Month: March 2017

I’ve been banging on now for a couple weeks about using Cost Containment to advance your career. But what exactly is Cost Containment? Is it as simple as spending less money? Must essential services be foregone; customer-pleasing amenities eliminated?

Cost Containment is about providing similar services more cheaply, or additional services for roughly the same amount. Broadly speaking, there are 4 categories of Cost Containment.

• Technology
• Architecture
• Negotiation
• Negative Expenses

We will discuss these categories one by one to better understand how they can work for your network. Continue reading “What is Cost Containment?”

I’ve said it before: the best infrastructure is invisible because you don’t see it until it breaks. Even worse, no one ever expects it to break. Infrastructure is taken for granted; always there, always doing what it should.

When it does break, oh the outrage, the inconvenience. How could it fail at this time, why now?  If you don’t believe it, ask yourself a question. When was the last time you paused in quiet appreciation as fresh, clean water poured from the faucet? How long has it been since you marveled that a room was illuminated the instant you operated the light switch?  How often do you thank your broadband provider when FaceBook floods your Messenger with notifications?

On the other hand, remember how inconvenienced you felt when water service was shut off?  When commercial electric power failed during a storm? When the speed of your Internet speed crawled to a halt? Continue reading “Infrastructure as an Expectation “

It is often said that the best infrastructure is invisible because you don’t even know it is there until it breaks. In Telecoms, it means that the network should simply work without problems and the Technical Team responsible for that network remains behind the scenes, out of view.

For telecom engineers, this approach can have negative consequences. For example, maybe you have done a great job but you never got any recognition. The best boss I ever had, Eddie, felt this was how things were supposed to be. Eddie was always proud, but a little uncomfortable, when his Technical team won awards, which frequently they did, within the company. Eddie was CTO at that time and felt that Engineers belonged in the background, out of sight, dragging their knuckles quietly, certainly not on stage accepting awards in recognition of their outstanding performance. Continue reading “Advance Your Telecom Career with Cost Containment “