IT Week's leader profile

Russell Altendorff is director of the information services division at the London Business School. He manages a team of 80

What does your job entail? Working for a university means that the IT director role is combined with being director in charge of library services. The job is leading and inspiring staff, guiding project governance processes, and maintaining an iron grip on financial control.

What was your first job?
Trainee accountant at Deloitte. I got into IT by being the one who volunteered to do the computer audit of British American Tobacco.

Which IT qualifications have proved most useful? ETP Project Management; Gartner CIO Academy.

Do you use a BlackBerry?
No, I use the Orange E650, which has push email, ActiveSync with Outlook, and the usual Windows Mobile 6 software. It is on all the time, day and night.

Which person do you most admire in the IT industry? Steve Gibson of Gibson Research.

Who is or has been the most influential IT vendor? Dell. Although it has been far from perfect in its service delivery, it has still reduced margins in the desktop, laptop, and now the datacentre, and has enabled a large number of organisations to deploy sophisticated systems, simply by being affordable.

Which technology would you most like to have invented?
Ethernet, but it’s a bit late now.

What has been the most over-hyped technology in the past five years and which will be the most over-hyped of the next year?
For the past five years, Windows in all its flavours and patch regimes. Next year, I would guess it will be Silverlight.

Which recent IT news item do you think will have the biggest impact on your organisation, or the industry in general?
The political insecurity of the western democracies and the real, and perceived, threats against them will increase demands for security in all its forms. But measures designed to increase security will also begin to erode our personal freedoms in the West. This will be one of the greatest challenges for IT professionals this century.