards. The talk ended with a look ahead at how electronic procurement is likely to develop.

ecentre^UK

e centreUK offers a "one stop shop" for providing help and advice on electronic commerce to its membership of over 15,000 companies. e centreUK provides a comprehensive suite of services to its members to help them to adopt best practice in doing business electronically across the extended enterprise. It supports and publicises the EAN·UCC (International Article Numbering Association/Uniform Code Council) standards and electronic commerce standards as required by members. See http://www.e-centre.org.uk for more information.

This talk argued that CRM is the natural development of IT in the demand side of business which builds upon the investment in supply side technology.

What is CRM - flavour of the month, a panacea or just something else repackaged?

What exploiting CRM really means for business and why CRM requires the development of a culture change to exploit customer service excellence.

CRM survival guide for business

CRM in action - war stories - practical experience - good and bad

Cap Gemini

Stephen joined Cap Gemini in April 1998 and is the CRM Delivery Manager in the UK. Prior to this, he spent over 23 years working for Barclays Bank Group.

He has a deep knowledge of the use of CRM in utilities, telecommunications, media, retail, automotive banking and financial services sectors. With over 13 years experience developing the strategy for and delivering Customer Relationship Management solutions and eCommerce including Home Shopping, Home Banking, Remote Learning, Interactive Television, Interactive Sales Terminals and Multimedia Kiosks.

He has worked on numerous projects in a consultative, project management and programme management role and has an in-depth experience of Information Technology, covering the full life cycle of projects from initial requirement capture to user acceptance. This includes seven years experience of working with the European Commission as an expert in CRM and eCommerce.

This was a joint meeting with North London Branch.

There has never been a period when so many companies have been formed to promote new products around a wealth of innovative technologies. Technology Initiated Business change has the capability to radically reshape the business model, and yet in an age of increasing focussed expertise, it is difficult to comprehend the overall picture. 'Putting the pieces together' was about fitting the different parts of the technology model to the business model in order to understand 'what and how' they will be used. This included understanding the e-commerce architectural model around user, tasks and events, and its relationships with the legacy based on applications, functions and data, as well as the individual values.

Chief Technical Officer, Cap Gemini

The rapid growth in e-business places additional emphasis on the application development imperatives of speed, flexibility and quality (usefulness, usability and robustness). Getting it wrong with an internal system may not be a disaster; getting it wrong with a web application may damage the business disproportionately due to its high visibility.

Simon Tyrrell-Lewis has been exploring and testing methods in this area. He presented the current version of his method and invited comments and ideas for further development.

In support, Stuart Pollard examined some web-site design principles. He explored examples of good and bad practice and invited participants to comment on their own web experiences.

Stuart Pollard of Sterling Software has worked in IT for many years in a wide range of application development and IT consulting roles.

Simon Tyrrell-Lewis of Tyrrell-Lewis Associates has over 18 years' experience in all aspects of Data Management, methods and tools. A consultant for the last 13 years, he has defined the requirements for IT methods, written them and trained staff in using them.

The predicted explosion in E-Commerce is bringing into sharp focus the very many IT-related legal considerations and minefields that are associated with web-based business. In this session, Scott Singer, Head of IT Law, Sinclair, Roche & Temperley addressed these issues, including the key area of liability for defective systems. Experiences related to the Millennium Bug, effectively a special case of defective systems, were also considered as a pointer to future risk and risk mitigation.

Sinclair, Roche & Temperley

Independent Consultant, Chairman BISSG