http://www.forrester.com/ Forrester is an independent technology research company that provides pragmatic and forward-thinking advice about technology's impact on business. en-us 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 120 http://www.forrester.com/imagesV2/affiliates/logos/forrester.gif http://www.forrester.com/ http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46943&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed As traditional notions of the business analyst evolve, application development and program management professionals must prepare for a new, emerging type of business analyst: the business technology analyst. Because these new business technology analysts blend technical knowledge with business sense, they will demand a different working relationship with app dev professionals than the relationship typical business analysts have required in the past. Application Development Enterprise Architecture IT Management Wed, 20 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Mike Gilpin" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46943&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=45620&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed An increasing number of banks are working on long-term business and IT visions of the future, realigning IT strategies on a continual basis. To help enterprise architects better understand the business and IT environment of the future, Forrester surveyed key vendors in the banking space and interviewed banking executives from five continents to get their take on banking's — and banking IT's — future. The net outcome they expect for their businesses? More fluid organizations, changing core competencies, and more specialization, as well as collaborative competition on regional and global levels. Enterprise Architecture IT Spending & Budgeting Consumer Industries Financial Services Wed, 20 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Jost Hoppermann" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=45620&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=45021&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed Serious gaming, or the use of games and gaming dynamics for non-entertainment purposes, is poised to take off thanks to the rise of Technology Populism, the greening of IT, and the emergence of the Millennials. Opportunity comes from many sectors, but competition comes from a hodgepodge of companies, including IBM and Microsoft. To achieve widespread adoption, the industry must deal with five issues: 1) what games should be called; 2) how slick the presentation should be; 3) how users should interface with the games; 4) how to determine ROI; and 5) determining if the technology has any limitations. Clearing these hurdles will open the door for revolutionary uses of games, but getting from here to there will require patience and guidance on the part of serious games vendors. Customer Experience Information & Knowledge Management IT Spending & Budgeting Marketing & Advertising Aerospace & Defense Education Healthcare & Life Sciences High-Tech Media & Entertainment Tue, 19 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "TJ Keitt, Paul Jackson" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=45021&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46055&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed This Technographics Insight takes a look at the financial attitudes among online consumers globally. It compares online consumers’ willingness to shop around for financial products, trust in financial advisors and keeping track of their finances. Consumer Industries Consumer Technology Adoption Financial Services Mon, 18 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Reineke Reitsma" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46055&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46773&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed To help customer experience professionals deliver compelling business cases, Forrester has created the Business Case Review Checklist For Customer Experience Professionals. This checklist should be used by business case authors to validate that their work has the content executives are looking for, organizes that content so that it tells a powerful story, and presents the argument in a way that is both easy to consume and engaging for the audience. Long term, firms should build the best practices outlined here into their business case templates to preempt problems in the first place. Customer Experience Mon, 18 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Megan Burns" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46773&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46740&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed Most architects now recognize that service-oriented architecture (SOA) is much more than Web services (WS) standards and better application integration. SOA continues to gain industry recognition as a key element of strategic business transformation — which is a much higher level of business impact than mere application integration. Strategic SOA-based business services increase both business and application flexibility, providing a modular, digital-world implementation of your business that is ready to connect to any customer, employee, supplier, or partner wherever and whenever. Web services add value to SOA by providing a standards-based ecosystem and open access via loose technology coupling. For architects to lead their organizations on a successful SOA journey, they must understand SOA's overarching concepts, its relationship to business design, and its impact on governance, technology platforms, solution delivery life cycles, and architecture management. Application Development Enterprise Architecture IT Management Mon, 18 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Randy Heffner, Larry Fulton" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46740&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46729&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed For a single, isolated solution delivery project, it's OK to think of service-oriented architecture (SOA) as just Web services (WS) standards for better application integration: Your application needs something from another one, and WS technology bridges the boundaries. However, across a portfolio of solutions, this view of SOA breaks down and can easily result in siloed, point-to-point Web services that solve only short-term, project-level problems. Longer-term application delivery benefits from SOA — for example, reduced time-to-market and lower development costs — require cross-project, portfolio-level strategy and planning. SOA is proven in the market — for the past three years, 70% of current SOA users have said they will do more SOA — but getting it