Practical Guide for IT Outsourcing
a HandiGuide®
ISO 27001 & ISO 27002 Compliant
"Handiguide has EVERYTHING that is needed to select an outsourcer, enter into an agreement, and manage the relationship," says a CIO of a Fortune 100 company.
The need to lower cost, increase efficiency and conserve cash has increased the motivation of companies to turn to outsourcing and increased the appeal of alternative delivery models. The disruptive shifts in new demand and supply patterns drives changes for how IT services are bought and from whom.
The Practical Guided for IT Outsourcing Template includes a Sample Outsourcing Contract along with a Service Level Agreement and other tools to facilitate the outsourcing process. The template includes Janco's exclusive Business and IT Impact Questionnaire.
The Practical Guide for IT Outsourcing is delivered electronically in WORD and/or PDF format. Included is a 3 page Job Description for the Manager Outsourcing. Sarbanes-Oxley issues addressed directly. Included is an ISO 27001 and ISO 27002 audit program.
The Outsourcing Guide and the Businesses and IT Impact Questionnaire are over 140 packed pages and include everything needed to plan for, negotiate, and manage an outsourcing process within an enterprise. The electronic document includes:
- Outsourcing Management Standard Overview of outsourcing, Service Level Agreements and responsibilities
- Outsourcing Policy Standard Policy that can be used to determine when outsourcing is an option
- Outsourcing Approval Standard Process which can be used in approving an outsourcing agreement. Includes a process flow chart on steps to a successful outsourcing agreement
- Sample Service Level Agreement Includes several sample service level agreements
- Service Level Agreement Metrics Definition of over 150 metrics presented in 18 tables that can be used to manage an outsourcing vendor
- Outline for Contract Negotiation Over 17 pages which issues to be addressed including service to be provided, service level requirements, term of the agreement, enterprise's facilities, enterprise's equipment (owned/leased), intellectual property, third party service providers, IT application project (current / future), responsibilities, training and conversion to mention a few
- Base Case Development Detail listing of factors to include
- Mutual Non-Disclosure Template Template that can be used to create an enterprise's own document for use with outsourcing vendors.
- Job Description for Manager Outsourcing (3 pages)
- Business & IT Impact Questionnaire - Inventory and assess all application - addresses Sarbanes-Oxley Compliance issues.
- ISO 27001 & 27002 Security Process Audit Checklist
- HIPAA Audit Program Guide
Outsourcing by Industry click on image to see full chart
When CEOs and executive management broach the subject of outsourcing, CIOs need to avoid making critical decisions in a state of crisis or panic. Outsourcing decisions made in haste can be simplistic and may adversely impact the ability to deliver real business advantage.
- CIOs should start their sourcing endeavor by building a solid sourcing strategy that focuses on creating short and long term value. This strategy should be aligned with the organization's sourcing management maturity and include business value scenarios, open options and a road map of value creation with a timeline of expected results.
- CIOs must take a long-term view of the developing global presence of countries that can provide high-quality resources at the right price point. If your geographic presence is diverse, seek providers that are not exclusively focused on single country, so that you can mitigate risks (such as geopolitical instability) and also take advantage of the benefits of alternative countries, which may offer opportunities close to your own growth markets.
- CIOs should actively monitor the market to determine the best combination of software and IT services and service provider options to meet their requirements and specify their appetite for risk.
These are the issues that the Practical Guided for IT Outsourcing Template addresses.
Outsourcing and IT Infrastructure News
Government employees continue to breach privacy of individuals
According to Gazette.net, a Maryland Department of Human Resources employee has been fired for posting about 3,000 names, Social Security numbers and other personal information on his personal website.
The information, which belonged to department clients who use food stamps, housing programs and other social services provided by the state, had been posted on the employee's website since April 27. The site has since been removed and there is no indication that the information has been misused.
The Baltimore Sun reports that a DHR spokeswoman, says it is unclear why he used the data in an unauthorized way.
The incident is still under investigation and no decision has been made yet about whether criminal charges will be filed.
