text:
Steps to Cut your Software Spend by 30 Percent
16 août 2017
Todd Labrum | ITAM Product Manager | Ivanti
Mark Devereux | Product Manager | Ivanti
It's time for a total asset management makeover. Making the most out of hardware and software assets is a challenge every business faces. On average, businesses only utilize 35-38 percent of the software they pay for. Inefficiencies swirl around hardware assets as well.
Join this 60-minute webinar to learn helpful tricks that help maximize the performance and value of your IT assets.
Todd: Okay. Good morning and good afternoon wherever you may be or even good evening. I welcome you to the webinar that we have for you today. We are going to cover "Steps to Help Cut Your Software Spend by 30 Percent." You have myself which is Todd Labrum. I'm an ITAM Product Manager at Ivanti. And then we also have, instead of Mark Devereux, that's what it said, he actually had another engagement to attend to. We have another individual by the name of Jonathan Sims. He's one of our SAM consultants and he's a great person to work with and a definite expert when it comes to IBM and even other vendors. Hey, Jon, I mean, just like to walk me today and could you say hello or introduce yourself?
Jonathan: Thank you, Todd. Hello, everyone. Yes, I spent the last three or four years within software asset management, doing a range of roles from consultancy to software licensing. And now it's just working with manage service customers, clients, and contracts as well.
Todd: Awesome. I'm glad to have you and as I said, I've been able to work with Jon over, actually just had a couple of months. And it's been a great time learning from him and having him be a part of the team. He's an employee here at Ivanti and based over in the U.K. So, it's been fun, as I said, to have him be a part of the team and continue to see what we're doing and moving forward. And we hope that you're able to learn what you can do today as you mentioned, back to the title, how you can cut your software spend? That's actually a stat that came from Gartner that you provide a couple of ways to go through and achieve that, and so have we in this presentation.
But before we do that, I would like us to go over the outline in what we're gonna be covering today. So, first thing is just to go through an introduction of what software asset management is? The reason I'm doing that is quite often when I'm talking with customers, they still aren't as familiar with software asset management or what it is, or what the practice is, you know, what you're trying to achieve. And so I'm going to cover that and we'll have Jonathan Sims help provide a look into License Optimizer. That is the tool that we have here at Ivanti to help customers understand what's going on with their software state. And then with that we will get to the tips and tricks on what you can do to reduce your software spend.
And lastly, I'll cover up with looking at, is this for real? I mean, that song is coming to mind when I say that. But really looking at an example and really the savings that our existing customers have already saved by using License Optimizer and going through those tips and tricks. And then just ending up with the summary. So, glad to have everybody on the webinar today and thanks for your time. And we'll definitely make sure we make great use of it. By all means, if you have any questions, please provide them in the chat window or the Q&A section on the webinar. We'll be looking at those and hopefully be able to answer those throughout the presentation. So, thank you. Let's go ahead and get started.
So, when we talk about software asset management, again as I'm looking at Gartner. Everybody loves our favorite analyst firm, right? Going through, really what it comes down to it is just a process for making software acquisition and disposal decisions. In all honesty, that's about it. So, how are you going about and purchasing software? How are you going about and seeing if what needs you have in the environment? What needs should the business have when it comes to what type of software to run efficiently or to really do their roles and be able to achieve what they want? But because it's so complex, organizations end up spending too much time and too much money on software and where they shouldn't be.
And that's why we're coming back into this. It's not more of a process of what can I do to optimize my software state? But maybe another reason is well, why? Why is this all important? There's always the security threats, right? So you wanna make sure you're going with software that's always secure an up to date, has a great release plan if you look at it from a security perspective that they're always keeping software patched. And covered from those exposures that come from a security perspective. Other reasons why, it might be a software audit. So vendors, because of the complexity of software and software licenses, and how they're actually calculated for that compliance perspective, they're coming in and auditing their customers.
And because of those audits, if customers are not using software in the right way, they are gonna get fined and that is expensive. That's yet another security risk is going on, right? So, when we talk about compliance, it's making sure you purchase the right software and using it in the right way. And if you're not, that's where those audits come in and those audits are painful. Not only the financial side of things that you get fined or the true-up that comes from it, but the time. If you aren't doing everything right, you're wasting a lot of time in responding to those audits.
The other issues that you might have are shadow IT. So, this is where any end user and in all honesty and I guess I've done this. And so as I'm sure most or everybody out there on this webinar, we go through and purchase software because we want to get going. We know what we want to use and we say, "Hey, I'm familiar with this software tool. I'm gonna go ahead and start using it and purchase it myself," and it may be expensive. Well, maybe it's a good thing but maybe it's not, right? So, when we talk about that shadow IT, that's something that the IT team isn't aware of and it's not being tracked. Other things are understanding the software lifecycle and refresh dates. So I wanna understand when software is no longer supported, especially when you look at maybe operating systems.
We always talk about quite often your XP back to you WannaCrypt, right, where that one is an older version of an operating system that wasn't probably kept up to date or patched. And there was some definite people out there that found an opportunity to expose an issue in it. So, being aware of an actual lifecycle and refresh is important. If other companies had already been able to update and upgrade, you know, to the latest patch or to a newer version, they wouldn't have that security threat. But because of all the complexity, another thing that we see quite often is overspending. Organizations are spending so much money on software and they're buying more than they need because of a fear of an audit or fear of being out of compliance.
So, again, you have those fines or true-ups, right? So, there's a lot of factors that go into why software asset management is important in making sure you have a program out there to effectively manage how you're buying and using software. Really to prove the points, we're looking at a few stats here. Back to what I was just talking about for overspends, we actually see 76% of organizations admit to spending or buying more licenses than needed because they have a fear of an audit. They don't wanna be found to be out of compliance. Some other issues that go on or other pains that might be in an environment is, well, how do you actually know what you have?
There's 50% of organizations that have 12 or more discovery tools. So, you might have discovery tools for Apple if you're thinking of like a jump, right? So, they're pretty great at Apple discovering Mac and being able to manage those. But what about Windows? What about Linux? What about Unix? What about the data center? What about IBM? What about Oracle? So, because of that complexity and all the different varieties that are out there, organizations will most often have several discovery tools. And again, you look at the lower part of that stat on the left hand side it says, 11% of organizations have more than 30 tools. So, well, why do I bring that up?
It might be important to have those tools but how are you dealing with that data? And that's where you look at the stat on the right. Again, when we're looking at having to make sure you have the right data at the right time, and it's the right level of accuracy that you need. If you don't you're gonna be wasting time resolving data accuracy issues. So, are you willing to spend additional manpower or time addressing those issues? Again, on the bottom, when you look at the software license complexity, just talking about the complexity in general. This is not what you're looking at, what is being used or what you're purchasing, but just the license complexity indirectly costs organization an average of 25% of their software license budgets, because they don't understand it.
Again, they don't realize that you can actually go through and negotiate better terms and conditions. You can actually navigate that complexity to get into better positions for you as an organization with whatever software you have against whatever vendor, whether it's IBM, again Microsoft, Oracle, Adobe, VMware, the list goes on.
So, quality had gone through unaddressed but the pains and what's really causing a lot of the SAM to rise up for that conversation or maybe initiative or objectives. The other reason behind it is the returns again, as we talk about overspend, as we talk about even understanding the usage of that software in the environment. Organizations can see a reduction in software spend because of implementing a SAM process.
So, I'm not even talking about a tool, a process that end…and it's as an end tool though. You can save up to 30% off your software spend. Other stats that we looked at is managing software can also lead to real cost savings. So, not only is looking at implementing a SAM process that helps you identify what you can reduce in software spend. If you continue to manage it, you can still lead to real cost savings by as much as 25%. Again, that's what ITAM or software asset management is all about. Again, the lowest, I mean that bottom stat talking about what type of return you can see or expect if you were to implement an ITAM program where you're helping manage the vendors and contracts that you can cut costs by as much as 25% to 50%.
So, who wouldn't want to get on that, right? So, I hope that's reiterating a fact. You're probably already aware of that and now you're saying, "Oh, yeah. We already know all this." So, what do you do next, right? So, the first thing I want to go at, to explain and explore as well, you have to get an understanding of what you have in the first place, back to those discovery tools. So that's only one step of it. So, when we talk about what do you have, what physical assets do you have? Which ones are on the network but also which ones are in the cages or in your storage rooms? Those are assets or even devices where software is installed and you are still liable for them. So, you have to understand what's not only on the network which is what usually discovery tools can find but you're gonna have to go through and do a physical audit of each location and identify all those and find those assets or devices that have software on them. And once you do that, you're now hopefully able to then track well, where is it now? And being able to stay on top of it from that point on. What licenses do you have? Who is it assigned to help identify where it's at? Who is it that actually owns that device or that software? What's its current status? What's the lifecycle? Is that something that I just recently purchased? Or is it nearing the end of its lifecycle? Well, what about contract renewals? What about license expirations? Can you actually understand its history? What about license upgrades, are you all eligible for those?
