Think you have trouble with your taxes? Well, I’m not going to feel sorry for the richest man in the world, but apparently his tax return is so complex that it requires a special computer, and because of that, if the info gets on the wrong computer, he erroneously gets notices of non-payment.
“Their normal computers can’t deal with the numbers,” he (Gates) said of the hapless taxmen. “So I am constantly getting these notices telling me I haven’t paid something, when really it is just on the wrong computer.”
According to an IRS spokeman, the agency’s main computers do not use the Windows operating system. IBM designed the original processing system for the IRS in the 1960s, which was largely tape and disk driven. Believe it or not the same system is used today, processing the bulk of America’s tax returns including, presumably at one time at least, that of Gates. Source:
Forbes
We Say: Perhaps it’s time for a hardware and software upgrade? I wonder if Ellison gets his own computer, and if not, if he’s jealous of that as well?
Friday, February 03, 2006
IBM exec urges companies to rethink innovation
It's probably not a shock to learn that Procter & Gamble outsources its computer support, but what about its Ivory soap? It turns out that Ivory, the company's oldest brand, isn't manufactured in a P&G factory.
What might even be more surprising is that P&G has opened up all 28,000 of the patents in its portfolio to license by other companies — even rival Clorox.
Those steps are why P&G is showcased as a company that's learned to let go of old ways of doing business in a new book by a top IBM executive.
"Let Go to Grow: Escaping the Commodity Trap," by Linda S. Sanford, an IBM senior vice president, with Dave Taylor, an author and professor, is a handbook for corporations that want to compete amid the forces of globalization.
Chappaqua resident Sanford, 52, is leading the Armonk-based computer giant's own transformation into a more nimble player as the Internet brings competitors from around the world as close as a computer click away.
"The fact that the world is so global, so flat and connected through networks is having a major impact on businesses and how they survive and grow in a commoditized world," Sanford said.
Citing examples from corporations such as General Electric, eBay, Dell, Toyota, Southwest, UPS, FedEx, BMW and IBM, Sanford makes a case for business leaders to look outside their own walls for innovation.
"You want to be able to shore up skills and talents around your core capabilities and leverage other skills and talents wherever they reside around the world," Sanford said. "There is no corner of the globe that has the corner on talent anymore."
Sanford said she was influenced by "The World is Flat," the 2005 book by New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman.
On the opening page of Friedman's book, he describes playing golf at a course in Bangalore when a friend urges him to aim his shot at the nearby glass-and-steel buildings of Microsoft and IBM — a scene that illustrates how much major U.S. companies have invested in India.
A central theme in both Friedman's and Sanford's books is how the Internet makes it possible for intellectual tasks to be performed anywhere.
Sanford gives the example of Eli Lilly, which created an innovation center on the Web and posts research and development problems that qualified scientists around the world are invited to solve.
"Pharmaceutical giant as they are, they recognize that they don't necessarily have the corner on innovation," Sanford said.
The 6,000 registered scientists from 125 countries are paid up to $100,000 for their input if they solve the problem.
"The success rate has been far, far higher than the in-house performance and at one-sixth the cost," Sanford said.
Businesses are realizing that it's not desirable or practical to control every aspect of their operations anymore. At one point in time, car makers even mined their own iron ore for steel.
"Clearly, that's not affordable today," Sanford said.
Letting go of control isn't easy. "What is the biggest inhibitor? It's the culture of an organization. Most of us have grown up in the world of command and control. Letting go is not intuitive," Sanford said.
IBM's own transformation from a manufacturer of computers to a purveyor of technological expertise took bringing in an outsider as chairman and chief executive. Louis V. Gerstner Jr. and his successor, Samuel Palmisano, have led IBM's rebirth as the biggest consulting company in the world.
In the process, IBM shed the hard disk drive business it pioneered and sold its PC business to a Chinese manufacturer.
When IBM started outsourcing manufacturing, it was a "shock to the system," Sanford said, but today the philosophy is ingrained.
For example, the company's Global Services arm acts like an outsourcer within IBM.
