Assignment 6 MIS

If you were hired by the university president as
an IT consultant, what would you suggest (technology, infrastructure,
innovations, steps, processes, etc) in order for the internet
connectivity be improved? (3000words)

(1st post):

Introduction:

In the IT consultation world, there are many business skills you need beyond computer skills to succeed. Before you start your own IT consultation firm, you need to become aware of the following required business skills: marketing skills; networking skills; financial skills; written communication skills; and presentation skills. While you don't need to have all these skills initially, you need to be prepared to learn them for the future to make your IT consultation firm work.

Marketing

During the first year, your business will revolve around marketing and sales. You can hire a marketing consultant at the beginning if this is not one of your strong suits and then learn as the IT consultation business develops.

Networking

In the IT consultation business you have to cultivate relationships with other consultants and people that can hire you, but you need to be willing to have a balance. If you push your business too hard, you might breed negativity.
Financial Management Skills
You might be wise to hire an accountant if you are not good with money. You should evaluate your abilities with finances very honestly using a system that will best gauge your money management skills.

Written Skills

You will need to submit written materials often in the IT consultation business. These materials will include proposals, progress reports and contracts, and being good at writing will allow you to work very productively. If you have intimate knowledge of the art of writing, you will be able to turn out proposals and reports quickly and efficiently.

The Art of Presentation

Public speaking will become a large part of your IT consultation business, as clients often need a group presentation before they will accept a project proposal. If you are not good at speaking, enroll in a public speaking class to improve your communication skills and help your future business.
You need to examine all your skills before you start your IT consultation firm and hire consultants or employees that can make up for the weak areas. If you are prepared to learn about skills you might currently lack, you have a better chance at succeeding in the future.

Work of an IT Consultant:

IT consultants may be involved in a variety of activities, including marketing, project management, client relationship management and systems development. An IT consultant works in partnership with clients, advising them how to use information technology in order to meet their business objectives or overcome problems. Consultants work to improve the structure and efficiency and of an organization’s IT systems.
They may also be responsible for user training and feedback. In many companies, these tasks will be carried out by an IT project team. IT consultants are increasingly involved in sales and business development, as well as technical duties.

Task typically involves:
• meeting with clients to determine requirements;
• working with clients to define the scope of a project;
• planning timescales and the resources needed;
• clarifying a client's system specifications, understanding their work practices and the nature of their business;
• travelling to customer sites;
• liaising with staff at all levels of a client organisation;
• defining software, hardware and network requirements;
• analysing IT requirements within companies and giving independent and objective advice on the use of IT;
• developing agreed solutions and implementing new systems;
• presenting solutions in written or oral reports;
• helping clients with change-management activities;
• project managing the design and implementation of preferred solutions;
• purchasing systems where appropriate;
• designing, testing, installing and monitoring new systems;
• preparing documentation and presenting progress reports to customers;
• organising training for users and other consultants;
• being involved in sales and support and, where appropriate, maintaining contact with client organisations;
• identifying potential clients and building and maintaining contacts.

Internet technology has become a dominant factor in business, academia, and everyday life. E-commerce and e-services are fueling a market sea change, with practically any business anyplace nurturing its equivalent on the Internet. The change began with advertisements and news, followed by entertainment (with music and movies) and traditional businesses, such as retail sales, financing, brokerage, and auctions. Now, entirely new businesses and services are created on and for the Internet. As a consequence, Internet service providers and application service providers have created a
revolutionary new model for driving new applications, hardware, and software development.


IT has come to represent virtually anything connected with computers, and nearly everything is connected to computers. If I am hired as an IT consultant by the University President, I would put forward the Infrastructure.


Why Infrastructure?

• Improve the performance, scalability, interoperability of Internet security services.
• Expedite the development and adoption of protection mechanisms for core Internet naming and routing infrastructure services.
• Research and develop techniques to exploit emerging programmable data planes to improve the survivability of Internet infrastructures.