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Record Management Needs to Include Email
As the importance of IT, the Internet, SmartPhones, and email has grown, its legal status has changed with far-reaching consequences. A variety of laws and regulations have been extended to cover all business records, including email and all communications in both public and private sectors. Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) and other mandates requirements touch almost every facet of paper and electronic data.
Among other provisions, SOX requires companies to maintain all audit or review work papers for at least five years. For registered public accounting firms, the period is at least seven years. Penalties for noncompliance include severe fines and even imprisonment, and intentionally altering or destroying records can bring even more serious consequences.
Consider that most work papers and records are created as emails and may never exist in physical form. An email can be deleted in violation of SOX at the click of a mouse. Key considerations for ensuring your company meets SOX record-keeping requirements include:
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- Can employees reliably distinguish ordinary emails from protected business records?
- Are you be certain that employees are storing the protected emails for the required time period?
- Is there a process in place for storing physical copies of every protected business records and emails?
- Are you certain that no one is hacking into your email system and maliciously changing records?
Wi-Fi needs to be secure
You can secure your wireless network in little time with these 5 simple rules:
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- Secure your access point administration interface: The default passwords of most standard devices are already known to most hackers. So, when you set up your router through the web interface, change the default password and write it down somewhere safe.
- Stop broadcasting your SSID: Your wireless router continuously transmits your SSID (Service Set Identifier). While this is useful in an office where many people are going to connect to your network, at home this is certainly not needed. Turn SSID transmission off as soon as you can. Wireless LAN "sniffers" will still be able to detect your network, but other than that, your network will mostly be shrouded from outsiders.
- Use MAC address filtering: Turn on MAC address filtering on your wireless router configuration utility. By doing so, you can add the MAC addresses of all of your networking devices to the address pool of the router. This way, no one outside your home network will be able to access your network.
- Reduce the power of transmission: Reduce the power of your wireless transmitter to such a degree that the signal does not reach outside your faciltiy or home. This will keep most outsiders at bay.
- Disable remote administration tool: Your remote administration utility is seldom used. So, keeping it on exposes your network to outsiders. Turn it off for enhance your network security.
Feds to spend billion on cybersecurity research
As the Obama administration and Congress propose various measures to improve the nations cybersecurity, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence is planning to spend "multiple billions of dollars" on cybersecurity research.
The deputy director of national intelligence for acquisition and technology, said at a recent cybersecurity summit sponsored by Defense Daily that her office, together with the White House Office of Science and Technology, will be sponsoring "innovative" research addressing three areas, the Washington Post reported:
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- Multiple security levels for government and non-government organizations.
- Security systems that change constantly to create moving targets for hackers.
- Methods to motivate individuals to improve their cybersecurity practices.
Disaster Recovery / Business Continuity is Not the Place to Cut Costs
In today's business environment, many enterprises are looking for way to reduce their expenses by cutting overhead. Often this takes the form of reducing headcount, particularly in areas that are regarded as ancillary or non-core components of the enterprise.
Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity often are placed in that category and, as a result, can be an early casualty of many cost-cutting programs. Whether it is an internal Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity team losing staff members, or a part-time Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity manager with less time to spare from the day job, Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity programs can be neglected and will quickly become out of date and ineffective, particularly in a rapidly changing organization. As anyone who has ever had to manage a Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity event knows, there are few things more useless than an out of date Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity plan.
Of course, it is hard to make a case for Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity at a time when core functions are under pressure, but maybe that is just when it should be on the radar even more than usual. With share prices shaky and credit hard to find, the last thing any organization needs right now is the damage to its reputation and credibility that could arise from failing to effectively manage a high profile disruptive incident.
Arguably, during a recession companies are at their most vulnerable, which makes it the worst time to neglect anything, which contributes to resilience or reduces risk. However, if an organization is under financial pressure, how can it square the circle and achieve those reductions in overhead costs while still maintaining the effectiveness of its Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity program.