What about downgrades? You look at, well, how is it actually performing for you? Are you going through and doing product rationalization? You might have a lot of software that overlaps each other. As funny as this may sound talking about it, there's a customer I was just visiting a couple of weeks ago and they have Corel in their environment. I know everybody makes fun of that, right, when we're talking about Quattro or anything in fact to what might that used. And he actually still has it on his computer. I just noticed that even a month ago, too. But so, he has not only Microsoft Word and Excel, he also has Corel. Why? They do the same thing. So, let's go back and we talked about product rationalization and overspending. So it's an opportunity to save money. But if you don't know what you have, how can you see what products or software is actually being used in the environment?
And finally in the end, what is it costing you? And being able to see that. Again, just to reiterate what all these questions are for, you can't manage what you can't see. So, again, going back to you need to discover and find what you have on the network and off the network. You are liable for both.
So, the three components that we always need or in understanding even a compliance position that goes for both ITAM and SAM, I mean you need to have, I just talked about the physical asset or information. So, understanding what you purchased, where is it at right now, whether it's physical device, whether it's, you know, a VM or a virtual environment and what software is on those? What does that environment look like?
The second piece is the financial data. So, this is really that proof of purchase if you will of where you acquired those licenses or where you acquired those devices. That is important and many organizations are not tracking that well. If not, that's where you're running to issues with vendors when they go through a software audit. And again, going back to that, we talk about the contractual side, right? What contracts do you have in place with Microsoft? Do you have an EA agreement? Is there SA on the licenses they purchased? That entitles you to software and how you can use it. If you're not aware of those contracts then you're again wasting money or wasting opportunities. Well, what if you do have a contract in place, how can you now negotiate a better terms and conditions with them?
So, when we look at it, the next step is really to start to get to that vendor visibility and integration. There is information everywhere, right? We talked about discovery tools, you have other data sources. Whether it's even being stored in spreadsheets. I will say quite often, if not maybe 70% of organizations I've talked to are tracking their apps, it's within a spreadsheet. So, realizing data is everywhere, whether it's coming from applications themselves. So what is the usage of the application? How many people have it installed on their machines? Going to the virtual side, well, what does my not only physical environment look like but am I using virtualization on top of that? Is there clustering? That's important for certain software licenses.
Back to the HR and finance, grabbing information from them to see what, again, what assets we purchased with…whether it's tracked through our financial software or even active directory is a great source of information. So, being able to get that data from all these different sources is important. Another great source of data is from the vendors themselves or if you have a reseller, if you're working with CDW or SHI or Insight or OnPoint or Softcutter. So, the list goes on and on with that one, right? But you need to have that visibility and then integration to make sense of what you own. And that's where we have Ivanti at the center. So, as we look at this, what data… So I've kinda covered all these different types of data sources but there's even a different set of data.
On the left hand side of the screen, you'll see that there's discovery and entitlement. So, discovery, this deals with what's actually installed and what's in use in your environment. This is where those discovery tools come into play. But again, I will say you have to be aware of also devices that aren't on the network. It is what your state looks like. So, we need both hardware, software, virtualization, utilization. That is discovery data.
The second set of data is entitlement, so what contracts do you have with your vendors? What licenses have you purchased? Do you have maintenance? Do you have expirations? What are the subscriptions? All of that's important on that second set of data.
We need to understand both of those as they come into this center here to go through a process that we call normalization and reconciliation. This is the magic sauce that everybody talks about, right? This is what is happening behind the scenes and this is what SAM tools will do. They have an extensive library to understand how we pair both sets of those data together to generate what's called a compliance position. Well, ultimately, you want to go through and make sure it's an optimized licensed position or even an optimized compliance position. That is what you're trying to achieve and that is what we will cover for the rest of this webinar, is how do you get there? What are the steps and the tips and tricks that you take to get to that optimized position?
So, behind the scenes, just talking about how that works. We have licensing experts, we have one on the call with us and that's why it's often...and thanks, Jon, again for being able to be on this webinar and we'll hear from you in just a short and just a little bit. But you need those people to understand that complexity. So, then convert that understanding and to tune what we have in that center, that powerful engine that make sense of everything in the environment that you continue to add that expertise there. Most organizations are not able to replicate or even purchase. Those individuals are expensive. If you're looking for a new job, I would suggest that's one way you can go.
If you're looking to say, "Okay, hey, where can I go or how can I improve my career?" Well, if you wanna become a licensed expert for SAP, for Adobe, for IBM, for Oracle, you can make pretty good money on that, right? So, talking about that complexity. If you want to start somewhere, start there. Even Microsoft is a good one side to understand. And then overtime, we have to make sure you do a continual tuning of that engine to make sure it's up to date. So, for example, Microsoft changed their licensing around the SQL Server. Well, you have to make sure that it's always up to date, so that's what we talked about with continual tuning.
So, enough of me talking about that. We'll go over to the benefits and then we'll hear from Jon right after this one.
So well, again, back to the why. Well, with this, if you go through a process and then a tool, you'll help to generate accurate information. It will be complete, consistent, and you can be confident about that data where you can present it to not only your executive team but even to those software vendors. And if they were to submit that audit notification letter, you can say, "Hey, I already got a tool, I already know where I'm at. Here's the data, here you go." And at that point, they see that and they do learn to…and then they've been trusting us as we've gone through that with some of our existing customers, they will not come to you and audit you as often as anymore, because they realized that you're on top of it.
So, that's where you're starting to get into that efficiency, right? And in that last piece. So, there's some great benefits that you have with this. So, as I said enough of me speaking. I'm sure you guys are wanting to hear a little different and actually get a peek at License Optimizer. So, for this one, I'm actually gonna turn the time over to Jonathan Sims. And make him presenter real fast so he can share his screen. We are going to go through a live demo. So we'll see how that goes and we do have a backup in case we need it. But, Jon is gonna go ahead and take us through a quick sneak peek at License Optimizer.
Jonathan: Hello, everyone. Thanks, Todd. So, Todd's been through a few items there. This is part of his webinar. At its simplest, a reconciliation is a comparison of the entitlement that you own, the software licenses versus the liability, the installs, the usage, the utilization that you've got out and your state. And what you're able to do with License Optimizer is you're able to see very quickly and easily, of course, your whole state, all of your licensed positions. And what we're looking at here is what we call the basic view of a reconciliation. It's the data summary vendor overview and we are seeing the compliance, this is demo data, compliance for software that's listed alphabetically. You'll recognize some of these software vendors.
And you can see some key information about your compliance for those vendors and shortfall and surplus and exposure. And I'll explain those in a little bit more detail. So, being sorted by vendor name is very useful. But we might be more interested in the compliance. So, it's the percentage compliance of your licenses versus your liabilities. And what we can see here is the ones that are least compliant. And you can see, as you go further down the list, the compliance, when we get a bit further down, I promise you, the compliance will increase. There we go. And you can see, some of these are 100% compliant. But compliance in itself isn't that important either. So, it's important to be compliant.
Definitely not going to take that away from you but if you were compliant or noncompliant and you don't have enough licenses to cover the liability you got out in your estate. And the noncompliance relates to quite a small amount financially then you're probably not going to spend as much effort into addressing that noncompliant as you should be applying against a bigger exposure, what we call an exposure. An exposure is the costed liability of a shortfall. So, this is where you don't have sufficient licenses. And then in this example here, this is a dummy example where we have a shortfall of five licenses and the exposure is coming at 131.26 pounds, not a great deal.
However, if we are looking at our biggest exposures, we can sort that exposure and we can see straight away that our biggest exposure is for IBM and for Microsoft. And those are quite large exposures, we're talking over five million and over three million. But we may want to dig a little bit deeper into those exposures and we can see where those exposures are coming from. So, if we look at Microsoft and we drill down into the Microsoft tile, we can see the products and we can sort those by exposure as well. And in this case, we can see that our biggest exposures as you might guess, are around Windows Server and SQL Server. And if we wanted to, we can drill down again and we can sort by the exposure we can see our biggest exposure in SQL Server is for SQL Server 2000 Standard. And there's an exposure there of almost three quarter of a million pounds.
If we drill down again, then we can see the metrics involved. And at this point, License Optimizer starts to recommend how you might address these exposures and shortfalls. And if we wanted to drill down further still, then you would be able to see the business units that are associated with those exposures or, in this case, the actual servers, the OSIs that relate to that exposure. So, you can see those are licensed and those that are not.
The other thing that we're gonna focus on in the webinar today and Todd will come back to this a bit later is we can actually look at surplus licenses.
The surplus licenses are those that you're not using. There may be a reason that you're not using those. The product may have been retired. It may be that the licenses that you purchased cannot be used in certain business units or certain companies that sit within your organization and you have an issue there. I mean in those cases, you could potentially look at using those licenses elsewhere within your organization if you can identify those surpluses. Again, in those cases, we can sort by surplus and we can identify those vendors. And again we can drill down and see the products and the versions and the additions, the metrics where the surplus licenses are and we can identify those.