There used to be 128 chief information officers running the tech support for various departments in IBM, Sanford said. Today, there is just one CIO, and he doesn't even run the data centers, which fall under the purview of Global Services.
In addition, IBM outsources its human resources administration to Fidelity.
"It frees our people in human resources to focus on compensation strategy instead of worrying about administration," she said. "Core to us is talent. We are people-based. We need to be sure that HR focuses on identifying, contacting and retaining talent, so we put the bulk of our resources there."
Sanford doesn't argue for outsourcing as a means to just save money.
Pointing to Amazon.com, which owes at least part of its success to timely delivery of goods by partners such as UPS, Sanford said today's outsourcing deals are all about creating "value webs."
"Outsourcing isn't the point of a value web. I make that distinction because I think it's important. Creating a value web means drawing on the strength of other companies, and letting them draw on your strength. That's different than giving something to someone else because they can do it cheaper," she said.
Sanford acknowledges that an IBM executive writing a book in favor of outsourcing is a bit like Ben & Jerry's writing a book extolling the virtues of eating more ice cream.
"Clearly, we have the experience, we have the skills and we have the capabilities in our consulting services that can help customers," she said. "Yes, I am telling the story and saying, 'We can help you do this.' "
Sanford, one of the highest-ranking women at Big Blue, said she decided to write the book in part because so many customers have asked her to share IBM's own story.
About half of Sanford's time is spent meeting with customers, which means countless hours on airplanes. Sanford traveled about 74,000 miles last year. "I had a lot of time to reflect on what I was seeing and observing around the world," she said.
Sanford said she wrote on weekends, evenings and during vacation time.
She wrote down her thoughts and her collaborator helped make them easy to understand — as well as weeding out those three-letter acronyms beloved by all IBMers.
"Dave was very instrumental in helping me make sure that it made sense to the reader," Sanford said.
Sanford is one of just a handful of IBM executives who have written general interest business books.
• Longtime CEO Thomas J. Watson Jr., son of the company founder, wrote two books, "A Business and Its Beliefs: The Ideas That Helped Build IBM" and "Father, Son & Co.: My Life at IBM and Beyond."
• "Who Says Elephants Can't Dance? Inside IBM's Historic Turnaround" was former chief Gerstner's story of his role leading IBM from the brink of bankruptcy in 1993 to its resurgence when he left in 2002.
• John R. Patrick, a former vice president of Internet technology at IBM, discusses the importance of the Internet in "Net Attitude."
• Ossining resident William J. Holstein, editor-in-chief of Chief Executive Magazine, said Sanford's book will be useful to corporate executives.
"This is one of the core challenges that everybody is wrestling with: What do we do that's really special — which used to be called core competence — versus what can be outsourced," he said.
He said examples of IBM's own transformation are compelling.
"They seem to live what they preach. The fact that they got out of the PC business says that they didn't see an advantage. They are concentrating their energies where they have an advantage, which is in services," he said.
"Obviously, this book is an intellectual basis for people making decisions that over the long term would help IBM's business. There is no question that there is an IBM agenda here. You would expect nothing less," Holstein said.
The trend toward outsourcing, which has received a lot of attention since the 2004 presidential election, is still in the early stages, from Holstein's view.
"It's not over by any stretch of the imagination. This is why her book touches on what I think should be one of the major debates in the country: How do we as Americans move up in the chain to be able to do more sophisticated things that can't be moved to Hyderabad," he said.
To workers alarmed by the thought of their jobs moving to India or elsewhere in the world as companies let go of work that used to be performed in the United States, Sanford says: "We are a country built on entrepreneurship and innovation. If you go back over the centuries, we have constantly come up with the next new innovation. We have to make sure our educational system supports that."
It's probably not a shock to learn that Procter & Gamble outsources its computer support, but what about its Ivory soap? It turns out that Ivory, the company's oldest brand, isn't manufactured in a P&G factory.
What might even be more surprising is that P&G has opened up all 28,000 of the patents in its portfolio to license by other companies — even rival Clorox.