right requires developers to step back and ensure that they truly understand how to think correctly about what SOA is and how it will add value. Application Development Enterprise Architecture Mon, 18 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Randy Heffner, Mike Gilpin" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46729&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46793&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed The problem with much of the sage advice that pundits give to IT services decision-makers is that very often it only makes sense in retrospect — after the train wreck. It doesn't have to be this way. Forrester has found that most IT outsourcing clients are generally satisfied with their primary service provider, but there are still some proven steps available to them to increase their chances of meeting — or even exceeding — business expectations. Up until now, no firms involved in outsourcing have managed to hammer together a deal that completely avoids all problems and issues. Even so, clients that stay focused on some deceptively simple business basics will increase their chances for outsourcing deal success. IT Services Sourcing & Procurement Mon, 18 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Paul Roehrig, Ph.D." <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46793&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46950&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed There are no known vulnerabilities that can seriously compromise a virtual server based on hypervisor technology from Citrix/Xen, Microsoft, or VMware today. As vendors improve the control and visibility of the underlying virtualization layer, however, administrators will gain more confidence that their virtual systems can't be exploited. In the meantime, security professionals should sleep at night, knowing that they can protect their organizations' virtual systems by simply updating their security practices. IT Infrastructure & Operations Security & Risk Mon, 18 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Simon Yates" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46950&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46398&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed IT professionals — and increasingly business users, as well — commonly use terms such as event processing, business event management, complex event processing, and various other similar expressions. But confusion about what each represents is rife, in part because an increasing number of business requirements are driving demand for different forms of event processing, even when it is not clear which form to use. Enterprise architects need a taxonomy of both types of events and of the forms that event processing can take. This document provides a concise description of event types and event processing forms so that enterprise architects can guide their enterprise's thinking about how it should approach and deploy event processing. Application Development Enterprise Architecture Packaged Applications Mon, 18 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Charles Brett" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46398&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46764&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed Blazing Web site performance isn't purely a factor of Web page design. Msnbc.com, a leading online news site, said that the right infrastructure architecture can be the difference in beating its competitors to market with breaking news by as much as two full minutes. Msnbc.com was able to achieve both blazing fast Web site performance and fast breaking news stories by optimizing its performance management practices and using load balancers, content delivery networks, and a custom content management system that integrates with its Web infrastructure. Networking Consumer Technology Adoption Media & Entertainment Fri, 15 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Mike Gualtieri, James Staten" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46764&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46806&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed Every year thought leaders and solution providers in the areas of aging in place, remote patient monitoring, and wellness and disease management support get together to discuss advances and issues in the industry at TCBI's Healthcare Unbound Conference and Exhibition. This year's conference included the usual smattering of new solutions and a hefty dose of frustration around the challenges that are hindering industry growth. Facing obstacles as broad-ranging as cultural hurdles, data disparities, and funding and reimbursement shortfalls, healthcare unbound solution hopefuls need to band together. To drive overall industry growth, vendor strategy professionals must forge ties with academic institutions, launch large-scale awareness campaigns, and lay the groundwork for intellectual property sharing. Healthcare & Life Sciences High-Tech Fri, 15 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Elizabeth Boehm" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46806&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46187&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed This report summarizes the merchandising and Web optimization findings from the 11th annual fielding of "The State of Retailing Online," a Shop.org study conducted by Forrester Research. In this study, retailers reported that the top investment priorities for their eCommerce Web sites center on improving the customer browse experience — improvements to the home page, search results pages, and product detail pages. Retailers also expressed a keen interest in investing in elements of the shopping cart, checkout, and fulfillment processes. Customer Experience Marketing & Advertising Packaged Applications eBusiness/eCommerce Retail Fri, 15 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Sucharita Mulpuru" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46187&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46942&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed As technology becomes increasingly integral to firms' offerings, strategy, and organization, the traditional model of IT as an independent and monolithic entity within the larger business is outmoded. Business technology (BT) will replace IT's technology orientation with a focus on providing business value through process-governed services measured in business-relevant terms. Infrastructure and operations professionals should understand what is driving the shift from traditional IT as well as the challenges around strategy, process, and culture when implementing BT. IT Infrastructure & Operations IT Management Fri, 15 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Robert