The software asset management isn't just about a one-off reconciliation. It's not about looking at where you are now and then going off and dealing with that. But it's about an intuitive process, it's about having a process in place and it's about managing. And managing implies that you do that over a period of time. But the other thing that I want to show you today within License Optimizer is the dashboard area of License Optimizer. We have a look at this standard dashboard first, but what you'll see within the dashboard or is you'll see every reconciliation that's been run in this summary environment. So, for each reconciliation that's been run those are data points and we can see there is a compliance trend that's been built up across the data points with these dates.
We also have the liability cost trend and we have other tiles that tell us our current compliance, our current exposure, and expiring [inaudible 00:26:20] that we have within the next 90 days. You can have OSI CAN information and you can also have other tiles that can add value in business information to many people within your organization. These dashboards can be customized and so if we have a look at a different view, we have a dashboard set up here for the CIA. There are a wide range of tiles to choose from and these tiles can be displayed in a number of different ways depending on what view you want. But we're gonna stick with this one and we're just gonna have a look at the ability to drill down and see the information that sits behind this.
So, License Optimizer retains all of these information. If we click on one of these tiles, then we get down to the actual data. This is the data that sits underneath that tile. We can click on the analyzer tab to choose two points on that compliance trend and we can analyze what's happened between those two points. And what License Optimizer is doing is it's going back now, it's reviewing the data and it's analyzing what changed between those two points in time to see such an increase in compliance. When that loads, you'll be able to see the estimated impact for each of these changes. But the data is always held and can always be referenced and you can actually look at the details of these hardware entitlement records.
If you could on one of these then a pane will appear here on the right hand side. And you'll be able to see the actual data that's contributed to that. But in the compliance trend, the dashboard is another area that's just worth pointing out to you as well and that's the ability to forecast compliance. So, within these slides, you're able to add a forecast position with forecast factors which will allow you to project what your compliance will be over time. And what you're able to do is identify the forecasting factors which is appropriate for your organization and use those to plot the liability that you're expecting to see in the future with your compliance, surplus, shortfall, etc. and map those on there.
And the more reconciliations that you do, what you'll find is that License Optimizer gets better at predicting what's gonna happen. So, you'll see that that forecasting line will gradually improve along with the compliance. That would be the overview of License Optimizer. I'm just gonna hand back to Todd now.
Todd: No, perfect. Thank you so much, Jon, for going through that. And I hope you guys have seen everything even though it was a brief demo. That is some great powerful tools that you have at your hands to understand really what's going on in your software state. So, when we start to look at these tips and tricks, he's actually gone through and shown a lot of those areas as mentioned. So, what we'll try to do is refer it and when we go through these tips and tricks, refer back to... Do you remember seeing this on the screen? This is what you would do on that. If I go back into mine, sorry, click into here. So, the tip number one for me, when we look at it and when I talk to customers it's you need to get visibility. No more spreadsheets, they don't cut it.
And that's where I'm at again, I'm always amazed at how many people are doing software asset management and license tracking through spreadsheets. You do not get the benefits of really understanding those downgrades, those upgrades. Your entitlement if you have SAs, if you have an EA with Microsoft. You do not have the ability to really get into the detail you need with the spreadsheet. So, that's my tip number one. I'm sorry, and I mean that just coming from us saying because we have a tool, but I really am saying that for your benefit. Again, I can't tell you how much companies are doing and wasting time and money because they're doing it through a spreadsheet.
The next step to get that visibility is understand what you're spending by vendor. That is actually quite hard for a lot of organizations to gather. But oh, it's like where again are those entitlements happening? Who's making those purchases for the software? You need to probably introduce a process in place to say that all software purchases must come through a centralized procurement model if you will. But that's one step to start to get that visibility into how much you're spending by vendor. The next step is now looking at well, what's actually in your environment and how is that software being used? Not all discovery tools will give you that detailed usage data. Again, that's important because you might not need as much software as you or as many licenses as installations because not everybody is using that software.
Why are they having it installed if they're not even using it? Just being aware of that and I'll get to that as another tip, but you need to get detailed information. From that information, you'll need to start and calculate that current compliance position. Back to it, Jon showed in that dashboard. You have that tile which tells you what your current compliance position is at this date in time. But even understanding your history as you mentioned. Understanding where it might go in the future. You need to be able to track and actually calculate that compliance position. If not, you have no clue where to go next. And that's where I'll get to maybe my second tip.
So, once you've generated that compliance position, and within again the License Optimizer and, Jon, I mean I'll go back into the demo on this one but you had talked about the surplus, right? Even from License Optimizer, we're able to detect, you have a surplus of licenses. Is that correct?
Jonathan: That's absolutely what I taught, yes. The surplus licenses are a really good point to start at because effectively, those licenses, our licenses aren't used in a reconciliation. And it's really important to understand why they are being used. Either because the product is no longer in use, and if that's the case, are you still paying maintenance on that product? In which case, there is a significant savings straight away. If it's because their licenses can't be used within the certain business unit or there is no install with that product within the business unit, then again that's something where you can look at addressing possibly exposure or shortfall in other areas of your business with those licenses. And that could be a simple call to the vendor to say, "We want to be able to use the licenses elsewhere, that is we're not using them within that company or that business unit now."
Todd: Awesome. And what can you do? So, you talked about discontinuing maintenance on licenses you no longer need. Great first place to start for saving money. Can you or have you are familiar with being able to resell any of those unused licenses? I'm just wondering.
Jonathan: So some of our clients have done. It's not [inaudible 00:33:51] on behalf of our clients but yeah, absolutely. The key point is, and it goes back to that comment you made earlier, you can't manage what you can't see. So, you can resell it but only if you know about it.
Todd: Yeah, right. And that's something that many organizations aren't aware of. I've brought up an example of a company that does this, where you can actually go on to their website, it's called usedsoft.com. And you can go ahead and you can actually even purchase some of those used softwares like your eBay if you will but for software. So, you can start to actually get money back, you can sell unused licenses to them. They'll then take those and then resell them to other companies or individuals that are looking for them. So, you can actually make some money or get some money back by doing that. Many organizations aren't aware that that's possible.
I do know that there are certain limitations within that or which types of licenses can be resold. So, be aware of that. There is information out there. If you look at it, I know on the Europe or in the NIA, the EU has gone through and provided some rulings on it. Not as much here in the US yet but there would be as much of the same type of arguments if you will. But just be aware of it is... Yeah, go for it.
Jonathan: Sorry. Also worth noting that if you got software that you haven't used, when you get into renew a situation with the vendor, then if you know about that puts you in the position of strength and you can give that back and maybe look at changing that software for other software that you know that you do need or are going to use in the future.
Todd: Awesome, that's actually one I've never heard of. So, being able to do a swap is what it sounds like. Is that the take to knowing what it is?
Jonathan: Yeah, that does happen with a lot of large vendors, yeah.
Todd: Awesome, so there you go. Yet another way to save money. And then lastly, looking at rationalization, right? This goes back to my example with that customer and I are laughing because my dad, I don't know why he's stuck on Corel but I find it funny. Either way, you wanna make sure you rationalize your application once you have that visibility. Because now you can start to see where there's an overlap. I mean you could talk about even data storage applications. So, if using a Dropbox or Google Drive or Microsoft One Drive or, my goodness, you can go through one of those, right? So, why do you have all those places to store information. See about only saying this is for our organization, this is the one that we're gonna support and use going forward. That helps to limit who you're not only working with and those extra licenses and expense for the same type of applications. But man, it's just a great way to get efficiency within that organization.
Jonathan: It has a big impact on maintenance as well because you're not paying lots of different maintenance contracts.
Todd: Exactly, so just think about that. The cost of the maintenance contract and just the volume of them if you will or the variety for the different vendors. So, tip number three. This is one, another great place to start. But again, if you don't have that visibility, you have no clue how to do this. So, when you start to look at the software that's installed, how is it being used? Maybe what you could do is introduce a nice software usage policy. And when I talk about this policy, I'm saying, okay, say for instance and I don't say I'm a culprit in for all the software that I have installed in my machine, everybody is. Can you guys go through, think to yourself. You know, I say that you've actually used every single software product that's installed in your machine at least once within the past year?
Can you actually say that for 100% of those product title or the installations that you have? Maybe I guess I'm not a betty man but I would bet on this one that you probably can't, right? So, for me, when you start to talk about introducing a software usage policy within an organization, you say, "Okay, for any application that goes unused for 90 days, for 120 days," whatever that time frame may be, "we are going to and we have the right to automatically uninstall that software from your machine." Now, I will say, one of the people say, "Well, hey, but what if I need it in the future, not to go back through and request or install it?" There is a way to go around that and that's actually at the very bottom of this list, is you're gonna actually implement a software catalog to reinstall it. And say, "Yup, you're still approved to use it and install it. Go have at it but we're gonna try to limit what software is installed on our machine so that we can keep those costs down for those licenses." So, you're introducing...