Those steps are why P&G is showcased as a company that's learned to let go of old ways of doing business in a new book by a top IBM executive.
"Let Go to Grow: Escaping the Commodity Trap," by Linda S. Sanford, an IBM senior vice president, with Dave Taylor, an author and professor, is a handbook for corporations that want to compete amid the forces of globalization.
Chappaqua resident Sanford, 52, is leading the Armonk-based computer giant's own transformation into a more nimble player as the Internet brings competitors from around the world as close as a computer click away.
"The fact that the world is so global, so flat and connected through networks is having a major impact on businesses and how they survive and grow in a commoditized world," Sanford said.
Citing examples from corporations such as General Electric, eBay, Dell, Toyota, Southwest, UPS, FedEx, BMW and IBM, Sanford makes a case for business leaders to look outside their own walls for innovation.
"You want to be able to shore up skills and talents around your core capabilities and leverage other skills and talents wherever they reside around the world," Sanford said. "There is no corner of the globe that has the corner on talent anymore."
Sanford said she was influenced by "The World is Flat," the 2005 book by New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman.
On the opening page of Friedman's book, he describes playing golf at a course in Bangalore when a friend urges him to aim his shot at the nearby glass-and-steel buildings of Microsoft and IBM — a scene that illustrates how much major U.S. companies have invested in India.
A central theme in both Friedman's and Sanford's books is how the Internet makes it possible for intellectual tasks to be performed anywhere.
Sanford gives the example of Eli Lilly, which created an innovation center on the Web and posts research and development problems that qualified scientists around the world are invited to solve.
"Pharmaceutical giant as they are, they recognize that they don't necessarily have the corner on innovation," Sanford said.
The 6,000 registered scientists from 125 countries are paid up to $100,000 for their input if they solve the problem.
"The success rate has been far, far higher than the in-house performance and at one-sixth the cost," Sanford said.
Businesses are realizing that it's not desirable or practical to control every aspect of their operations anymore. At one point in time, car makers even mined their own iron ore for steel.
"Clearly, that's not affordable today," Sanford said.
Letting go of control isn't easy. "What is the biggest inhibitor? It's the culture of an organization. Most of us have grown up in the world of command and control. Letting go is not intuitive," Sanford said.
IBM's own transformation from a manufacturer of computers to a purveyor of technological expertise took bringing in an outsider as chairman and chief executive. Louis V. Gerstner Jr. and his successor, Samuel Palmisano, have led IBM's rebirth as the biggest consulting company in the world.
In the process, IBM shed the hard disk drive business it pioneered and sold its PC business to a Chinese manufacturer.
When IBM started outsourcing manufacturing, it was a "shock to the system," Sanford said, but today the philosophy is ingrained.
For example, the company's Global Services arm acts like an outsourcer within IBM.
There used to be 128 chief information officers running the tech support for various departments in IBM, Sanford said. Today, there is just one CIO, and he doesn't even run the data centers, which fall under the purview of Global Services.
In addition, IBM outsources its human resources administration to Fidelity.
"It frees our people in human resources to focus on compensation strategy instead of worrying about administration," she said. "Core to us is talent. We are people-based. We need to be sure that HR focuses on identifying, contacting and retaining talent, so we put the bulk of our resources there."
Sanford doesn't argue for outsourcing as a means to just save money.
Pointing to Amazon.com, which owes at least part of its success to timely delivery of goods by partners such as UPS, Sanford said today's outsourcing deals are all about creating "value webs."
"Outsourcing isn't the point of a value web. I make that distinction because I think it's important. Creating a value web means drawing on the strength of other companies, and letting them draw on your strength. That's different than giving something to someone else because they can do it cheaper," she said.
Sanford acknowledges that an IBM executive writing a book in favor of outsourcing is a bit like Ben & Jerry's writing a book extolling the virtues of eating more ice cream.
