Is Management Handbook

by Carol V. Brown and Heikki Topi

In systems analysis, programming, development, or operations, improving productivity and service - doing more with less - is the major challenge. Regardless of your management level, the Handbook... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0849315956
• ISBN13: 9780849315954
• Release Date: June 2003
• Publisher: Auerbach Publications
• Length: 1004 Pages
• Weight: 3.25 lbs.
• Dimensions: 2.2" x 6.1" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

A Complete Reference for Consultants and IS/IT Ops

This is a collection of focused essays divided among five IS/IT management and operational domains: SECTION 1 (Achieving Strategic IT Alignment), SECTION 2 (Designing and Operating an Enterprise Infrastructure), SECTION 3 (Providing Application Solutions), SECTION 4 (Exploiting Web Technologies)and SECTION 5 (Facilitating Knowledge Work). Because this book covers such a wide landscape of management and operational issues it is impossible to let a potential reader know which are best since most readers are going to be interested in a particular domain or select topics in more than one of the five domains this book addresses. I'll cite the essays that I read out of personal interest or professional need, or that especially impressed me. I read all of the essays in Section 1 because of research and professional interest. Each was well written and collectively they contained a wealth of valuable information on topics in that domain.In Section 2 "Improving Data Center Productivity and Effectiveness", "Quality Assurance and Control" and Quality Information Services all contained invaluable information and reflected the authors' deep knowledge and insights into these topics. I skipped over the other essays in this section, but if the ones I read were any indication of the content and quality of the rest, then this section contains a wealth of information."Strategic Use of JAD" in Section 3 was insightful and gave me a lot of ideas on requirements elicitation and management using Joint Application Design workshops as effective approaches. I also liked "Project Success and Customer Needs", "Win-Win Projects" and "Managing the User/IS Relationship", each of which provided complementary approaches to user-center project management and how to assure that your project's final deliverables reflect true user requirements. This cluster of essays would make a small and valuable book in and of themselves.I skipped over SECTION 4 (Exploiting Web Technologies) because I have other material on that domain; however, I did quickly glance through a few of the essays and thought they were accurate (from what little I read) and well written. Section 5, in its entirety, was filled with useful information. I carefully read through this section and found gems of information and insights in each of the essays, the most interesting of which is "Helping Users Help Themselves". This book is suited for organizational use more than for individuals because of the range of topics covered. In my opinion the essays were on par with papers produced by the Meta Group, GartnerGroup and other consultative content providers, making this book a bargain and valuable resource.