Sri Lanka - Land of Paradise!

Much has been said and lot has been published about this enchanting island that is unique in many ways. Here we share an article from The Hindu, that provides a nice synopsis for the astute holiday hunter. Well, there is more than an opportunity to get away here - it is one of investment and you pick the area. Sri Lanka has recently been liberated from a long spell of terrorism that gripped the island. The government is leaving no stone unturned to ensure the country is geared towards post war success.

An U.S. Fund recently invested $875 in treasury bonds last week. We believe this is the beginning of unique opportunities at a time your once favorite locations of investment appear uncomely.

Switching to Mac - Time Bas Been Right for a While!

I finally made my switch from Windows to the big Apple. It has been a while now but here is why you should consider the same.

Six months would not pass without my having to reinstall Windows! With time, the windows registry rapidly collects clutter and the performance graph begins to nosedive. For more than a year now, I am running on Mac without a hitch in performance or messy reinstalls. I would say stability was the first benefit to me in the migration (or graduation shall we say?) from Windows to the Mac.

From the discerning user to the beginner - Mac can be your reliable companion. One of the biggest show stoppers for the majority of users that made the switch over from Windows to Mac has been software compatibility. This can be annoying even for the technical user. With the persistent hard work of the brilliant folks at Apple under the able leadership of Steve Jobs, an era of possibilities had dawned!

The Mac operating system (current version is code named Leopard and Snow Leopard will be available from August 28, 2009) is one of the most stable end-user operating systems available today. It is based on the BSD (a UNIX like) platform. In the world of enterprise computing, servers that perform intensive computing run on some flavor of UNIX. This should be the first reason for you to start placing your faith on your Mac book. Moving on to more pragmatic things, your Microsoft Office needs are taken care of to say the least. While Microsoft does have a version of its Office suite for Mac, it is worth exploring Apple's own productivity suite - iWork '09. This consists of Pages (Word), Numbers (Excel) and Keynote (Powerpoint). While it is not a copy of Office it is compatible with Microsoft Office, and in my humble opinion produces better documentation than Office! Just try Pages and you will find in it a more advanced and powerful word processing application. Interestingly, you no longer need Adobe Acrobat as the PDF reader comes free with Mac operating system. To take things a step closer to your heart, you can save your documents as PDF files in Pages!

Next we discuss one of the most annoying issues notorious with all Microsoft operating systems - the virus menace! You would be surprised to know that this is no longer an issue, although there is anti-virus software for the Mac. I did run anti-virus on a short trial but have since uninstalled it. If it ain't broke don't fix it, goes the famous IT tech rule of thumb. I get further value in my Mac's built in backup that works like a breeze. Just plug in an external USB hard drive and let Time Machine do the rest! It automatically maintains multiple versions of your backups with no hassle of technical configuration and you can always revert to an earlier state in time with the simple restore feature.

Well now we've covered your Office, taken care of virus issues, a slow machine that freezes no matter how much memory you throw at it; I guess we still need a mechanism to bridge with the world of Microsoft. Simple! I used to run Parallels and then VMWare Fusion which are all paid purchases but not any more with the arrival of Sun's VirtualBox. All of these are virtualization software that allow you to run Windows on your Mac. Any experienced techie would tell you that Vista was probably the worst operating systems that made it to the market, while agreeing that Windows XP ran better on their PC's (No offense meant in any way towards Microsoft). At least I can tell you that I actually purchased XP Retail CD's to run in one of my production environments even after Vista was forced on every laptop that shipped! So now you have the option of running your old Windows XP using VirtualBox just in case you have that odd piece of software that was only made for the Microsoft platform. I have had to use XP on very few occasions and one of them was to run CBT's which are mostly aimed at the Windows user market. I activate my virtualization software (yet to test VirtualBox and look forward to sharing my experience on it soon!) and run XP right within my Mac OSX (Leopard) and put it away into suspend mode with a click when I'm done. This is also a safer and more stable way to run Windows as Mac is in control of the hardware as opposed to resource hungry Windows.

Music, podcasts and videos are taken care so don't you worry. For the occasional Windows Media Player requirement there is Flip4Mac and other free solutions out there that will play Windows media right within your Mac. Apple's iTunes takes care of your audio/video including podcast requirements and this works seamlessly with your iPhone.

Well, I think we've covered most of our bases and I invite you to visit your nearest authorized Apple dealer. While Apple does not pay me for writing about their product I am glad to share the success story of what I consider one of the greatest products of the century. More power to computing and peace to all. Do not forget to include Steve Jobs in your prayers.