Jonathan: In your mind, while the person isn't using this software, that license maybe something that can be used by somebody else within the organization that doesn't want to use it in the next few months.
Todd: Exactly, and so that's where you're starting to get to that. You reduce the liability, you reduce how much you're spending. And you're getting to a certain level where you found, "Okay, here's the just right enough licenses to have on hand." for what Jon just mentioned. And you get to the optimized level and that's what you're looking to do. So, as you introduce those policies then you go through and identify it as what we've been talking about, and then you uninstall it. There's no reason why they should have it if they're not using it. As part of that, you could implement a software reclamation policy per product if you want and that can be automated. A great way to save time and money.
And then as I mentioned, still allowing access to reinstall it if needs be, you know, at a future time with that employee ended up needing that software again. So, those are some great tips when we talk about looking at unused software. So, we talked about surplus, that's when you just purchased too much. You now reduce that amount and now you're looking at the other end. Well, maybe I didn't need that much to begin with and that's where you look at the unused. So, again, you reduce it even further there. On the next tip and this is maybe one thing that most companies or organizations are aware of is that you start to understand the installations, the usage, and how you're licensed.
But you can focus either on now volume discounts, that is what my hope is, right, as you start to consolidate your contract and applications to the handle of vendors. You can start to benefit from volume discounts. But not only that, looking at that third one, you can negotiate better terms and conditions. This is something those organizations don't do. And there's great benefit in doing that. I've been trying to think and Jon is hopefully on the spot, but this is something that we, I mean done for someone, help I guess if you will with some of our existing customers. We can't do it for them but we can probably provide them in the right direction, is that correct?
Jonathan: Absolutely, yeah. We've done a lot of work with existing customers and numbers of existing customers to help them prepare for that next renew. And it's something that needs to be built into organization's processes. It's important that we've been able to go at and consult with them and help them to identify what that process is in, put it in as well as actually doing the work for themselves. And it's always a real opportunity for organizations to put themselves in the position of strength when they negotiate with their vendor. With a software audit, we can sometimes be a difficult situation to be in where perhaps you feel as though you're unprepared for that audit coming in.
With the right processes and policies in place, and a software asset management tool, you can be prepared for that. And I assume in a way with the renewal, you can always be prepared for that renewal. You can go into a renewal situation with all of the knowledge that you have about your state and also about your usage for the future. So, I mentioned the ability within License Optimizer to forecast. And as you saw within the dashboards, as you build up the number of reconciliations that you do over a period of time, you can see what's happening with, for example, your usage of products. So, you may see that your product usage is increasing for Office 365.
You may know about a future scenario where you're gonna be recruiting more people or bringing in, purchasing another company and add into your organization. And the other thing that License Optimizer were able to do is run a scenario mapping. So, scenario mapping gives you the opportunity to imagine what life would be like after an IT change that you're claiming to make. And with that sort of foresight knowledge, you can generate a great deal of business information that can put you in a really good position for a vendor renewal. Because you're able to tell them exactly what you're using now but also understand what you're going to be using in the next 12 months, 24 months, 36 months. However, only in the next renewal and the software support and maintenance that goes with that might be.
Todd: That's awesome. So, again, great tip and great opportunities here for hopefully many of you on this call. Then hopefully you're learning something now a few tips and tricks. And just maybe the possibilities that are out there, especially when we're talking about negotiating. I know for us here at Ivanti, talking with our IT team, that last book was just an example that I have with the Microsoft Office. We were, I would say strongly guided, forced, no, whatever word you wanna use when it came to saying, "No, every single employee within your organization used to have an Office 365 ET license." For those that aren't familiar with how Office 365 is, they have various subscriptions with different products included or I would say capabilities of how the product is delivered.
So, an E1 is like an online only version of the Microsoft Office suite or the E3 is both online and you can then install it on up to five devices and five mobile devices. So, anyway, because we didn't have the information available, we were forced to pay for an E3 subscription for every single employee in the company. Now, not everyone needed that type of subscription, not everyone needed the installable version. But we had no profiles to prove to Microsoft that, "Hey, these users only need the online version." And therefore, the smaller cost, right? And so that was something I was working with their IT team on and I believe with our next true up, we're able to be in a position to say, "Hey, Microsoft. We don't need this many E3 licenses anymore. Here's the mix of profiles that we have and here's how many of each we need."
So, back to negotiating better terms and conditions with Microsoft on that. And then lastly, we're looking more at maybe time efficiency is really the last tip that we have. Once you've gone through, those others all deal with the software state, the spend, so it's more of us. I know it's not physical but I wanna put my air quote there and talk about its physical. Something you can actually track a little bit easier for an ROI. Now, tip number five, when we talk about time efficiency, that is a little bit harder to track but is nonetheless still valuable. So, when we talk about that, using a tool will help you get that efficiency you need because software is complex. If you're doing it again through spreadsheets, you're not gonna get there.
There, again, another company I visited with, I would say there is one individual who is a member of the ITAM team. And I will say he mentioned 90% of his time is spent in Excel. That's dealing with data again and understanding software and that complexity and everything. Ninety percent of his time was doing that, so why? Right? It comes back down to that question. You can implement that software portal as we already talked about that helps to facilitate the ease of software request and installation. They can automate that. There should be no reason why you can't. Another one I tell you about is for responses, we do have a whitepaper on this when we talk about audits.
The time it takes to respond to an audit, I don't remember the stat but I want to say it's around 190 hours. You look at that is a law of time for an IT team to respond to an audit. So, as you start to implement a tool and to get the data on hand, readily available, you also can introduce another process into that place of here is how we're going to respond to the audit. I'm gonna create an audit response team. Here's the steps that we have to go through and respond to that audit. And, again, that is exactly another, I don't know if we did a webinar, I can't remember that. It was maybe a year or so ago. There is a blog I wrote on that and we do have a whitepaper. So, looking at what are the ten steps to respond to an audit. Making sure you just have that in place.
Even having that in place will help you be more efficient than not having it. Other options available, if you just do not have the time or resources to do this, you can outsource. There are a lot of companies out there that do this through managed surpluses. I know that's what I guess we are doing and that's why we have Jonathan Sims on the call. He actually works with a couple of our customers. And we are managing the software state for them. So, that is a great way to make sure that at least you're getting that efficiency but maybe also utilizing resources that you might not have access to or that expertise to understand well, how to do all these. So, that is the last tip. I mean, Jonathan, last thing. I'm just wondering from your perspective, is there anything else you would add to these?
Jonathan: I think just to reiterate some of the points that we've made earlier on actually in terms of the savings that Gartner said that you can make by implementing process and having a tool. The process itself is obviously very important. But as you've said, software is complex, particularly in the data center. And that complexity can lead to a lot of risk around exposure, where you don't have enough licenses to cover what you've got installed out there. But it can also lead to those surplus licenses, where you're over-licensing, you're buying more licenses than you need. And as Todd has said, Excel just isn't going to cut it. It's going to take a lot more time and effort to use Excel to gather all of the data that you need and then work at your license positions.
The product License Optimizer allows you to do that and make that part of your day to day process. It becomes as simple as clicking a button and running a reconciliation to see what your license position is. And if you have the ability to do that, then you can always be prepared. You can always be prepared for an audit. You can always be prepared for a renewal, and it allows you to see your state and therefore manage it. And as Todd said earlier, you can't manage what you can't see.
Todd: Awesome, thanks Jon. There is a question that came up and as we go through looking at the benefits. The question that I believe it's talking about, so they had a case where they're essentially managing a number of licenses I'm guessing. But they have separate clients and we need to identify them separately or provide it a view of their state across anyone. So, I guess the best way and we didn't really cover that…I'm even thinking within an organization, you'll have different cost centers, different GOs, different ways that you want to view that information. And yes, you can actually go through and assign licenses. If you've gone through and have this information, you can assign a license to a particular GO, a particular business unit, a particular cost center, or a client.
And at that point, on that dashboard, you can actually create specific views that they only have access to that level of information within that hierarchy. They can't see above them, they can't see...they can see below them, right? But they can't see anything with their peers or above them. I guess, is that right? I mean, Jon, I know we didn't go through that but tell us about what I'm thinking your question was. It's not re-added into the Q&A section.
Jonathan: So, Todd, I don't know if you just want to maybe just allow me to present and I can show the business units view for the participants before we jump into the last section perhaps?
Todd: Yeah. We got seven minutes. I'm wondering, huh, okay. Let's see, I mean I don't wanted to go through with the presentation just to do it, but maybe this slide just talk about an idea of maybe like a size of customer and what's available. Because there's another question that came in and we talked about how you benchmark their costs. So, I go back to that first tip, you need to get that visibility. The only way you can benchmark their costs is understanding what they're spending in the first place. And then from that point on, we can actually start to gauge, okay, how much is actually possible? You now look at the, again, what's being installed and used in the environment. You look at what's being unused.
