Monthly Archives

December 2019

Dec 06
0

The Power of the Soft Red Bat

By | Blog, Inspiration

Do you struggle with being your own worst critic and judge, like me? Is so, read on and I hope my story can help.

I have struggled with self-judgment for a long time. However, through the help of a personal friend, I recently learned how to visualize what “bat” I should be reaching for in my mind when I beat myself up. Doing this in advance has made it easier for me to reframe my thinking, change my perspective, and improve my own self-acceptance. It’s had such a significant and positive impact on me that I want to share my story with others who may struggle with self-judgment as I have.

If you’ve ever read the popular book The 5 Love Languages then you’ll understand when I say I’m an “acts of kindness” person. Meaning, I share and also derive my strongest feelings of love from doing things for other people, and vice versa. When my friend asked me what I would do for a friend in need, I didn’t hesitate to respond by saying, “anything!”. He then followed up by asking what I would specifically do and I began to ramble on about how I would listen, how I would provide them with compassion, how I would share my own similar experiences, and how I would ask them what they needed from me.

My friend then asked me what I do for myself when I have a need. His question was met with uncomfortable moments of silence, then a dim light bulb in my mind growing brighter and brighter until I said out loud, “F#%&!”.  In that moment that it became apparent that I freely and easily provide to others without any judgment whatsoever, but do the complete opposite with myself.

My friend asked me to close my eyes and imagine a line of baseball bats in front of me. All the way at one end are those big, heavy professional bats. You know the ones — the Louisville Sluggers made out of the hardest ash and hickory. I was asked to scan my eyes down the line of bats and imagine their size and shape growing smaller and smaller. Midway down the line, I had imagined that yellow hollow plastic ball bat from my youth, the one you used to hit that crazy white whiffle ball with the holes punched into it. Now it’s certainly not as tough as the Louisville Slugger, but I’ve got to be honest, it’s still something I wouldn’t want to get hit in the face with because it would still hurt like hell.

My friend encouraged me to continue scanning down the line of bats until I got all the way to the other end. It was here that I was asked to imagine that small, wide, and soft red toy bat — the one you’re comfortable giving to a three-year-old because it’s not going to hurt them. My friend told me to remember which bat I should use when I want to beat myself up.

I wasn’t asked to not beat myself up. That would be impossible! I was just asked to be a little kinder to myself when I do. The soft red bat I imagined in my mind doesn’t hurt anything like the Louisville Slugger that I had been using. The soft red bat made it easier for me to remember that everyone has faults. I now try to think about how I would feel if I were looking at myself from another’s perspective.

As I look at my friends, or if I were looking at myself as I look at a friend. Would I be harsh and unforgiving in my judgment from this different perspective? No, is usually my answer. Is my thinking irrational? Yes, is usually my answer. I now have an easier time of laughing at myself and being self-deprecating in a healthy way, because the reality doesn’t match the perception, and it’s not as bad as I’ve made it out to be. The red bat reminds me…

Oftentimes when I see someone struggling with self-judgment, I share this story. When a friend, colleague, client, mentor or anyone else seems to be unable to stop, I find myself taking a trip to the store, and picking up another squishy, soft red bat for them. Delivering one of these to a professionally employed adult may seem silly, but sometimes having the right tool, in this case, a foam covered Nerf bat, makes the job easier, and having a visual reminder leaned up in the corner of your office reminds you to be kind to yourself too.

While it took me almost 50 years to begin to understand my struggle and the peace that I have found with a new perspective, I share my story in the hope that others may learn sooner to be kind to themselves. Sometimes we want to hit ourselves or others with a Louisville Slugger, and sometimes we need a crack upside the head to sort ourselves out, but the safer, easier and less damaging approach is to pick up the squishy, soft red bat.

What I’ve also learned:

  • Better clarity and control of my thinking
  • Stronger empathy for myself and others who judge
  • Increased feelings of self-worth
  • Greater self-acceptance
  • More peace and happiness with myself

 

Dec 06
0

What’s Driving Your IT Budget in 2020?

By | Blog, Insight

More and more companies are realizing the benefit that technology brings to their growth. No surprise there. And it makes perfect sense that experts predict that 2020 budget levels will keep pace with 2019 levels in spite of economic uncertainty. Technology is that vital.