Importance of Organizational Structure and Project Based Delivery

The global recession and chain of events that are typically associated with one have all but taught us valuable lessons we could not afford to ignore. One the most important aspects of the recession that affected the masses in general is value, i.e. what was taken for granted, available and was of benefit was suddenly gone! Either jobs were lost, projects were called off, solutions to challenges and issues that were coming along the pipeline were suddenly on hold, with no promise of delivery or no delivery schedule. This became unconceivable to the masses as seen through the experience of thousands of project workers in the Middle East. When time was ripe and projects were competing with each other in a race against time to deliver value, it was the masses that dedicated their lives to project work and this meant the same to the families and countries of these workers. What we need to agree and acknowledge here is that anything of value as in projects mentioned here must be appreciated and protected - this is called value management. The biggest argument for this is the example of a hedge fund capable of funding projects or generating venture capital or a funded project itself suddenly finding itself bottom side up!

This has generated immense interest upon the tireless effort undertaken by the Project Management Institute (PMI) of the US to study project management and outline the metrics, concept and methodologies that enable us to manage value in a transparent, accountable and acceptable manner. The Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK) in its fourth edition at the time of writing this article is a result of years of research and collaboration by project management professionals and practitioners in the field. It is quite common now in the Middle East to find a renewed and heightened interest in qualified project managers. The need to 'project manage' the delivery of work (projects) has now been realized across the board. You ask any experienced recruiter/head hunter involved in Middle East recruitment, they would tell you the same. In the case of small to medium projects, the same sponsors that pushed you through delivery and violated the fundamental theories of project management have now learned the hard way - after a loss venture capital, time and a negative balance sheet.

Moving on, I would like draw a parallel to the concept of 'projectized delivery' as highlighted above to matrix organizations. Traditionally organizations were hierarchical and had a manager for each division (or product), as in FMCG, healthcare products, food divisions. With the diverse nature of projects requiring diverse of expertise, an era dawned for collaborative effort between diverse lines of service. This meant the traditional forms of management could no longer cope with the handling or efficient coordination of resources when faced with these projects. This led to the progressive thought of management, one with a fundamental shift of focus from organizational structure to organizational culture. This led to the matrix organization structure. This is ideally a best of both structures - combination of the product type organizational structure and the functional structure. Functional structure is similar to the product structure, except in this case the division of labor in the organization is grouped by the main functions that need to be performed.

While matrix structure is the most complex of the organizational structures discussed so far, there are three types of matrixes:

1. Weak/Functional Matrix - A project manager (PM) with limited authority oversees the cross- functional aspects of the project. Functional managers retain authority over their resources and project areas.

2. Balanced/Functional Matrix - Authority is shared equally between project manager and functional managers bringing best aspects of functional and projectized organizations. This is however the most difficult as sharing power is a delicate fine line that may bring its own challenges. This is very common in large organizations.

3. Strong/Project Matrix - Project is primarily responsible for the project while functional managers provide expertise and assign resources as required.

Successful outcome of the implementation of the above matrix in any organization largely depends on its purpose and function. You map out the ideal structure and strategy, you are set for success! This is a specialized area and consultation with best of breed management consultants and project managers combined with an intelligent study of similar organizations and their approaches would be the best way to approach it.

According to the A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide) - Fourth Edition, a project is temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product, service or result. Even third world nations have realized the value of project management as a discipline and science that would transparently and responsibly manage their investment and this is clearly evident in the case of ICTA, The Information and Communication Technology Agency of Sri Lanka.

An Agile Project for the Educator

Ever realized how rigid in inculcation some of the eastern and former British colonial education systems tend to be? I have no doubt that it served its purpose back in its day. We now see the influence of modern ideas and concepts in education systems let us say, in South Asia and the Middle East. One of the new kids on the block that is rapidly gaining market share in the UAE is Bon Education. An educational leadership mentoring program as I would like to call it, that aims at teaching educators to exploit the vast resources available on the internet like the Open Education Resources (OER's) to improve classroom education. This is an extension of the digital bridge (as discussed in one of my previous articles) into the education systems in our countries. This inevitable revolution holds the key to the improvement of future masses!

Think about it. Some of the countries in Asia where poverty is rampant are home to millions of people that do not even have access to basic education. Bon Education is one solution that is cost effective and capable of transforming the way we teach and learn. It opens out a whole new world of collaborative education where the parents can be involved in the day to day advancement of their little ones. Imagine a parent at work that is able to connect with the school system, particularly the classroom and the teachers right from his/her desk at work! Open Education Resources like peer-reviewed curricula to recommended reading and interactive learning tools and resources, all for free!

Explore Bon Education initiative and contact them for a free brainstorming session on how Bon Education could help you improve your teaching and get you on the road to innovative minds and an educated populace.

http://boneducation.com/home

Future is here! A Business Plan for the Discerning.

What started off as a desert ranch in the land of beduins has now arrived in Sri Lanka! Packed for business and ready for deployment - check out the idea:

Holiday Ranch Biz Plan