About my Magma consulting activities

Ah, the passing of time—the ultimate thief in the night! If human memory were a goldfish, we'd be swimming in a bowl of forgetfulness. Honestly, who among us can recall the intricacies of every project or the names of all the people we’ve collaborated with? It’s a wonder we manage to remember our own birthdays, let alone the details of a career that’s spanned decades! And let’s be real, the irony of a curriculum vitae—that glossy snapshot of one's professional prowess— fizzling out to little more than a dry list of job titles is a missed opportunity of epic proportions.  So, dare we dive into the vault of memories? Picture it: 1996, when my youthful self-walked through the hallowed halls of SAP, ready to tackle whatever techno-terrors lay ahead. I was the go-to guru of network and Microsoft wizardry, tasked with ensuring those clunky Windows NT 4.0 servers didn’t turn into blue-screen holes of despair. Remember the glorious chaos of Windows 95? The struggles were real, ...

IDC, one of the major strategy ICT market analyst, will organize the 2017 IDC European CIO summit in Palma de Majorca. The theme of this year is the Über CIO, being the IT directors that might be, one day, leading a company as a CEO or a COO (who knows, uh?) Have a look at the IDC event website and I will report more info and news about those two days meeting on this blog and on my twitter account.

In May 2013, McKinsey Global Institute issued a publication about the major technologies and 'next big things' that our interconnected, worldwide economy could expect. They identified, based on specific criteria, the 12 technologies that would make a significant difference (in our lives, in our economies, in our working habits). Mobile Internet Automation of Knowledge work The Internet of things Cloud Technology Advanced Robotics Autonomous vehicle Next generation genomics Energy storage 3D printing Advanced materials Advanced oil & gas exploration and recovery Renewable energy And, based on this selection, I believe that the daily life of the Chief Information Officer (Chief Innovation, CTO, the title does not really matters here) will be tremendously impacted by some of this. If we consider the evolution of...

Norton has released, for the fourth edition, a cyber security report. What I like in this reading is the readability and the clean facts that it delivers. For example, it is quite striking that victims of cyber criminality activities are located in Russia and China (slightly different than being at the origin of some attacks). And we have interesting stats, like that 50% of surveyed adults have been already facing some cyber crime threats... You can get the full report right here .

I believe this is certainly one of the most burning question we might ask, with the raise (explosion) of the social media tools that are now inside corporations available. In fact, and in an ideal world, every user would like to have his personal wall, like his FB page, displaying the discussion threads and the questions that are pertinent for him and some other followers. If this trend continues to grow and that the major software houses can associate to that a powerful search engine, I don't really see what a traditional intranet platform could offer more than a 'corporate' FB-alike system...documents, links, likes, groups and topics are there, public or private, with common announcements and publications...

I spent the last weeks in attending a lot of meetings (oh, God, has someone invented 3D avatars to go in my place?), presentations and some good ideas (most of the time) from some CEO's, technical evangelists or some past glorious executives...and one topic is now clearly back on the agenda...it's about disruptive technologies (and innovation , again). But what is this all about? Disruptive technologies, implying that any new technology would not disrupt the traditional business model, established market or long-time service provider? Seriously? Well, I learned around two decades ago that Michael Porter invented a strategy analysis with five forces, from one of them was the 'Treat of new entrants' . And that is exactly what is happening in the customer services market, with phenomenons like Uber, AirBnB, TripAdvisor...you name it. Some brilliant ideas are transformed thanks subtle code and smart applications into billion dollars businesses, but I don't clear...

Just being back from the ESPC 2014 edition (what a great city, a fantastic weather – how no to fall in love with Spain, really?) where thousands of presentation were given. In a nutshell, we had four great key notes, on Social and Sharepoint 2013, but not only. A special mention to RafalLukawiecki (Boticelli project) for his very well-prepared presentations, his hands-on approach on the BI side of the Sharepoint force and, last but certainly not least, his sense of humor. But what stroke me on during the four days we had is how few (to my knowledge, this must have been zero if I'm not mistaken) speakers proposed as subject an alternative client computer other than a recent Windows machine. Why not connecting a native Mac, Linux, older MS OS, tablets, Androïd phones to some Sharepoint or SQL instances? If I can understand that Microsoft wants to promote uniformity of their products and avoid diverse technologies, I believe however that this would bring a more concrete and...

Being back from a nice vacation, I could only remember the landscapes, the visited places and the impression of beauty those left in my mind (I also read the very inspiring Off to the Side: A Memoir of Jim Harrison (2002), that I warmly recommend). And then you come back to work, Internet, wifi, civilization. I could not prevent me for comparing the quality of information, of action and (most important) reflection I had during those two periods. What is striking is the loss of time, the (really) poor quality on what we read online, what is blogged (and you can consider this as being part of that eRubbish) and what we really do with that information we gather the whole day long. Digging into the subject, and if you like going back to in-depth analysis, understanding the impact of disruption on your mind, on your work, on your judgement, I strongly recommend to go to (yeah, I know. I'm full of contradictions) the site of Rolf Dobelli and download his article on Ne...

Without being controversial, I was browsing the Linkedin news (loosing my time?) and came through an article about 'being around 20 years old and reading 5 books' . And, sorry, I can't leave it, I need to express my disagreement on those kind of advices (apologies to the author of the post). 1. Its is so striking to mention 5 books and being around the twenties...but, oh, yes, I know. Reading is not hype anymore, it requires attention and intellectual effort - so, don't read too much. You could be 20 years old and have an headache; 2. Five books...twenty years...Hell, yes. That's a math. One book every two years ('cause you need to have finished your reading list before being old (that's reaching the canonical age of 30); again: one book every 24 months of your life is a real personal challenge. 3. And now comes the list itself: the top first one is Paul Coehlo's Alchemist, which is, I agree on that one, a great book. Now being the one that you sho...