"Clearly, we have the experience, we have the skills and we have the capabilities in our consulting services that can help customers," she said. "Yes, I am telling the story and saying, 'We can help you do this.' "
Sanford, one of the highest-ranking women at Big Blue, said she decided to write the book in part because so many customers have asked her to share IBM's own story.
About half of Sanford's time is spent meeting with customers, which means countless hours on airplanes. Sanford traveled about 74,000 miles last year. "I had a lot of time to reflect on what I was seeing and observing around the world," she said.
Sanford said she wrote on weekends, evenings and during vacation time.
She wrote down her thoughts and her collaborator helped make them easy to understand — as well as weeding out those three-letter acronyms beloved by all IBMers.
"Dave was very instrumental in helping me make sure that it made sense to the reader," Sanford said.
Sanford is one of just a handful of IBM executives who have written general interest business books.
• Longtime CEO Thomas J. Watson Jr., son of the company founder, wrote two books, "A Business and Its Beliefs: The Ideas That Helped Build IBM" and "Father, Son & Co.: My Life at IBM and Beyond."
• "Who Says Elephants Can't Dance? Inside IBM's Historic Turnaround" was former chief Gerstner's story of his role leading IBM from the brink of bankruptcy in 1993 to its resurgence when he left in 2002.
• John R. Patrick, a former vice president of Internet technology at IBM, discusses the importance of the Internet in "Net Attitude."
• Ossining resident William J. Holstein, editor-in-chief of Chief Executive Magazine, said Sanford's book will be useful to corporate executives.
"This is one of the core challenges that everybody is wrestling with: What do we do that's really special — which used to be called core competence — versus what can be outsourced," he said.
He said examples of IBM's own transformation are compelling.
"They seem to live what they preach. The fact that they got out of the PC business says that they didn't see an advantage. They are concentrating their energies where they have an advantage, which is in services," he said.
"Obviously, this book is an intellectual basis for people making decisions that over the long term would help IBM's business. There is no question that there is an IBM agenda here. You would expect nothing less," Holstein said.
The trend toward outsourcing, which has received a lot of attention since the 2004 presidential election, is still in the early stages, from Holstein's view.
"It's not over by any stretch of the imagination. This is why her book touches on what I think should be one of the major debates in the country: How do we as Americans move up in the chain to be able to do more sophisticated things that can't be moved to Hyderabad," he said.
To workers alarmed by the thought of their jobs moving to India or elsewhere in the world as companies let go of work that used to be performed in the United States, Sanford says: "We are a country built on entrepreneurship and innovation. If you go back over the centuries, we have constantly come up with the next new innovation. We have to make sure our educational system supports that."
www.thejournalnews.com
What might even be more surprising is that P&G has opened up all 28,000 of the patents in its portfolio to license by other companies — even rival Clorox.
Those steps are why P&G is showcased as a company that's learned to let go of old ways of doing business in a new book by a top IBM executive.
"Let Go to Grow: Escaping the Commodity Trap," by Linda S. Sanford, an IBM senior vice president, with Dave Taylor, an author and professor, is a handbook for corporations that want to compete amid the forces of globalization.
Chappaqua resident Sanford, 52, is leading the Armonk-based computer giant's own transformation into a more nimble player as the Internet brings competitors from around the world as close as a computer click away.
"The fact that the world is so global, so flat and connected through networks is having a major impact on businesses and how they survive and grow in a commoditized world," Sanford said.
Citing examples from corporations such as General Electric, eBay, Dell, Toyota, Southwest, UPS, FedEx, BMW and IBM, Sanford makes a case for business leaders to look outside their own walls for innovation.
"You want to be able to shore up skills and talents around your core capabilities and leverage other skills and talents wherever they reside around the world," Sanford said. "There is no corner of the globe that has the corner on talent anymore."
Sanford said she was influenced by "The World is Flat," the 2005 book by New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman.
On the opening page of Friedman's book, he describes playing golf at a course in Bangalore when a friend urges him to aim his shot at the nearby glass-and-steel buildings of Microsoft and IBM — a scene that illustrates how much major U.S. companies have invested in India.