But you'll see that we've kinda built these tips on a logical path to help you get to that answer. And this is for Michael Swanton. So, when we manage it, yeah, we do benchmarking. We can track it, we can see the historical cost, that trending information that you saw in the dashboard. And then when we talk about comparing to an industry average, we're getting there. Awesome question, that's what we want. You'll probably see more of around industry coming in 2018, so that's on a road map. Good question though. So, Jon, I know you might wanna go back into that but maybe I just do a quick recap. Here are our existing and actual License Optimizer customers. Here's the size of their environment just to give you an understanding.
And then what software vendor that was focused on and what savings they were able to achieve. So, you'll notice even for small companies around the 2,000 to 2,500 size, we were still able to save one to three million dollars. So, you think about that, even for a company of that size. Now, yeah, and I'm not probably able to talk about the last one in the webinar, the Global Pharmaceutical but let's just say that $15 million, it's actually quite a bit more than what they saved. So, it's quite a bit higher than that. But, again, that was what, we're just putting on there just because either it doesn't seem like an actual number. But also the team didn't want to expose it because they didn't want to be saying, "Oh, we're not doing our job effectively because in a way, wasting that much money was IBM and Oracle, right?"
So, these are actual savings from customers. This is what through that tool that Jon, I mean License Optimizer, it was what Jon took us through earlier. Here's yet another customer within the first three months. They were able to have a cost avoidance savings of just shy at the million dollars. So, that's one of our customers from Sealed Air. Another customer, same thing, cost avoidance of $100,000 within the first month of using the tool. It is actually real. This is not a gimmick. I'm laughing because I've been on some webinars where you go through that, right? Reach on be like the... Was it get-rich-quick schemes? Yeah, I'm not on those all time trusting, but it is funny to listen to him. But just to recap, it is that simple, right?
We're talking about gaining visibility, focusing on that surplus, then focusing on the unused software. That is the biggest steps you can take to start saving money. And then you can really focus in negotiating better terms and conditions and looking at time efficiency after that. All of that will help lead you to success for a SAM solution or really for your software spend. So that being said, I don't know if there's any other questions. But if you're still willing to jump on, I think we can go ahead and show you, Jon, if you want to do that within the last four minutes. Now, go ahead.
Jonathan: The very point of view of what we can do within License Optimizer is how the product works. And this is a business unit view, hopefully you can all see this now. And you can see the way that the business unit is structured. So, within the age of our business unit, we have a number of countries here and then we might have a number of locations. So, those business units can be used in the reconciliations but also within the dashboards. So, within the reconciliations, you can choose to run a reconciliation just for a specific business unit or for a number of business units. But if you wanted to, you can also fill through the dashboards. In each tiles, you're able to filter anytime just specific business unit either on the dashboard lies at the time.
Or if you wanted to, you can configure a dashboard tile to always show specific business units and nothing else. To finally close that other bit out, you can have a number of users. There's no limit on the number of users that can log into License Optimizer. But each of those users can be restricted by the business unit as well. So, if you only wanted a user to be able to see business units in the AsiaPac region, in the example that you've just given, then you would be able to limit them to those business units.
Todd: Awesome. Thanks so much, Jon. Hopefully that answered your question Keith and it gave you an idea of how that would be doable. But that ends our presentation. So I'd really like to thank everybody for jumping on the webinar today and for Jon and Ericka who's also here helping out, and then really, we'll have an email sent out with a link to this webinar along with the recording, so you'll have access to the presentation. But again, thank you so much for your time and hopefully you're able to learn something. I'd love to hear back from you. If you have any other comments or questions, by all means we're always open here at Ivanti and we wanting to help you out. So, thank you so much and again thanks, Jon, for joining.
Jonathan: Thank you everyone. Goodbye.
Todd: Goodbye.


text:
2015 Special Exhibition Tour
Saturday, October 10, 2015
3:00pm — 4:00pm
3:00pm — 4:00pm
Type: 2015 Exhibition, Tours
Saturday & Sunday
3:00 pm
At 3pm Saturdays and Sundays visitors are invited to a guided tour of the special exhibition, Lynda Benglis: Water Sources. Forty-five minutes to one hour in length. Please meet in front of the Visitor Center.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Each bomb is handmade and weighs between 275-290 grams
Baking Soda, Citric Acid, Epsom Salts, Dead Sea Mineral Salts, Cornstarch, Grapeseed Oil, Distilled Water, fragrance oil, candy sprinkles
100% Vegan friendly, made with no animal products
The only
place that changes our products from "natural" to "nearly natural" is the use
of fragrance oils vs essential oils. Essential oils are completely natural,
distilled from the natural source - Fragrance oils are synthetic. Customer
demand dictates the use of fragrance oils so I make soap with Essential oils,
Fragrance oils and also Unscented to suit everyone!


text:
Michael Collins: Third man of Apollo 11
Clip: Season 31 Episode 3 | 1m 12s
Michael Collins piloted the command module nicknamed the Columbia, while Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the moon.
Aired: 07/08/19
Buy Now:
Problems Playing Video?
Corporate sponsorship for American Experience is provided by Liberty Mutual Insurance and Consumer Cellular. Major funding by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.


text:
Greetings –
Publib-L does not appear to be up and running quite yet since the migration with OCLC. This was the original post in November from Sara:
[Publib] PUBLIB-L IS MOVING
Sara Weissman Sara.Weissman at mainlib.org
Sat Nov 19 13:25:40 EST 2011
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(Yes, all caps) PubLib-L is shifting to new software the Monday-Tuesday following Thanksgiving. Please note! the list will be in read only mode during the migration so please do not post anything Nov. 28-30th ..until we get the go-ahead from our hosts at OCLC. Have a good Thanksgiving . yr co-moderators, Karen & Sara
Filed under: Uncategorized |


text:
This medication is typically used to relieve migraines. Its effects can be felt within 1 hour.
For greater effectiveness and faster relief, use this product at the first sign of a migraine.
Generally, this medication is used only as needed. Important: Follow the instructions on the label. Do not use more of this product, or more often, than prescribed.
This medication may be taken with or without food.
In addition to its desired action, this medication may cause some side effects, notably:
Each person may react differently to a treatment. If you think this medication may be causing side effects (including those described here, or others), talk to your doctor or pharmacist. He or she can help you to determine whether or not the medication is the source of the problem.
As with most medications, this product should be stored at room temperature. Store it in a secure location where it will not be exposed to excessive heat, moisture or direct sunlight. Keep it out of reach of young children. Make sure that any leftover portion is disposed of safely.
It is important to tell the health professionals you consult:


text:
Not only did the Packers QB call TK terrible, unfunny, and clueless, but he did it on ESPN Radio. This is not what the WWL had in mind when they consolidated their media empire.
Rodgers was on ESPN Radio Milwaukee, and thankfully, Sports Radio Interviews was there to transcribe.
You know who was better than Tony Kornheiser? Dennis Miller was ten times better. Dennis Miller was a great comedian, but one of the worst Monday Night Football guys ever. And he was ten times better than Tony Kornheiser. His stuff was actually funny. Tony stuff wasn't funny at all. He did no research. We'd sit in those production meetings and he would add absolutely nothing to the conversation. I'd be like, 'What are we doing here? This is stupid.'… You get in there with Tony and he's asking you all these dumb questions that have no application to the game you are playing or anything you are doing. He's terrible… I don't think he's funny. I don't think he's insightful. I don't think knows anything about sports."
Rodgers also thinks Ron Jaworski dicked him over on draft day, Marcellus Wiley doesn't know what he's talking about, and Trent Dilfer is actually a good analyst. So, you know, grain of salt.
Aaron Rodgers Ranks Tom Brady "Best by Far" and Thinks Tony Kornheiser is "Terrible" [Sports Radio Interviews]


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Dillon town manager Joe Wray resigns
Joe Wray resigned Monday, Feb. 24, from his post as Dillon town manager, Mayor Pro Tem Kevin Burns confirmed on Tuesday, Feb. 25.
The Dillon Town Council will hold a special meeting on Saturday, March 1, that will include a short executive session followed by public action on Wray's resignation, Burns said.
Carrie McDonnell, town of Dillon finance director, said the town manager is a contract position and that the council has to officially accept a separation agreement with Wray. Saturday will officially mark Wray's last day with the town, once the separation agreement has been approved.
The council also will need to appoint an interim town manager until Wray's replacement can be found. McDonnell likely will be appointed to that position during Saturday's special meeting.
Burns said a notice about the meeting would be posted Thursday. Additional details about the meeting and about Wray's resignation were not immediately available.
Wray did not return calls for a comment.
With his decision to resign, Wray becomes the second high-ranking public official to leave office in the town of Dillon in less than a week.