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Disaster Planning and Server Consolidation
The cutting edge of virtualization technology may have set its sights on virtual PCs, unified network fabrics and other esoteric applications, but server consolidation remains
the primary driver for most data centers. In fact, only a handful of enterprises have begun the process of virtualizing their server farms, according to most recent surveys, although the pace is likely to pick up as energy costs and competitive pressures drive organizations to increase performance even while paring down their hardware infrastructures. But as those who have already taken the virtual plunge have no doubt realized, consolidating servers is not just a matter of powering up the virtualization layer and then pulling equipment out of racks. There is a long list of factors to consider with any centralization project and a wide range of land mines that need to be avoided to prevent service failures. One of the main concerns is the resiliency of remaining hardware. - more info
NAS a good backup solution
Remote offices present IT managers with a number of technical challenges. Traditionally, companies have relied on tape backup solutions to backup data both at corporate headquarters as well as at remote offices. At one point in time, tape backup was the only viable option for backing up data. That's no longer the case. There are benefits of network-attached storage (NAS) hardware, a completely self-contained appliance that has a built-in power supply, an operating system, an easy-to-use management console, and network-accessible storage. - more info
Federal cloud web site hacked
A Department of Treasury Web site hosted by a third party was hacked for a short while redirecting visitors to a malicious site in Ukraine and later tracking IP addresses before the Department of Treasury took the site offline.
The Department of Treasury did not identify the provider that hosted the Bureau of Engraving and Printing Web site, but did acknowledge in a statement that it "entered the cloud computing arena last year."
The attack is bound to raise concerns about federal agencies' abilities to secure data hosted by third-party service providers. Security remains one of the biggest concerns in government circles as the Obama administration makes an aggressive push for federal agencies to begin adopting cloud computing services. The attack may also be used as a tool by legislators and policy makers to demand tighter security requirements.
The main web site of the Treasury division that prints U.S. paper currency, the Bureau of Engraving and Printing presented would-be visitors with a 404 "not found" error at each of the four URLs that point to the page, bep.gov, bep.treas.gov, moneyfactory.gov, and moneyfactory.com.
Cisco's ScanSafe tracked the attack to a Web site that attempts to exploit numerous vulnerabilities in Adobe Reader, Adobe Acrobat, Internet Explorer, Microsoft Office, Symantec AppStream, and other applications, and said that the malicious site has targeted sites hosted by Network Solutions and GoDaddy.
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New York City Failed Bomb Highlights Disaster Planning Requirements
The failed Times Square Car bomb shows that there is now a new class of disaster that CIOs need to plan for.The infrastructure may be damaged, communications may be lost, and the building may not be intact. That highlights some things that a disaster plan needs to consider:
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- Have a communications plan that doesnt require the use of cell phones or smartphones.
- Have an alternate form of communications if necessary to save lives or call for help. Your emergency coordinator should have at least one ham radio operator on staff, with a radio available - ham radio is often the only reliable means of emergency communications in a real crisis.
- Define a central assembly point thats located somewhere besides your office. Pick a place inland, within 50 miles or so, where you can set up a place for employees to check in.
- Assume that some of your employees will not be able to make it to the assembly point and have a plan to have their jobs filled until their status is determined.
- Validate your insurance carrier has you covered for such contingencies.
Intel can not meet chip demand
As companies upgrade to Windows 7 and replace older laptops there is a shortage of the latest Intel laptop PC Core i3 and Core i5 microprocessors.
The shortfall is in Intel's new laptop microprocessors codenamed Arrandale, including some Core i3 and Core i5 chips. The shortage has caused chip buyers to bid the price of the microprocessors up to a 20 percent premium over contract prices on the open market, according to U.S. chip distributor Converge. The shortage hit in March and will last throughout April, the company added in a monthly research report.
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Utah may extend the reach of e-verify
The Utah state legislature has pass SB 251 to its governor, which would require businesses with 15 or more employees to use E-Verify to check whether new hires are legal workers, passed the legislature this month and is waiting for action by Governor Gary Herbert. However, some activists report the bill may be in trouble because business lobbies are working hard to get the governor to veto the bill.
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Database security a management issue
Traditional IT security focuses on protecting the corporate network perimeter with firewalls, VPNs, and antivirus software. While important, these first-line defenses aren't enough. New technology and business practices spread sensitive data across multiple channels, creating new vulnerabilities. The solution is safeguarding data where it lives - in the database and on the file servers. - more info
Security Policies Should be Part of Normal Business Practices According to Federal Judge
A federal judge has rejected a proposed settlement by TD Ameritrade Inc. in a data breach lawsuit. That marks the second time in recent months that a court has weighed in on what it considers basic security standards for protecting data. The case stems from a 2007 breach that exposed more than 6 million customer records.