Being attending a political discussion yesterday evening, I was surprised (and happy) to hear that some politician finally understand and do care about new technology in Belgium (and in Europe). It seems that the public sector - at large - is now discovering the virtues of new technologies (job creation, environmental friendly sector, inclusion of jobless people in a sector that is continuously looking for bright minds and new ideas etc.). And one of my concern (I blogged already about it) is the lack of real, ambitious programme for offering a European strategic alternative for data storage (on a cloud-based model) and the support for alternative US software providers (exception made for the German SAP ERP software). Why is that Europeans are not capable to bring to market Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft, Oracle giants? Where are Nokia, Ericsson, Linux today? And do we finally have a strategy to address the European market and propose a road forward? Interesting links t...

One of the most funny observation I do when reading social media threads (likes; shared information; questions asked and suggested quiz that will convince you that you're a genius) is to compare the recurrence and the apparent pattern of those. Like for example, a quite popular question of the moment is to wonder if Google is more innovative than Apple (but who cares about that? What's the value of that kind of opinion?). Another good one is the philosophical 'flavor' behind some (pretended) quotes (like 'You will only lose if you give up' by W. Churchill or ' If you can't explain complexity simply, you don't understand it ' by A. Einstein and, a last one for the road: " Value the relationship more than the quota " by Zig Ziglar). And with such a strong metaphysical background, I will quote my conclusion: a fool will always remain a fool .

What stroke me this year (let's pretend the year is finished, okay?) is the contradiction residing in the private and public sector trends: On one hand, democatric citizens claim responsibility (environmental, corporate social responsibility, food transparency and regulation of the financial markets, for example) - hoping probably with those requests to establish a more democratic and transparent society; On the other hand, we read every day in international press about democratic governements (remember? the one that was supposed to bring peace and democracy in Irak?) about spying and analyzing millions of communcation files, correspondance and messages exchanged amongst normal citizens, like you and me. The morality of this simple contradiction could be: Public sector and some 'democratic' states are eroding the trust for whom they are working for; 'Leading by example' is not a common practice within politics (surprised, hu?) ...but what's differe...

Twitter finally announced his proposed share price for the next big IPO in the technology space. Valuing the firm at $18bn, it will make this new (young) Internet player a new 'commodity' in the digital space (think on our life BEFORE Google Map, Facebook, Booking.com, Trip Advisor and some other tools we use every day for gaining in information accuracy, process improvement and...time saving). But what with Twitter now? What can the micro-blogging tool represent for direct targeted marketing on mobiles devices, for example? Or what about emergency services that could warn a specific community via Twitter messages? What about project management, disaster recovery, security warnings in private (business) sector?? Waw...can't imagine the endless possibilities here.

Announced for October, I'm quite excited with the idea to discover the Windows8 version - and the huge transformation on end-user interface level. Having had an interesting conversation earlier this week about the impact of Windows8 on the tablet (corporate) market, we came to the following conclusion: 1. Windows8 on tablet will be as good as IOS6 (yes, I dare to write that some Microsoft products will be 'as good as' Apple products. Sorry folks); 2. The corporate network integration will be optimal, in Microsoft environment at least; 3. The price per unit will be significantly cheaper than the Apple material; 4. Security will be better (sorry again...) Microsoft and Ballmer not innovative enough? Will see....

What can we do in management consulting with Twitter? If you're not Lady Gaga, Madonna or Barack, what can you do with Twitter if you're an ordinary man, just working as CIO and not looking for over-exposure on the Internet....? Well, I guess the answer will be: stay informed. I added quite a lot of well-known twitters in my following queue and I've to aknowledge, it's quite cool to read the latest news about the topics you selected. A kind of perpetual RSS feed, with real-time and online information about various topics (music, book, publishers, arts etc.). My real-time gazette, written by the people I allowed to write and I decided to read. Or not. Nothing changed, basically.

Not sure it's a good idea though, but yes, finally on Twitter...hmm....can't be on the Net without it, hu..? check: #MagmaConsult account and find some more there :-)

You can now test the new Lync technology (Unified communication product from Microsoft) in the Cloud. It's integrated in Office 365 and you can enrich online experiences without installing any package. Just follow this link right here!

The next year in tech will be all about building connections between PC and post-PC devices, whether phones, tablets, game consoles, e-readers or next-gen SmartRoombas. They’ll be connections without cords, built on shared interfaces, proximity-based communication, and storage, syncing and computing infrastructure increasingly shifted to the cloud. That’s what Tuesday’s release of OS X Lion is all about: building on the App Store and iCloud. That’s what Microsoft’s forthcoming Windows 8 is all about: building on unified IDs on everything from Windows Phone 7 to Office to Xbox and Skype. And I’m going to convince you that this is even what Google+ is really all about. You can see this already in Google+’s mobile apps for Android and iOS; we’ll see it more as Google continues to integrate more of its web properties into the social network. Read further Tim's article on Wired web site

Have a look at the video that some librarians made some days ago. It highlights the social dimension, the service minded approach of this profession and all the kind of information you can get in a library (and not on Google ebook or on Amazon). As they believe, I thought that knowledge sharing was not on the Internet only, but also on the coffee machine or in a reading room....?? So, maybe yes, they're right...libraries will survive !!

KPMG International has released an interesting paper on Web 2.0 technologies within the public sector...you can find the document on several KPMG web sites, like on the Belgian site (the official title is 'Dynamic technologies for smarter government' and is available in PDF format).