On Wednesday, Feb. 19, interim police chief Brian Brady resigned from the Dillon Police Department during a 5th Judicial District Attorney's Office investigation into whether he committed perjury during a September 2013 hearing over a parking ticket dispute in Dillon/Silverthorne Municipal Court.
As one of his last pieces of town business, Wray was instrumental in drafting and pushing through an ordinance updating sections of Dillon's code to require bar and restaurant owners to report inappropriate behavior to law enforcement officials.
The ordinance, passed during the town council's Feb. 18 regular meeting, also instituted two new criminal penalties for business owners and their employees who do not comply with the new law.
Reports have since surfaced that the ordinance violates the Colorado Constitution. It also was reported that local residents and business owners were unhappy about the new law and applied pressure to the town council to repeal it.
However, those reports have not been confirmed. It is not known whether public pressure played any role in Wray's decision to step down.
Start a dialogue, stay on topic and be civil.
If you don't follow the rules, your comment may be deleted.


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Siberian tigers — aka Amur tigers — are the largest cats alive on Earth. My favorite Siberian tiger description comes from nature journalist John Vaillant, who once characterized them as creatures that possess "the agility and appetite of the cat and the mass of an industrial refrigerator."
The video below shows what happened when four of these not-so-wee beasties discovered a group of snowmen in their enclosure at Longleat Safari Park. Bonus points go to park officials for stashing cameras inside the snowmen:
We know. Adorable, right? Cool — now that you've had your squee, go check out this true story of a man-eating tiger's "vengeance". Here's the upshot, in case you need persuading to go read:
At the center of the story is Vladimir Markov, a poacher who met a grisly end in the winter of 1997 after he shot and wounded a [siberian tiger], and then stole part of the tiger's kill.
The injured tiger hunted Markov down in a way that appears to be chillingly premeditated. The tiger staked out Markov's cabin, systematically destroyed anything that had Markov's scent on it, and then waited by the front door for Markov to come home.
Take home: trifle not with the Amur tiger.


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The German women and Japanese men finished first in qualification in the team portion of the 30th DTB Cup, held Friday at Stuttgart's Porsche Arena.
The top four teams from Friday advance to the finals on Saturday (men) and Sunday (women), following the individual World Cup all-around contests. Each squad consists of up to four gymnasts, with up to three competing per event and the top two scores counting toward the team total.
Olympic vault finalist Janine Berger helped the German women squeak past Russia, 106.00-105.75. Berger's 14.10 was the top vault score, while world team member Lisa-Katharina Hill contributed the second-best score on uneven bars.
Russia put up only two gymnasts on floor exercise and vault after the withdrawal of 2011 world team member Yulia Inshina. The team was forced to count Anna Rodionova's 12.20 on vault as well as her 11.40 for a weak floor exercise (double tuck; 1 1/2 to full; front full; crashed 2 1/2 twist dismount).
Superstar Aliya Mustafina competed two events for Russia, returning to competition after winning four medals at the Olympics in London. She performed a simplified set on uneven bars for the top mark of 14.80 (Stalder-full to Maloney; piked Jaeger; Pak to Stalder-half; toe-on full to full-twisting double). She had the second-best score on balance beam with several breaks (double turn; switch ring; front aerial) but nailed her standing Arabian.
Veteran Kristina Goryunova had the best score on beam with a solid and attractive routine (switch ring; aerial kick over; Onodi; front aerial, ff layout; side somi; double pike.)
Japan finished third thanks to the best top total on floor exercise, topped by 13.60 from Wakane Inoue and 13.40 from upstart Mai Murakami.
A second squad from Germany rounded out the four teams advancing to Sunday's final. Austria finished fifth ahead of Switzerland and a third German squad.
The men's qualification saw 10 teams fighting for the four spots to the final. The Japanese barely edged Brazil out of first place, 176.35-176.20. The Japanese outscored the field handily on parallel bars (15.45 from Kenya Kobayashi and 15.10 from Koji Uematsu), but the team total on floor exercise was just ninth. The team also had the best total on pommel horse with three 14s.
Olympic still rings champion Arthur Zanetti led Brazil with the top marks of the day on rings (15.50) as well as vault (16.10).
2012 Olympian Sam Oldham and world all-around medalist Daniel Keatings led the British men to third. Oldham earned the best score on floor exercise (15.15, tied Russia's Nikita Ignatyev) and Keatings contributed three scores in the 14s.
Russia grabbed the fourth and final spot to the final. Olympic medalist Denis Ablyazin scored just behind Zanetti on both still rings (15.25) and vault (16.05).
A young German squad finished fifth, missing out on the final by less than 1 point. The team had the best total on high bar (including Christopher Jursch's top score of 15.60) but weak pommel horse and still rings left the host team out of the final.
German men's head coach Andreas Hirsch said he was disappointed, but noted that the team was without its Olympic stars. Double Olympic silver medalist Marcel Nguyen is slated to compete in Sunday's World Cup event.
"It was clear that after the Olympic Games, a generational change was taking place," Hirsch said. "So it's good that we introduce the young gymnasts to international competition. I feel the team did very well, but clearly there is still a lot of work to do."
Switzerland finished sixth, followed by Puerto Rico, Canada, the Netherlands and a mixed German/Azerbaijan squad.
Competition continues Saturday with the women's World Cup all-around event, followed by the men's team final. The women's team final takes place Sunday after the men's World Cup competition.
External Link: Official Website
30th DTB Cup
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text:
For the last 26 years, I've had a great "micro" view into the aikido world — as a student, teacher, and dojo operator. I've experienced periods of hard training, I've raised students and developed instructors, I've built a sustainable dojo, and I've had the honor of cultivating a 26 year long mentor/disciple relationship with my sensei.
In the last year, through my involvement with Aikido Journal, I've been able to gain a much better grasp of the "macro" landscape. The journal has a unique position in the world of aikido. Transcending stylistic, organizational, cultural, and geographic boundaries, we are the largest aikido community in the world, reaching over 500,000 people a month. Through Aikido Journal, I've had access to, and needed to process, an overwhelming amount of data. I've spent many nights and weekends looking at the data, seeking to understand it, and figuring out how best to use the journal to communicate important insights, problems, and success stories in the world of aikido.
As I assembled this briefing for the community, I experienced feelings of sadness, shock, and dismay, but also feelings of curiosity, hope and determination. This article will take approximately 15 minutes to read. If you're an aikido practitioner, I think it's important enough for you to sit in a quiet place and take the time to read it with your full attention.
This two part article focuses on these key topics:
- The Decline of Interest in the Art of Aikido: A data driven assessment.
- A New Vision for Aikido Journal: An overview of our vision and what you can expect from us in the future.
Now is a critical time for the art of aikido and our community. We hope you'll get your bearings with us and that you'll join us to be part of the turnaround story we must write together.
Part 1
Fading into Irrelevance
The Decline of Aikido
After assuming responsibility for Aikido Journal in early 2017, I took immediate action to start a dialogue by launching a wide-reaching survey to help me create a snapshot of our community. In addition to the structured survey responses, I read through hundreds of comments and personal stories. I even reached out to some community members to talk, listen, and learn. While everyone's stories and comments were unique, most of them had a similar theme. Here are some of our discoveries (data compiled from over 1,000 respondents):
- Student: Chief Instructor ratio: 5.4: 1
- Student: Instructor ratio: 1.5: 1
- Biggest Challenge: Finding and retaining new students, especially in the 18-29 demographic
While this data from the Aikido Journal community may not directly correlate to real world aikido practitioners in a given geographic region, our tribe is large and this data certainly reflects a meaningful segment of the global aikido community.
With only 5 students per chief instructor, this data indicates we're very top heavy and don't have a sufficiently large group of students to sustain many professional instructors.
Of course a number of dojos are thriving and have far different ratios. However, many more are struggling to maintain dedicated dojos, others are operating out of community centers and shared training venues.
I've now had personal communication with at least 100 dojo-chos and a number of senior leaders from some of the world's largest aikido organizations. While everyone knows there are clear success stories and some thriving examples of aikido, almost all (at least within North America) agree that there is a clear problem.
Great masters and gifted teachers are seeing fewer and fewer beginning and intermediate level practitioners at seminars and many are concerned the generation of instructors that follow them won't be as well-equipped as they were. Many dojo-chos are teaching slowly dwindling groups of older practitioners with a complete absence of a younger generation of students. An increasing number of aspiring sensei have been discouraged from starting new dojos, because they can't find a viable way to start one or make a living running one.
Interest in Aikido
I wanted to look beyond our community to see if I could find outside data sources to support or refute what we've seen within our own tribe. It's pretty easy to find growth data and research reports for the media and entertainment or semiconductor industries. However, in the aikido world, we don't have the infrastructure or resources within our ecosystem to produce those kinds of reports. However, there are other large and accessible data sources we can tap.
Google tracks trend data by keyword. Google is used by everyone — people of all ages, in nearly all locations.
While looking at trends for aikido doesn't directly map to number of aikido practitioners, it does map directly to interest in aikido.