The federal judge did not find the proposed settlement to be "fair, reasonable, or adequate." Rather than benefiting those directly affected by the breach, Ameritrade's proposed settlement was designed largely to benefit the company. The judge described the additional security measures that Ameritrade proposed in the settlement as "routine practices" that any reputable company should be taking anyway and should be defined in their normal security policies and procedures.
In September 2007, Ameritrade said that the names, addresses, phone numbers, and trading information of potentially all of its more than 6 million retail and institutional customers at that time had been compromised by an intrusion into one of its databases. The stolen information was later used to spam those customers.
As part of an effort to settle claims arising from that incident, Ameritrade this May said it would retain an independent security expert to conduct penetration tests of its networks to look for vulnerabilities.
The company also offered to retain the services of an analytics firm to find out whether any of the data that had been compromised in the breach had been used for identity theft purposes. The company also said it would give affected customers a one-year subscription for antivirus and anti-spam software.
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SOA Best Practicdes
SOA Design Patterns & Best Practices
Some of the most important tools in the evaluation, purchase, and ongoing use of Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) are the best practices that vendors, consultants, and customers have compiled. What factors vary most are the time, cost, and ease of SOA implementation. This template gives you the tools for SOA success by fcousing on the processes and providing a definition of the standard best practices for large-scale technology implementations.
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IT security - Often a Myth
IT Security polices for notebooks and desktops are typically managed by restricting the choices that users have by reducing the number options that are supported. This standards-based process ensures control by reducing flexibility. But try maintaining that system when users can buy a relatively cheap smartphone with as much power as a desktop had in the early 1990s.
Furthermore, attempts by IT organizations to prevent the use of handheld devices has largely failed because of the number of tools available to work around IT policies. For example, users who are restricted from using wireless e-mail often find ways to redirect e-mail to outside ISP services, where they synchronize e-mail to their personally owned devices. This raises the security threat for enterprises because it means that control of e-mail routing has been losts.
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Microsoft gives Google Chrome an edge in the EU
Microsoft's new browser ballot screen, which is supposed to randomly scramble the positions of the top five browsers, instead gives Google's Chrome the best chance of landing in the preferred first spot, an IBM software architect said today.
"This was a rookie mistake," said a professor, who works for IBM and has a degree in astrophysics from Harvard University. "I was definitely surprised to see an error of this type in the ballot."
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Windows 7 Crushes Vista In terms of adoption
Microsoft has already said that Windows 7 is the fastest selling operating system in history, but, judging by the adoption rate, the platform is simply leaving Vista in the dust. Janco found that Windows 7s market share had skyrocketed to no less than 12.5% since the OS was released. In this regard, the market share of Windows 7 is dwarfing that of Vista, comparing the first seven months after release. - more info
IE Loses 6.21% Market Share in 12 Months
Janco has just released its Browser and Operating System Market Share White Paper. The major findings are that in the last 12 months Microsofts browser market share has continued to erode Microsoft lost over 6% in the last 12 months; Firefoxs market share is unchanged for the last 12 months; Google Desktop and Chrome now have just under 6%; and Netscape is no more. On the operating systems side, Windows 7 is being accepted at a pace is parallel to the way Window XP was in the 90s. The CEO of Janco Associates, Victor Janulaitis said, "The last six months have been a mixed bag for Microsoft. Their browser market share has fallen to level that they back in 1998 with no end in sight. At the same time Windows 7 now has 12% of the OS market in less than 7 months since its release."
The top five browser market share rankings are: 1 - Microsofts IE 64.78%; 2 - Firefox 17.38%; 3 Google (Desktop & Chrome) 5.78%; 4 Mozilla 1.73%; 5 Safari 1.39%. The CEO of Janco Associates, Inc and the ITPC, M. Victor Janulaitis said: "The positive glow on Googles Chrome was dulled in with the identification of some defects in the way it handles XML pages. But the real story is the continued erosion of Microsofts" market.