A central theme in both Friedman's and Sanford's books is how the Internet makes it possible for intellectual tasks to be performed anywhere.
Sanford gives the example of Eli Lilly, which created an innovation center on the Web and posts research and development problems that qualified scientists around the world are invited to solve.
"Pharmaceutical giant as they are, they recognize that they don't necessarily have the corner on innovation," Sanford said.
The 6,000 registered scientists from 125 countries are paid up to $100,000 for their input if they solve the problem.
"The success rate has been far, far higher than the in-house performance and at one-sixth the cost," Sanford said.
Businesses are realizing that it's not desirable or practical to control every aspect of their operations anymore. At one point in time, car makers even mined their own iron ore for steel.
"Clearly, that's not affordable today," Sanford said.
Letting go of control isn't easy. "What is the biggest inhibitor? It's the culture of an organization. Most of us have grown up in the world of command and control. Letting go is not intuitive," Sanford said.
IBM's own transformation from a manufacturer of computers to a purveyor of technological expertise took bringing in an outsider as chairman and chief executive. Louis V. Gerstner Jr. and his successor, Samuel Palmisano, have led IBM's rebirth as the biggest consulting company in the world.
In the process, IBM shed the hard disk drive business it pioneered and sold its PC business to a Chinese manufacturer.
When IBM started outsourcing manufacturing, it was a "shock to the system," Sanford said, but today the philosophy is ingrained.
For example, the company's Global Services arm acts like an outsourcer within IBM.
There used to be 128 chief information officers running the tech support for various departments in IBM, Sanford said. Today, there is just one CIO, and he doesn't even run the data centers, which fall under the purview of Global Services.
In addition, IBM outsources its human resources administration to Fidelity.
"It frees our people in human resources to focus on compensation strategy instead of worrying about administration," she said. "Core to us is talent. We are people-based. We need to be sure that HR focuses on identifying, contacting and retaining talent, so we put the bulk of our resources there."
Sanford doesn't argue for outsourcing as a means to just save money.
Pointing to Amazon.com, which owes at least part of its success to timely delivery of goods by partners such as UPS, Sanford said today's outsourcing deals are all about creating "value webs."
"Outsourcing isn't the point of a value web. I make that distinction because I think it's important. Creating a value web means drawing on the strength of other companies, and letting them draw on your strength. That's different than giving something to someone else because they can do it cheaper," she said.
Sanford acknowledges that an IBM executive writing a book in favor of outsourcing is a bit like Ben & Jerry's writing a book extolling the virtues of eating more ice cream.
"Clearly, we have the experience, we have the skills and we have the capabilities in our consulting services that can help customers," she said. "Yes, I am telling the story and saying, 'We can help you do this.' "
Sanford, one of the highest-ranking women at Big Blue, said she decided to write the book in part because so many customers have asked her to share IBM's own story.
About half of Sanford's time is spent meeting with customers, which means countless hours on airplanes. Sanford traveled about 74,000 miles last year. "I had a lot of time to reflect on what I was seeing and observing around the world," she said.
Sanford said she wrote on weekends, evenings and during vacation time.
She wrote down her thoughts and her collaborator helped make them easy to understand — as well as weeding out those three-letter acronyms beloved by all IBMers.
"Dave was very instrumental in helping me make sure that it made sense to the reader," Sanford said.
Sanford is one of just a handful of IBM executives who have written general interest business books.
• Longtime CEO Thomas J. Watson Jr., son of the company founder, wrote two books, "A Business and Its Beliefs: The Ideas That Helped Build IBM" and "Father, Son & Co.: My Life at IBM and Beyond."
• "Who Says Elephants Can't Dance? Inside IBM's Historic Turnaround" was former chief Gerstner's story of his role leading IBM from the brink of bankruptcy in 1993 to its resurgence when he left in 2002.
• John R. Patrick, a former vice president of Internet technology at IBM, discusses the importance of the Internet in "Net Attitude."
• Ossining resident William J. Holstein, editor-in-chief of Chief Executive Magazine, said Sanford's book will be useful to corporate executives.