People who want to learn the art search for local aikido dojos. People practicing aikido search for aikido seminars, organizations, or teachers. People interested in aikido, search for "aikido."
Interest in aikido has declined an average of -9.3% per year over the last five years. The spike in interest in November 2015 correlates to the release of a Walking Dead episode featuring aikido.
- Google Trends: Last 5 Years
- Growth Rate: -9.3% CAGR
A 9% loss in interest can be difficult to notice on an annual basis, but can be catastrophic if compounded over a longer period of time. Let's take a look at the interest in aikido over a 13 year period, starting in 2004 — the farthest back we can search Google's database.
- Google Trends: 2004-2017
- Growth Rate: -86%
These are worldwide numbers. Some will note that aikido is healthy or thriving at certain dojos, or within certain countries/geographic regions. We know this to be true and this gives us both hope and examples of a new path forward. However, for the aggregated worldwide numbers to drop at these levels, there must be many more struggling dojos and regions to bring the averages down this low.
The Martial Landscape
We can see our change in influence as indexed against two other activities for a reference point. In 2004-2005, we were at the height of our popularity. For those of you who have been in the aikido world long enough, this was the time of the last Aiki Expo held in 2005. An incredibly diverse group assembled for this groundbreaking event. Many new friends and connections were made at the Expo and a number of sensei whom I respect had the course of their development as martial artists altered by this event.
Since that time, interest in aikido began a slow and steady decline. MMA, as a televised fighting sport with global distribution, obviously surpassed interest in every traditional martial art. We are not suggesting aikido needs to be compared to, or compete with MMA. This is solely an extra data point to give perspective on the landscape. BJJ has been on a slow but steady growth curve, passing aikido in global interest in 2010. Anyone interested in playing with the numbers and comparisons can go to Google Trends and craft their own reports.
The Younger Generation
After looking at data from both our Aikido Journal community and Google, we sought out other independent data sources that might provide insight. While Google is used by nearly everyone and gives us an index of interest across all demographics, Instagram is a social network predominantly used by those age 18-29. Compiling hashtag data from Instagram gives a general idea of interest in aikido on the Instagram network, used by over 500 million worldwide.
Data as of December 2017
Within the 18-29 demographic, Aikido is nearing total irrelevance.
Other traditional Japanese arts like Judo and Karate have 7-10X the interest, with an art like BJJ surpassing aikido by over 25x. Merely as an interesting data point, yoga, a non-competitive mind/body/spirit art, generates more interest than all the martial arts and fighting sports combined.
I started aikido at age 19 and spent the remainder of my teens and twenties training hard, taking ukemi for my senpai, and using my youthful energy and athleticism to immerse myself in training and personal development through the art of aikido. In my formative years, the young adults at my dojo brought enthusiasm, athleticism, and new ideas and perspectives. They inspired our teachers, pushed them to improve themselves, and gave their efforts focus and purpose. I saw these young adults forge my sensei into a better martial artist, leader, and mentor. I fear something very important will be lost without this generation's presence in the art of aikido.
Reaching a Crisis Point
While general interest in our art has declined by 86% since 2004, we don't believe the number of aikido practitioners has declined by an equally catastrophic amount. However, data and stories from our community do reflect symptoms of an unhealthy environment, and the dramatically dropping interest in our art is likely a leading indicator of further decline.
We don't need aikido to be an all-pervasive mainstream art, but at all costs, we must avoid losing an ecosystem large enough to support a critical mass of professional instructors.
The sensei who spend the majority of their professional time teaching, researching, developing training programs, and mentoring students, are a key asset in the aikido world. If our art can't sustain enough professional instructors, instructor quality will decline, student quality and interest will decline, and there won't be a large enough audience to to sustain dedicated dojo spaces or support projects like the writing of new books or the development of professional instructional or documentary videos.
What Happened?
Leaders in the aikido world I've spoken with have different perspectives and insights regarding the root causes of our current state. I believe it's a complicated issue and that there are many factors that contributed to the decline in interest in aikido.
The founder's first generation of students spread across the globe to build and promote aikido. Over a period of decades, they did a monumental job scaling aikido throughout the world and then stabilizing by building organizations, formalizing technical curriculum, documenting their knowledge, and promoting the philosophy and vision of the art. Their achievements are legendary and have served the art of aikido well. Yet somehow, what we've been doing for the last 13-15 years has not produced the kind of growth and vitality the art of aikido experienced in the past. In fact, we've seen a sharp decline over this period with no end in sight to our downward trajectory. This is not a new story. Here are other perspectives on the topic:
- Martial arts in a state of decline? (2006)
- Are You an Unwitting Participant in the Demise of Aikido? (2015)
- Aikido Down the Tubes? Here's How to Reverse the Trend. (2015)
- The Future of Aikido (2017)
- Christian Tissier: On Revitalizing Aikido (2017)
Now, it's more important than ever that we examine this more closely, have open and constructive discussions about it, research and test theories, find a better way forward, and take action to turn things around.
Part 2
Aikido Journal: A Vision for the Future
Aikido has transformed my life and many of those around me. Our art is true modern Budo — forged with philosophy of compassion and positive creation. Aikido develops our bodies, sharpens our minds, and teaches us what it means to be a good human being. The world needs aikido more than ever.
Kids need to learn to work together cooperatively to help each other grow. They need to learn to fall safely and to stay comfortable in their bodies as they grow. Young adults, many of whom can't identify with any organized religion or political party, need supportive communities and an ethical system to connect with. Older adults need a practice that can last a lifetime, providing skill development, personal growth opportunities, physical and mental fitness, and pure joy.
An art like yoga has been around for thousands of years. Aikido is a mere newborn by comparison, but has the potential to serve humankind for generations to come. Imagine what our art could become and the impact it could have if it blossoms in the right way.
The future of our art is now in our hands. We are the living guardians of art of aikido.
This is why it's important we keep going and make real committed efforts to find better paths forward. Aikido Journal stands ready to collaborate with our community, to lead projects, and to support the projects of others.
Fueling the Tribe
Within the aikido world, the Aikido Journal community is unique. Tied together digitally, we transcend differences in geography, culture, political affiliation, and technical style. We are a self-selecting tribe of individuals united in our love and pursuit of aikido. We aspire to improve ourselves and strengthen the art of aikido. We accept that there are many different visions for what this means and how it should be accomplished, and we respect the path of others.
Aikido Journal intends to empower the great teachers, practitioners, leaders, pioneers, and researchers of aikido to best realize their own visions, efforts, and expressions of aikido, as well as maximize the benefit of their work for others.
To this end, we want Aikido Journal to do three things:
- Be rocket fuel that propels our individual and collective growth, We want to empower individuals, dojos, and organizations to succeed and realize their own best expressions of aikido. We will do this through collaborative projects and the creation of new tools and infrastructure for the aikido world.
- Facilitate the flow of information so we can efficiently learn from each others' mistakes and contribute our best ideas into others' unique expressions of aikido. We'll do this through our media coverage, research reports, case studies, and instructional courses.
- Tell the story of aikido in powerful ways. Aikido is beautiful, inspirational, and transformative. We want to create and share stories that reflect that in an authentic and impactful way. We plan on finding ways to introduce aikido to more people in a positive light and to create media that we can proudly show as representative of our art.
Let's Get Started
We're ready to roll up our sleeves and get to work. Within 30 days after taking formal control of Aikido Journal, we secured and consolidated the entire Aikido Journal archive (which spanned 8 databases and includes many terabytes of data). We redesigned and launched a new website and an on-demand streaming video service. We've put workflow systems in place to continue to update and republish the vast contents in our collection. We are well on our way to completing our goal of making the entire Aikido Journal content library and knowledge base available globally (A special thanks to subscribers of AikidoJournal.TV who directly support our projects and efforts).
We think having access to quality aikido news and stories keeps us aware, informed, and provides an opportunity to reflect on new perspectives. Integrating it seamlessly with a comprehensive historical archive keeps us grounded, reminds us of our lineage, and allows us to learn directly from the wisdom and insights of the founder and great masters of our art.
Aikido Journal Academy
With a full 40% of our community as instructors and over 60% with more than 10 years experience, we believe another important area for Aikido Journal to focus on is instructor development. We want to help aikido instructors be the best teachers and leaders in the martial arts world.
As a community, we have everything we need. We have great aikido masters with powerful knowledge and insights, subject matter experts outside the aikido world willing to support us, a powerful new digital communications platform with massive reach, and a legion of instructors who are thoughtful and intelligent with true passion and dedication to the art.
This will be our next area of focus. We'll be launching Aikido Journal Academy later this month. Initially, it will produce next-generation online instructional courses, as well as live events designed to connect and empower our leaders. Aikido Journal Academy will help us better learn from each other, share best practices, avoid mistakes, and support and accelerate each others' development as leaders and dojo operators.