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IT service management issues that CIOs face
The key service management business questions facing CIOs and senior IT managers today are:
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- What are the service management impacts with the ever-increasing technical complexity on margins and customer satisfaction?
- Where are the areas where margin-improvement opportunities exist?
- How can IT minimize the maintenance-contract price pressure to drive new service-revenue opportunities to the bottom line?
- How does improved service management translate into a competitive advantage?
What is the future as the IT function moves from fixing problems to driving product value?- What are the challenges of off shoring support and how should the enterprise address them?
IT Infrastructure a CIO Challenge
The CIO struggles to manage Infrastructure as they prepare for change
While the business faces changes that require more agility, IT is seen as lagging behind - even when CIOs carefully manage business and IT alignment:
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- IT objectives still include only cost reduction and quality. IT objectives rarely reflect enterprise agility objectives. CEOs want greater agility but do not talk about it as a measurable objective. Instead, many firms still measure IT on its contribution to cost reductions inside and beyond the walls of IT, along with its reliability and its availability to run today's business.
- Business agility improvement projects do not easily gain funding. There are a number of current trends that, in theory, should improve agility - such as service-oriented architecture (SOA), on-demand services, pervasive technologies, outsourcing, Dynamic Business Applications, agile development, and offshoring. However, IT still needs to plan for and rightsize these options to reach the agility required while balancing the costs and risks. In addition, these technologies require cross-department investment in enterprises where each business unit manages budgets separately.
Obama administration to ask for more 1984 Big Brother powers
Everyone knows that police can peek inside an email account it if they have a paper search warrant
But cybercrime investigators are frustrated by the speed of traditional methods of faxing, mailing, or e-mailing companies these documents. They're pushing for the creation of a national Web interface linking police computers with those of Internet and e-mail providers so requests can be sent and received electronically.
A federal task force (soon to be released) study says that law enforcement agencies are virtually unanimous in calling for such an interface to be created. Eighty-nine percent of police surveyed, it says, want to be able to "exchange legal process requests and responses to legal process" through an encrypted, police-only "nationwide computer network."
The study also says: "89 percent of investigators agreed that a nationwide computer network should be established for the purpose of linking ISPs with law enforcement agencies so that they may exchange legal process requests and responses to legal process. Authorized users would communicate through encrypted virtual private networks in order to maintain the security of the data."
But the most controversial element is probably the private Web interface, which raises novel security and privacy concerns, especially in the wake of a recent inspector general's report from the Justice Department. The 289-page report detailed how the FBI obtained Americans' telephone records by citing nonexistent emergencies and simply asking for the data or writing phone numbers on a sticky note rather than following procedures required by law.
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Oursouring continues
U.S. defense contractors growing use of offshore (outsource) subsidiaries from 2003 to 2008 allowed the Defense Department to save money on contracts but also resulted in the loss of U.S. tax revenue and unemployment benefits for some U.S. workers, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office.
Practical Guide for IT Outsourcing a HandiGuide
The 29 largest publicly traded defense contractors increased their use of offshore subsidiaries by 26 percent from 2003 to 2008, the report states.
Those subsidiaries helped the contractors reduce taxes, in part by avoiding Social Security and Medicare payroll taxes for U.S. workers hired at the foreign subsidiaries, GAO auditors said.
About a third of the contractors also decreased their effective U.S. corporate tax rates in 2008 in part through the use of foreign affiliates, lower foreign tax rates and indefinite reinvestment of foreign income outside the United States.
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Almost 200,000 jobs lost in IT during this recession
Job cuts in technology were fierce in 2009, but 2010 is expected to see modest growth in a number of subsectors. The last time layoffs were this bad was in 2005.
Job cuts in technology were fierce in 2009. Last year saw 174,629 jobs lost in the sector, catapulting up 12.3 percent from the 2008 cuts of 155,570 jobs, according to an outplacement company which tracks industry numbers on announced layoffs. Technology - still considered by the Department of Labor to be one of the most promising industries for future job creation - has not seen that many layoffs since 2005.