Infrastructure is the basic, underlying framework or features of a system or organization. Can be defined as the basic physical and organizational structures needed for the operation of a society or enterprise, or the services and facilities necessary for an economy to function. The term typically refers to the technical structures that support a society, such as roads, water supply, sewers, power grids, telecommunications, and so forth. Viewed functionally, infrastructure facilitates the production of goods and services; for example, roads enable the transport of raw materials to a factory, and also for the distribution of finished products to markets. In some contexts, the term may also include basic social services such as schools and hospitals.

Administration

The overall responsibility for managing Internet Protocol address or domain names at upper levels is vested in the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA), which delegates the actual administration of most functions to other bodies.
At global regional levels, the principal bodies providing allocation and registration services that support the operation of the Internet globally are:
• RIPE NCC (Réseaux IP Européens Network Coordination Centre)
• ARIN (American Registry for Internet Numbers)
• APNIC (Asia Pacific Network Information Centre)
• LACNIC (Latin American and Caribbean IP address Regional Registry)
• AfriNIC (African Regional Registry for Internet Number Resources)

Internet Operations

Internet operations are coordinated worldwide through the Internet Engineering Planning Group (IEPG), an Internet operational group intended to assist Internet Service Providers to interoperate within the Global Internet. At global regional levels, bodies active in coordinating operations include the:
• American Registry for Internet Numbers
Manages the Internet numbering resources for North America, a portion of the Caribbean, and sub-equatorial Africa.
• Asia Pacific Networking Group (APOPs)
Promotes the Internet and the coordination of network inter-connectivity in the Asia Pacific Region.
Internet Security
Internet network security is significantly facilitated by a number of Computer Emergency Response Teams (CERTs) in eight countries and within a number of service provider operations and private networks. They were formed to continually monitor the network for security incidents, serve as a repository for information about such incidents, and develop responsive advisories. The CERTs are coordinated by the Forum of Incident Response and Security Teams.
Internationalisation
• Alis Technologies
Founded in 1981, Alis Technologies Inc. develops standards for Multilingual Information Management Solutions (MIMS )with the IETF (Internet Engeneering Task Force), the Unicode Consortium, W3C and LISA.
• Internationalized Domain Names (IDN) Committee
Working group to study making domain names available in character sets other than ASCII.
• MINC (Multilingual Internet Names Consortium)
A non-profit, non-governmental, international organization. It focuses on the promotion of multilingualisation of Internet names, including Internet domain names and keywords, internationalization of Internet names standards and protocols, technical coordination and liaison with other international bodies.
• CNNIC (China Network Information Center)
(site is in Chinese)
• KRNIC (Korea Network Information Center)
Established the system for managing Internet address resources in Korea.
• TWNIC (Taiwan Network Infomation Center)
The unique neutral and non-profit organization that takes charge of the domain name registration and IP address allocation in Taiwan.
• The Unicode Consortium
Responsible for defining the behavior and relationships between Unicode characters, and providing technical information to implementers. The Consortium cooperates with ISO in refining the specification and expanding the character set.
Internet Connectivity
• Network Startup Resource Center (NSRC)
Database about international networking developments and Internet connectivity providers, with major emphasis on countries in Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, the Middle East, and Oceania. Information is available on country-by-country basis and includes connectivity providers, networking infrastructure, and other country-specific information.
• Connectivity Table from University of Wisconsin's FTP server.
Lists entities with and without international network connectivity. Shows countries (with ISO two letter country code (ISO 3166)) which have:
o international IP Internet links
o domestic UUCP sites which are connected to the Global Multiprotocol Open Internet, and
o domestic FIDONET sites which are connected to the Global Multiprotocol Open Internet.
o Connectivity Maps
• Internet Hosts Map
Shows the millions of Internet hosts worldwide as of January 1999.



http://ezinearticles.com/?IT-Consultation:--Do-You-Have-the-Required-Business-Skills?&id=290641

http://www.prospects.ac.uk/p/types_of_job/it_consultant_job_description.jsp

http://www.howstuffworks.com/internet-infrastructure.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service_design#Characteristics_of_Service_Design