Whiteley" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46942&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46791&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed With most enterprises now conducting business on the Web, it has become more crucial than ever that the experience is rich and responsive. Often these two goals conflict. How do you ensure a robust, interactive experience without sacrificing page-loading speed? How is it that some of your competitors are able to deliver dynamic content and rich Internet applications (RIAs) and still have sub-second load times? The answer comes in two parts: best practices for you (addressed in this report), and best practices for your application development colleagues (addressed in part two of this series). To optimize the infrastructure for blazing fast Web site response, follow these four best practices: 1) measure early and often; 2) cache smart and cache often; 3) architect for scale out; and 4) partner with application development professionals. These best practices are not just about infrastructure; they are also about jointly developing and executing your ongoing performance management strategy with the application development professionals rather than passing the problems back and forth with the requisite finger pointing. Customer Experience Networking Consumer Technology Adoption Fri, 15 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "James Staten, Mike Gualtieri" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46791&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46656&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed When Forrester polled a panel of 33 business and IT decision-makers to rate their B2B eCommerce capabilities, we found that their feelings were mixed. Ten of the respondents rated their competencies "very good or outstanding," while another 10 viewed their performance as "poor or below average." In addition, Forrester discovered that a few of the key areas that plague B2C capabilities are also primary pain points for B2B, such as email Web campaigns and online ordering. However, we also learned that there are some subtle distinctions where sentiments around B2B and B2C capabilities differ broadly, such as online quoting and cross-sell/upsell. To master B2B eCommerce and avoid common pitfalls: 1) Be sure that you have a firm grip on your B2B goals and objectives; 2) understand your B2B eCommerce strengths and weaknesses; and 3) arm yourself with a long-term applications strategy. Packaged Applications eBusiness/eCommerce Fri, 15 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Pete Marston" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46656&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46761&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed The "SMART 2020: Enabling the low carbon economy in the information age" report issued by the Global e-Sustainability Initiative (GeSI) will raise the environmental stakes for strategy professionals at IT suppliers. Vendors looking to respond to their customers' increasing demands for environmentally responsible operations and products need to: 1) clean up their internal operations and the transparency of the report progress; 2) improve the environmental footprint of their hardware, software, and services; and 3) incorporate their technologies into solutions that enable greener business, industrial, and societal activities. The GeSI report highlights the enabling capabilities of IT products and services; IT vendors looking for environmental leadership must add this dimension to their slate of green activities. IT Infrastructure & Operations Security & Risk High-Tech Fri, 15 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Christopher Mines" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46761&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46688&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed The worst CIO misunderstanding about service-oriented architecture (SOA) is to think of it only as another technical initiative for software reuse. Although SOA's reuse potential is real and good, its business impact goes much further: In Forrester surveys, 44% of current SOA users say they are using it for strategic business transformation. SOA's true source of power is its ability to start from and focus on business design. By correctly understanding SOA, CIOs can lead their organizations on a solid and well-managed path to greater business technology value. Application Development Enterprise Architecture Fri, 15 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Randy Heffner, Alexander Peters, Ph.D." <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46688&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46275&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed All CIOs want to be valued partners to their business peers, helping with company strategy and making smarter use of IT, instead of heads-down focused on running the IT organization. PepsiAmericas' Senior Vice President and CIO Ken Johnsen has established a CIO profile that enables him to do just that, today spending 80% of his time with business peers on making the business use of technology. During his seven-year tenure as CIO, he built a team focused on operational excellence, established and met business expectations, and finally established a two-tiered governance structure that works. IT Management Consumer Packaged Goods Manufacturing Fri, 15 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Alex Cullen" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=46275&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=45238&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed Forrester applied its IVR Review methodology to the phone self-service experiences at 16 firms — four each of the largest airlines, banks, department stores, and MP3 player manufacturers. Among the generally weak phone self-service experiences delivered by the companies, American Airlines received the one passing score for its IVR. As a group, airlines outperformed other industries, while department stores fell to the bottom of the list. Despite the flaws we found, there were also a number of best practices, such as United Air Lines' advanced IVR functionality, Wells Fargo's error handling, and Macy's clear system feedback. To improve phone self-service experiences, firms should evaluate their own IVR experiences, fix problems like unclear menus, and take advantage of the strengths the channel offers to maximize self-service opportunities. Customer Experience Networking Packaged Applications Consumer Industries Consumer Technology Adoption Financial Services Retail Travel Fri, 15 Aug 2008 04:00:00 GMT "Adele Sage" <resourcecenter@forrester.com> http://www.forrester.com/go?docid=45238&src=RSS_TopicGroupFeed