Efm Events

Rob Kosier
IT Director
Hard Rock Hotel & Casino

In this breakout Rob Kosier will share the 18 month journey Hard Rock has taken in a construction project from start to finish.  He will specifically talk about how the construction project was broken down into phases so his team could celebrate the small wins along the way.  Rob will discuss the challenges, communication, and planning processes his team went through to deliver this large project on time without adding additional staff. 

Richard Daley
Director of Records and Information Management
Tejon Ranch Company

Don’t let the practice of putting out fires and dealing with emergency’s become a part of your business practice.  This will erode the relationship with the business long term and create an environment where IT is not viewed as a partner. 

This breakout session will share the journey The Tejon Ranch has taken to change the culture in the IT environment from a short term fix to a long term way of thinking.  Richard Dayley will specifically share how they organized piles of paperwork into an electronic format that will also support compliance laws, audits, and regulations where everything you need for emergencies is only a click away.

Tim Cohick
Lead Network Engineer
MGM MIRAGE

State of the art architecture and technology come together to define a project.  The CityCenter network is truly the lifeblood of the campus that touches each and every aspect of daily operations.  This discussion will focus on all phases of its creation and the opportunities it allows for the business in the future.      

Ron Matteson
Application Manager
Marin County

Until August, 2008, the Marin County Tax Assessment Property Information Systems (TAPIS) ran in a mainframe environment. Two years earlier in September, 2006, Marin County embarked on a journey to "LIFT and SHIFT" the old VSE COBOL, IDEAL and DATACOMM solution to a modern Windows platform.  The successful completion of that effort has allowed Marin County to preserve the highly valued investment in the property tax business systems while at the same time has positioned Marin to take advantage of all the new capabilities available in the Microsoft .NET development environment.

The participants will gain an understanding of a real world experience moving a valued County COBOL asset from a legacy environment to modern platform.  The presenter will share why they did it, what worked, what didn’t, key learnings and where they are taking the systems now.  You’ll understand why a “lift and shift” might be a good, lower risk solution to long term support challenges your department is experiencing.  You’ll hear how some of the mainframe environment problems like spool management,  batch job control and automation were solved in the new server world.  Finally, you’ll see how this can be a step (albeit a big one) in a cycle of continuous improvement for critical applications software.

Ken Shaffer
Director of IT
FBL Financial Group

Cost savings is the # 1 issue CIOs are facing given the current economic downturn.  IT professionals are being challenged by their companies to do “more with less” despite a decreasing budget and a diminishing workforce.  

Answers to these challenges have been found; while adding true dollars to the department’s bottom line.  In this town hall style breakout, we will be discussing how one company has been able to address cost savings by utilizing a third party in their IT procurement processes (i.e. RFP process, contract negotiations and licensing issues).  The addition of a 3rd party negotiator has allowed this organization to focus on running their business and not focus on the challenges of contract negotiations and licensing issues. Through this cost savings initiative, they have been able to add a significant amount of money to the bottom line and also insure a “best in practice” contract that protects them from hidden or unexpected costs in the future. 

One particular project that utilized expert negotiators to assist their team will be discussed.  The project consisted of an RFP, price and contract negotiations for a software purchase. We will also look at ROI and true run rate savings achieved by partnering with this team of expert IT negotiators.