We took a look at a study conducted by Spiceworks which says that budget drivers vary by company size and location. For example, “a greater priority placed on IT projects” is the top factor influencing IT budget growth in enterprises, likely because large organizations are typically better funded and have more resources to allocate against strategic initiatives than smaller businesses.

Plus, the more you’re managing in terms of data, departments, employee devices to connect, manage and secure, 25% of enterprises are also increasing IT spend due to a recent security incident, compared to only 4% of small businesses.

Across all company sizes surveyed in that study, budget highlights within each category include:

  • In hardware, budget allocations for laptops (17 percent), desktops (17 percent), servers (14 percent), and networking (8 percent) hardware top the list.
  • Top software budget allocations include operating systems (13 percent), industry-specific applications (11 percent), productivity suites (10 percent), and virtualization software (10 percent).
  • In hosted/cloud-based services, budget allocations for online productivity solutions (14 percent) top the list, followed by online backup/recovery (12 percent) and email hosting (10 percent).
  • Top budget allocations in managed IT services include managed hosting (13 percent), managed hardware support (11 percent), and managed storage/backup (11 percent).

 

So, what should you consider when developing your IT budget for 2020? What drivers should you pay attention to and which can you pass over this year? The critical thing to remember is that you should fund based on your company’s situation and not just do a cookie-cutter solution that may not fully support your strategic plans.

We’ve identified some components that we think are critical and should be considered when determining an IT budget:

Strategic objectives

One thing that we know is that the IT department plays a big role in reaching the strategic objectives of a company. It used to be that IT-supported whatever was defined as a goal of the business. Not that supporting the business was a lightweight effort, but executives are finally realizing that technology can be put to better use. Now technology and digital initiatives are at the forefront of company growth. Savvy business leaders understand the importance of IT as a growth leader and rely on the CIO and other tech leaders to take an active role in strategic business initiatives.

But before any growth heroics can occur, it’s important to define what you will need to accomplish regarding customer requirements and other objectives as they relate to business growth. For example, the IT budget may have to accommodate upgrades to meet critical objectives in the new year. At Calyx, we challenge everything, especially when it comes to customer growth. We’re not satisfied until strategies align with budgets because it’s only when viewing IT as an asset—not an expense—that businesses can accomplish growth objectives.

Technology lifecycles

The very nature of technology creates the need for change and updating on a regular schedule. That’s pretty much a fact of IT life. The average lifespan for a desktop computer is only three to five years. Servers start to decline in performance after about five years.

And you know this from personal experience—wireless devices have the shortest life spans of all at approximately 18 months. So when determining your 2020 IT budget, it’s a good idea to document each IT asset with its age so that you can project a replacement date and plan accordingly.

Current IT infrastructure and assets

What infrastructure is in place at your company today? What assets do you own? We’re talking hardware, software, servers, printers, network infrastructure, phone systems, mobile, desktop and other devices. Identifying your IT assets will help you develop an appropriate budget by listing everything at the beginning.

Keeping infrastructure current is projected to be the biggest IT challenge for companies in 2020. Businesses will need to address security best practices as well as incorporating a blend of onsite infrastructure and cloud-based services.

From our perspective, company size will also affect budgets for 2020. Small businesses will face security issues and disaster recovery solutions while large enterprises will be challenged when integrating technology innovations into their current tech environment.

Projected revenue

Any budget within the enterprise is contingent upon current and projected revenue for the business. No more, no less. Your IT budget will be contingent upon how much revenue is coming in today and how much is projected for 2020. Makes sense. But you need to account for the state of your revenue. If your business is in a rapid growth phase, you might have to increase normal funding to make sure your infrastructure can handle all the demands you’re going to place on it.

Experts predict that a large number of organizations will direct most of their 2020 budgets toward security and cloud initiatives. We agree that those are critical. But it’s also important to allocate portions of budgets to mobile initiatives, infrastructure upgrades, digitalization and staff training.

What’s our advice on what should drive your 2020 budget? Know your organization. What are your strategic plans for the new year? Be honest about the current state of your infrastructure. There’s nothing worse than not being able to support—let alone drive—business initiatives. But above all, stay strong on recommendations and continue to monitor IT support to grow your business.