The worst of the downsizing occurred in the first quarter, which is when the overall economy hit rock bottom. The recession's impact on the tech sector was inescapable.
The technology-focused blog TechCrunch developed its own "layoff tracker" Web application, which has been documenting layoffs in the sector since October 2008. For comparison, as of its last update in November 2009, TechCrunch had reported a total of 350,299 employees laid off - roughly 20,000 more, but certainly in the same ballpark.
The tech sector accounted for about 13.2 percent of the total 1.3 million announced job cuts in the United States in 2009, said Challenger, Gray & Christmas. By subsector, electronics fared the worst with 65,000 jobs cut - up 55 percent from 2008 - while telecommunications lost 9.4 percent fewer jobs in 2009. The computer industry was unchanged.
It's going to be a slow climb out of this recession, but computer and electronics firms should be among the first to see the turnaround, as companies try to postpone hiring by achieving productivity gains through technology. Even with the economy showing some nascent signs of recovery beginning the second half of the year, many companies are holding off on investments in new technology. And, with it still [being] difficult for small businesses and startups to obtain loans, there are few opportunities for tech firms to expand their customer base.
Despite the potential for improved hiring in the new year, there are a lot people competing for every opening and many employers are very particular about what skills and experience they want new workers to have. It is critical that technology workers continually update their skills in order to remain competitive. It is necessary to maintain a balance between having specialized skills and having the flexibility of a generalist. It may also be necessary to expand one's search to more industries or geographically.
We'll see a radically transforming marketplace - driven by surging demand in emerging markets, growing impact from the cloud services model, an explosion of mobile devices and applications, and the continuing rollout of higher-speed networks. These transformational forces will drive key players to redefine themselves and their offerings and will spark lots of M&A activity.
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IT Job Descriptions HandiGuide 2010 Version Released by Janco
The IT job descriptions contained within the Internet and Information Technology Position Descriptions HandiGuide® was updated in 2010 and contains over 650 pages; which includes sample organization charts, a job progression matrix, over 231 job descriptions, best practices for resume screening and best practices for phone screening.
The author of this book has extensive experience in job content definition and analysis. He personally is recognized by the courts as an "expert" and has been used by a number of firms as an expert in age and job discrimination cases. The HandiGuide includes some of the tools that he uses in that process.
The book also addresses Fair Labor Standards and the ADA, and is in a new easier to read format. Each job description meets ADA standards and the position description is delivered in electronic format - word which is editable and PDF which is printed. Also included are tools to help you expand, evaluate and define your enterprise's unique additional required. Those tools include:
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- Job Evaluation Questionnaire
- Position Description Questionnaire
- Job Progression Matrix (Job Family Classifications)
- Best Practices for
- Screening Resumes
- Phone Screening
- Hiring employees
- Motivating employees
- Mandated Requirements
- American with Disabilities Act (ADA)
- Health and Safety Requirements (Federal and State)
- Fair Labor Standards Act
- Sexual Harassement
- Other Labor Laws
Google personal lead sensitive data in error
It was reported in Computerworld that Google apologized after it mistakenly e-mailed potentially sensitive business data last week to other users of its business listings service.
The company's Local Business Center allows businesses to create a listing for Google's search engine and Maps application, as well as add videos, coupons or photos.
Google then provides data on how customers found the listing, showing search terms people used before clicking the listing and other data such as the geographic location of someone who looked up driving directions to the business.
Google will send reports to those who are signed up. Early last week, Google sent the reports to third parties by mistake. The mistake affected several thousands businesses registered with Local Business Center, of which there are more than a million.
"Shortly after sending the newsletter to a portion of our users last night, we discovered that some e-mails included statistics for the wrong business," Google said in a written statement. "We promptly stopped sending any further e-mails and investigated the cause, which we found to be a human error while pulling together the newsletter content. We'd like to apologize to all the business owners impacted and assure them that we're fixing the process that led to this mistake."
People who received the data then began to publicize the incident, realizing the privacy implications. Chicago-based Internet consultant David Dalka wrote on his blog that he received information regarding the listing for Boscos, a restaurant in Tennessee that brews its own beer.
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