"This is one of the core challenges that everybody is wrestling with: What do we do that's really special — which used to be called core competence — versus what can be outsourced," he said.
He said examples of IBM's own transformation are compelling.
"They seem to live what they preach. The fact that they got out of the PC business says that they didn't see an advantage. They are concentrating their energies where they have an advantage, which is in services," he said.
"Obviously, this book is an intellectual basis for people making decisions that over the long term would help IBM's business. There is no question that there is an IBM agenda here. You would expect nothing less," Holstein said.
The trend toward outsourcing, which has received a lot of attention since the 2004 presidential election, is still in the early stages, from Holstein's view.
"It's not over by any stretch of the imagination. This is why her book touches on what I think should be one of the major debates in the country: How do we as Americans move up in the chain to be able to do more sophisticated things that can't be moved to Hyderabad," he said.
To workers alarmed by the thought of their jobs moving to India or elsewhere in the world as companies let go of work that used to be performed in the United States, Sanford says: "We are a country built on entrepreneurship and innovation. If you go back over the centuries, we have constantly come up with the next new innovation. We have to make sure our educational system supports that."
It's probably not a shock to learn that Procter & Gamble outsources its computer support, but what about its Ivory soap? It turns out that Ivory, the company's oldest brand, isn't manufactured in a P&G factory.
What might even be more surprising is that P&G has opened up all 28,000 of the patents in its portfolio to license by other companies — even rival Clorox.
Those steps are why P&G is showcased as a company that's learned to let go of old ways of doing business in a new book by a top IBM executive.
"Let Go to Grow: Escaping the Commodity Trap," by Linda S. Sanford, an IBM senior vice president, with Dave Taylor, an author and professor, is a handbook for corporations that want to compete amid the forces of globalization.
Chappaqua resident Sanford, 52, is leading the Armonk-based computer giant's own transformation into a more nimble player as the Internet brings competitors from around the world as close as a computer click away.
"The fact that the world is so global, so flat and connected through networks is having a major impact on businesses and how they survive and grow in a commoditized world," Sanford said.
Citing examples from corporations such as General Electric, eBay, Dell, Toyota, Southwest, UPS, FedEx, BMW and IBM, Sanford makes a case for business leaders to look outside their own walls for innovation.
"You want to be able to shore up skills and talents around your core capabilities and leverage other skills and talents wherever they reside around the world," Sanford said. "There is no corner of the globe that has the corner on talent anymore."
Sanford said she was influenced by "The World is Flat," the 2005 book by New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman.
On the opening page of Friedman's book, he describes playing golf at a course in Bangalore when a friend urges him to aim his shot at the nearby glass-and-steel buildings of Microsoft and IBM — a scene that illustrates how much major U.S. companies have invested in India.
A central theme in both Friedman's and Sanford's books is how the Internet makes it possible for intellectual tasks to be performed anywhere.
Sanford gives the example of Eli Lilly, which created an innovation center on the Web and posts research and development problems that qualified scientists around the world are invited to solve.
"Pharmaceutical giant as they are, they recognize that they don't necessarily have the corner on innovation," Sanford said.
The 6,000 registered scientists from 125 countries are paid up to $100,000 for their input if they solve the problem.
"The success rate has been far, far higher than the in-house performance and at one-sixth the cost," Sanford said.
Businesses are realizing that it's not desirable or practical to control every aspect of their operations anymore. At one point in time, car makers even mined their own iron ore for steel.
"Clearly, that's not affordable today," Sanford said.
Letting go of control isn't easy. "What is the biggest inhibitor? It's the culture of an organization. Most of us have grown up in the world of command and control. Letting go is not intuitive," Sanford said.
IBM's own transformation from a manufacturer of computers to a purveyor of technological expertise took bringing in an outsider as chairman and chief executive. Louis V. Gerstner Jr. and his successor, Samuel Palmisano, have led IBM's rebirth as the biggest consulting company in the world.
