The Lines are Blurring

My first job in IT landed me at a company in the mid 90's that made fax software. It was, in fact, the first company to make such a product and it was a surprise runaway hit. A surprise mainly because the company's main focus was electronic forms software and the fax software was just the pet project of the lead developer. But I digress...that's not what this post is all about. This post is about is how the line between IT infrastructure and telephony is blurring. You see, I started at this company as a desktop technician and in the department there were also network administrators and telephony people. The telephony folk sometimes mixed with the Wide Area Network folk, but they were definitely different breed than the LAN/desktop people. That was just the way it was. There was a very defined line between the two camps.

So it may be disturbing to some old timers that this line is getting less and less defined, but hopefully to the majority of you, it's an exciting change. Imagine being able to send a message to a person and have that message find the person it's meant for without you, the sender, having to know and send multiple messages to the intended receiver's email, cell phone, work phone and home phone. Unified Communications. It's changing the technology world and how we communicate. It's also changing the IT landscape and the job definitions of a lot of IT professionals.

Join me as I talk with Vicki Mains from CNIB, Tony Rybczynski from Nortel and Erin Elofson from Microsoft Canada about the new role of the IT professional and the opportunities for software-powered telecom solutions. The podcast is available in both MP3 and WMA formats. For more information about this podcast series, check out the IT Manager Podcast web page.

P.S. Think you know what Toronto-based software company I worked at in the mid-90's? Email me your answer and I'll send a copy of Windows Vista Business Edition to the first one to get it right.

P.P.S Need another hint....think flying toaster screen-saver. But enough said - that's not what this post it about!