These programs are designed to supplement and complement the training our instructors already receive from their mentors. If our instructors keep leveling up, our dojos will be healthier, our practitioners will be better and larger in number, and our communities will be stronger.
We're in the final stages of competing our first Aikido Journal Academy course and will be ready to launch it later this month. This alone won't solve all our problems, but we believe it's the most high-impact next step we can take with our available resources.
Taking Action
Please consider joining us and taking action on these next-steps forward:
- Share, thoughtfully: Leave a comment and tell us your thoughts and experience related to the health of aikido. Contribute with a clear and objective insight, a theory, or a relevant story. If you have a point that can identify problems and obstacles and/or suggest solution sets, we'd love to start a constructive discussion about what got us here, and what are the most high-impact things we can do to make positive change.
- Aikido Journal Academy Feedback: We'll soon release an article about Aikido Journal Academy and its approach to developing instructor courses that transcend stylistic and organizational boundaries. The article will end with a short poll asking about your interest level in different topics/courses. Please participate, tell us how we can best support you, and help us prioritize.
We've had fantastic support from the community and have made many new friends. The leaders in the aikido world I've had the opportunity to speak with want to build upon the great achievements of the founder's direct students and forge a new and stronger future for our art. Our practitioners and the larger aikido and martial arts communities are ready to rally together to support aikido. We hope you'll join us on this path of challenge and adventure. Together, we can write the next chapter in the history of aikido. We expect it to be a great turnaround story.


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The idea of these posts is to compare and contrast the methodology and background expressed by the Lessons back in the early 1900s and what we are experiencing today. By and large, the comparison is very favorable. At the core of the practice of genealogy, stripping away all the technological do-dads, the process of doing genealogy has not changed all that much. Most of the practical advice from the old Lessons book applies equally well today as it did then.
Here is what the book says about foreign research. Remember, that this was a book published in Salt Lake City, Utah. Almost everything was foreign back then because as the book notes, most of the inhabitants of Utah were either immigrants or descended from immigrants.
After all other sources of information have been exhausted, there are still the vast accumulations of original records in the churches and archives of the older states and countries of Europe. This western part of America is still young. Either we or our immediate forefathers came here from the East or from Europe, and to these old home-lands must we eventually go for a continuation of our pedigree hunting. The European records consist largely of parish registers, containing entries of births or christenings, marriages, and deaths or burials; then there are records of wills, deeds, visitations, etc. All this is found in the original ancient scrip which, as a rule, is not easy to read, as. much of the matter is in the old style of writing and some in Latin. An expert is therefore required to get satisfactory results. A novice usually makes little headwav. Also these records are frequently in the keeping of ministers and parish clerks whom it is hard to approach, and who charge the full extent of the fees which the law usually allows them to charge every searcher at will. The Genealogical Society of Utah has helped many people to get information from foreign countries, and hopes to be able to do more in this way in the future. Competent persons have been doing this work in Great Britain, Germany, and the Scandinavian countries. However, at the present, because of the war and other causes, this work is quite unsatisfactory, and it is advised that persons who desire research work done in Europe, first communicate with the Genealogical Society of Utah. A genealogical and biographical blank record book for the use of Latter-day Saint families and individuals has recently been published and approved by the Church Authorities, which will be found invaluable as a means of recording and preserving all items and dates of importance in the histories of families or lives of individuals. The price is $1.25. It may be purchased from the Genealogical Society of Utah.Remember that this book was written just as World War I was beginning in Europe. There certainly were difficulties in obtain access to the records at that time. If we fast forward to the present, we find this same Genealogical Society of Utah, now called FamilySearch, doing exactly the same thing; making the records of the world available. At the time this was written the entire microfilm effort was far in the future and could not have been imagined given the bulky and difficult to use camera equipment of the day. But now after 74 years of microfilming and digitizing we have millions upon millions of records either available on microfilm for a nominal cost of rental or free online at FamilySearch.org.
By the way, the book that was selling for $1.25 in 1915, adjusted for inflation, would now cost over $26.00, no small amount for the people of the time.
But what about the idea of hiring a professional genealogist to do the work over in Europe? Well, that is still quite common. I hear about people hiring genealogists all the time, although I have not had the need or opportunity to do so. But the observation about the difficulty of reading the old scripts is still very much a consideration.


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A guide on the general outlook of the implementation
The rise of the social enterprise
VAT in the GCC and the impact areas in the implementation cycle
Leadership perspectives from across the globe.
Learn how this new reality is coming together and what it will mean for you and your industry.
Apprehensive millennials: seeking stability and opportunities in an uncertain world.
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To contact the Alumni team, please send an email to:


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Gov. Jerry Brown, Lawmakers Strike a Deal on Key Budget Issues
Gov. Jerry Brown and top lawmakers have reached agreement on some of the most contentious issues in the state budget, granting the governor significant victories on the redistribution of school money and expectations of revenue.
By Chris Megerian and Anthony York
Gov. Jerry Brown and top lawmakers have reached agreement on some of the most contentious issues in the state budget, granting the governor significant victories on the redistribution of school money and expectations of revenue.
The budget plan would increase funding for schools across the board and send extra money to districts with large numbers of poor students and English learners -- a key goal for Brown.
In addition, legislative leaders agreed to use Brown's more conservative estimates for state income, bolstering the governor's ability to limit state spending.
Senate leader Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) and Assembly Speaker John A. Perez (D-Los Angeles) huddled with Brown in the governor's office Monday afternoon and emerged smiling. They told reporters that only a few minor details remained to be worked out.
"It will be a budget that I think accomplishes all of the things that we have sought to accomplish," Steinberg said.
He and Perez persuaded Brown to accept some new spending for social services and health programs, though not as much or as quickly as they had wanted.
Want more finance news? Click here.
A joint legislative committee hammered out many of the final details Monday evening, and Brown issued a statement praising lawmakers' work.
"The Legislature is doing their job and doing it well," he said. "It looks like California will get another balanced budget and, very importantly, educational funding that recognizes the different needs of California's students."
The Legislature must pass a budget by Saturday, and the governor must sign it before it can take effect July 1. With those deadlines looming, lawmakers have been trying to refocus Sacramento's attention on state finances rather than a federal investigation into one of their own, Sen. Ronald Calderon (D-Montebello).
Calderon returned to the Capitol on Monday for the first time since the FBI searched his office almost a week ago, and he broke his silence on the issue.
"My intention at this point is to do my job that I was elected to do," he told reporters at a brief news conference.
On the nature of the investigation, Calderon said, "I have a lot of my own questions that aren't answered yet." He said the situation was "very stressful."
A law enforcement official with knowledge of the investigation told The Times last week that authorities are examining Calderon's "income stream." City officials in Los Angeles County and a utility contractor said federal agents have been asking questions about connections between a controversial water district, the senator and his brother, Tom Calderon, a consultant and former assemblyman.
Meanwhile, legislative staff members were racing to draft bills for the agreements reached in closed-door negotiations between the governor and top lawmakers.
Senate Budget Chairman Mark Leno (D-San Francisco) said a formal announcement on the deal would come Tuesday.
Negotiations on school funding were initially a point of disagreement between Brown and lawmakers. But they reached a compromise that largely mirrors the governor's original proposal to divert money from wealthier school districts and send it to needier schools.
The agreement includes slightly more money for every school student and a slightly higher threshold than Brown proposed for school districts to qualify for the extra funds, or "concentration grants" -- 55% of a district's students must be poor or English learners, rather than 50%.
The Democrats who dominate the Legislature backed away from an early proposal to fuel the budget with higher estimated tax receipts than the governor had calculated. Brown has repeatedly insisted on using his figure, which was $3.2 billion less than the Legislature's budget analyst projected.
The governor said that relying too much on stock market improvements could be dangerous for California's finances. Using the governor's lower estimate "doesn't close the door on anything," Leno said. The Legislature could revisit the revenue and spending levels in six months, he said.
Brown agreed to spend $140 million to help people with severe mental health needs -- money not included in his own proposal. Other legislative bids were pared back and delayed somewhat on hopes that the state will be on firmer financial footing later. For example, Perez's plan to reduce university costs for some students was reduced in size to roughly $300 million from $460 million and will be phased in over four years starting in fall of 2014.
Brown and lawmakers also struck a deal on the use of money generated by Proposition 39, which changed the corporate tax code when voters approved it in November.
Roughly $2.5 billion will be available for energy-efficiency projects at schools and community colleges over the next five years. Officials can tap the money by submitting detailed proposals.
Sen. Kevin de Leon (D-Los Angeles) said in a statement that the plan includes "strict accountability so we can report back to taxpayers exactly what they received for their investment of these public dollars."
(c)2013 the Los Angeles Times
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Performance art? Amtrak stops for allegedly berzerk rider
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Jun 10th, 2011
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The man whose alleged actions brought an Amtrak train to a halt in the Nelson County village of Shipman on the morning of June 9 will be spending nearly a week in jail. Barrett Harrington Wolfe, a 22...
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