In the process, IBM shed the hard disk drive business it pioneered and sold its PC business to a Chinese manufacturer.
When IBM started outsourcing manufacturing, it was a "shock to the system," Sanford said, but today the philosophy is ingrained.
For example, the company's Global Services arm acts like an outsourcer within IBM.
There used to be 128 chief information officers running the tech support for various departments in IBM, Sanford said. Today, there is just one CIO, and he doesn't even run the data centers, which fall under the purview of Global Services.
In addition, IBM outsources its human resources administration to Fidelity.
"It frees our people in human resources to focus on compensation strategy instead of worrying about administration," she said. "Core to us is talent. We are people-based. We need to be sure that HR focuses on identifying, contacting and retaining talent, so we put the bulk of our resources there."
Sanford doesn't argue for outsourcing as a means to just save money.
Pointing to Amazon.com, which owes at least part of its success to timely delivery of goods by partners such as UPS, Sanford said today's outsourcing deals are all about creating "value webs."
"Outsourcing isn't the point of a value web. I make that distinction because I think it's important. Creating a value web means drawing on the strength of other companies, and letting them draw on your strength. That's different than giving something to someone else because they can do it cheaper," she said.
Sanford acknowledges that an IBM executive writing a book in favor of outsourcing is a bit like Ben & Jerry's writing a book extolling the virtues of eating more ice cream.
"Clearly, we have the experience, we have the skills and we have the capabilities in our consulting services that can help customers," she said. "Yes, I am telling the story and saying, 'We can help you do this.' "
Sanford, one of the highest-ranking women at Big Blue, said she decided to write the book in part because so many customers have asked her to share IBM's own story.
About half of Sanford's time is spent meeting with customers, which means countless hours on airplanes. Sanford traveled about 74,000 miles last year. "I had a lot of time to reflect on what I was seeing and observing around the world," she said.
Sanford said she wrote on weekends, evenings and during vacation time.
She wrote down her thoughts and her collaborator helped make them easy to understand — as well as weeding out those three-letter acronyms beloved by all IBMers.
"Dave was very instrumental in helping me make sure that it made sense to the reader," Sanford said.
Sanford is one of just a handful of IBM executives who have written general interest business books.
• Longtime CEO Thomas J. Watson Jr., son of the company founder, wrote two books, "A Business and Its Beliefs: The Ideas That Helped Build IBM" and "Father, Son & Co.: My Life at IBM and Beyond."
• "Who Says Elephants Can't Dance? Inside IBM's Historic Turnaround" was former chief Gerstner's story of his role leading IBM from the brink of bankruptcy in 1993 to its resurgence when he left in 2002.
• John R. Patrick, a former vice president of Internet technology at IBM, discusses the importance of the Internet in "Net Attitude."
• Ossining resident William J. Holstein, editor-in-chief of Chief Executive Magazine, said Sanford's book will be useful to corporate executives.
"This is one of the core challenges that everybody is wrestling with: What do we do that's really special — which used to be called core competence — versus what can be outsourced," he said.
He said examples of IBM's own transformation are compelling.
"They seem to live what they preach. The fact that they got out of the PC business says that they didn't see an advantage. They are concentrating their energies where they have an advantage, which is in services," he said.
"Obviously, this book is an intellectual basis for people making decisions that over the long term would help IBM's business. There is no question that there is an IBM agenda here. You would expect nothing less," Holstein said.
The trend toward outsourcing, which has received a lot of attention since the 2004 presidential election, is still in the early stages, from Holstein's view.
"It's not over by any stretch of the imagination. This is why her book touches on what I think should be one of the major debates in the country: How do we as Americans move up in the chain to be able to do more sophisticated things that can't be moved to Hyderabad," he said.
To workers alarmed by the thought of their jobs moving to India or elsewhere in the world as companies let go of work that used to be performed in the United States, Sanford says: "We are a country built on entrepreneurship and innovation. If you go back over the centuries, we have constantly come up with the next new innovation. We have to make sure our educational system supports that."
www.thejournalnews.com
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