"Star Search"—Talent Management Made Simple

So, what is talent management, anyway?

When I think of talent, I think of musical and artistic talent: stage performers, actors, and singers. I think of Star Search, Canadian Idol, and America’s Got Talent.

When I think of talent management, I think of talent agencies and talent scouts. But talent management reaches far beyond Hollywood’s casting couch and the doors of Motown’s recording studios.

Talent management is the process of developing and retaining current employees, and of recruiting and attracting highly skilled workers for your business.

Talent management may also be referred to as human capital management (HCM), human resources information systems (HRIS), or human resources management systems (HRMS)—and it’s something that every growing business should know about.

While talent management emerged in the 1990s, the term was originally coined by McKinsey & Company in 1997. Since then, it has been adopted by scores of businesses looking to improve the processes of tracking and managing their employee talent.

Why Is Talent Management So Important?

One of the biggest challenges businesses face today in the area of human resources (HR) is the recruitment and retention of skilled talent. According to 2007 HR Trends Report: People to Profitability—answered by more than 500 executives of small and medium sized companies—talent management is the greatest business concern after revenue.

People are the most important resource in today’s global economy. And whether companies are willing to admit it, at the end of the day, it’s their people that are going to make the difference to their bottom line. To remain competitive in today's job market, employers need to know about their employees—what they're doing, what their skills are, how they're progressing, and where they fit in the business’s future. As such, companies need to integrate talent management into their wider business strategy.

When it comes to managing talent, HR and talent managers definitely have their work cut out for them. In order to deliver results that will positively influence their organization, these managers must develop and implement an integrated talent management strategy or plan.

A successful talent management plan must flow seamlessly from strategy to practice, putting effective techniques into efficient practice.

What Are the Two Key Challenges?

1. Employee Recruitment and Retention

Recruiting and retaining the “best and brightest” requires more than just offering fringe benefits and signing bonuses. Managers must be ready and willing to help their current employees develop the skills that will prepare them for higher-level roles. The search for the best and the brightest can be a constant and costly battle, so companies need to find more imaginative ways to keep their best people.

Don’t lose the skilled talent your organization needs to your competition. Understanding which employees have the greatest value in particular business areas will enable you to create an effective workforce plan. Having a workforce plan will help determine whether you have the right type and number of employees with the right skills to meet the demands of your business.

2. The Global Workforce

Globalization has changed the face of business. While most organizations have adapted their operations to this new reality, too many are falling behind in developing HR strategies, policies, structures, and services that support their global operations. To create a truly global workforce, companies—especially organizations that operate on an international level—must incorporate a talent management strategy throughout their global environment.

In order to stay competitive and maintain an effective and stable workforce, organizations have to change their hiring, retention, and workforce management strategies throughout the global enterprise. This will help them to keep their candidate pipeline full for future growth.

To this end, a talent management strategy can be invaluable in developing a unified corporate philosophy for attracting and retaining much-needed talent across the globe.

What Systems Are Available to Help Manage Talent?

By now you have a better understanding of the importance of talent management. But even the best talent management strategy can’t stand alone; it requires the help of a system that can automate core HR functionalities while making crucial employee data easily accessible to the users who need it. In order to control costs and gain the most from the organization’s resources, the system must be able to bring key talent management and such HCM processes as performance management, workforce planning, skills management, succession planning, recruiting, and resource scheduling together into one unified solution.

Enter integrated talent management (ITM).

An ITM solution is comprised of several applications designed to help organizations improve their recruiting and hiring processes. These processes include performance management, succession planning, and workforce planning, and may include several other modules, depending on the solution. ITM can often be adapted to meet industry-specific challenges, such as those in the health care, education, or financial services fields.

ITM solutions are primarily delivered as hosted software—i.e, software-as-a-service (SaaS)—but they are also available as on-premise software.

Some of the benefits of ITM include the following:

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provides managers the tools they need to accomplish their recruitment and retention goals
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handles large-scale hiring and terminations
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integrates comprehensive employee data into one unified system
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identifies which employees qualify as successors for key positions
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enables the creation and management of a talent pool that is based on performance appraisals and career goals

Squeeze Play in the Supply Chain Management Market

To increase market share, vendors are expanding and offering more services to customers. On one hand, enterprise resource planning (ERP) vendors are adding such functionality as warehouse management systems (WMS) and transportation management systems (TMS) into their suites; on the other hand, supply chain management (SCM) vendors are including business intelligence (BI) or supplier relationship management (SRM) functionalities in their applications. Consequently, the IT market is seeing a convergence of functionality for ERP and SCM systems.

In pushing downward into the supply chain space, ERP vendors are incorporating such additional functionality as product lifecycle management (PLM), SRM, advanced planning, WMS, TMS, event and performance management, labor, slotting, yard management, and radio frequency identification (RFID) to their ERP product suites. This business model of ERP vendors pushing downward has expanded, and it is consuming valuable supply chain execution (SCE) market share. This is in accordance with market demand, as organizations are now expected to have one system to address all needs collaboratively.

This article examines the upward push of supply chain vendors into the ERP space and the downward penetration of ERP into the supply chain market, as well as the overall impact on the market.

The Downward Push of ERP Vendors

ERP vendors are expanding their market share at the expense of SCM vendors. ERP solutions encompass a wide range of functionality that includes most of the business processes of an organization. Traditional modules like accounting, BI, customer relationship management (CRM), advanced planning and scheduling, manufacturing, warehousing, and shipping are all standard ERP offerings today.

Most ERP functionality is usually stronger within a particular function of the enterprise (such as financials), while accommodating the other functions within its infrastructure. Other business functions within the ERP infrastructure are incorporated within the same platform, and there is no need for additional interfacing between each operation. Although ERP software covers many modules, its functionality within a module may vary widely, and may not incorporate an adequate level of detail for a particular function like an engineered-to-order product.

Many organizations have elected to implement best-of-breed SCE software on top of their current ERP system to address the shortcomings of functionality within the supply chain. An example where additional functionality was needed in the warehouse is Indigo Books & Music. Indigo implemented SAP corporate-wide, and then had to install an additional WMS (HighJump) to cater to its warehousing requirements. This is common for other companies, such as Nike, Daydots, and 99 Cents Only Stores, where ERP systems have been installed along with WMS solutions to manage the warehouse.

Companies like Catalyst, HighJump, Manhattan Associates, and RedPrairie have all interfaced to SAP successfully, and Catalyst is even approved by SAP for its interface between the WMS and the ERP. Generally speaking, new SCM functionality now incorporated into the ERP products is more detailed and stable from a platform and functionality aspect.

This new level of functionality incorporated within ERP may be the element that is currently missing to handle today’s increasing need for real-time information and accuracy. Tier one vendors, aware that their solutions were lacking in detailed supply chain functionality, have spent extensive research and development resources to improve these shortcomings. SAP, for instance, has dramatically increased functionality within its WMS offering.

Figure 1 outlines most of the traditional functionality included with most ERP and SCM systems software.

How the Mining Industry Benefits from ERP Systems

Mining is a multifaceted business, one that in many ways parallels a repetitive manufacturing business. The analogy is that exploration and marketing for a mining company, for example, is similar to the marketing research performed by a manufacturer, although a noted difference between the two is that most mines are of sizes to support decades of operation, whereas a manufacturer’s production runs last for much shorter durations.

Here in this article, a loose comparison is drawn between the mining industry and the manufacturing industry, and suggested is a method to follow in order to integrate financial reporting so that auditors can verify results. It concludes with concepts that are required to manage the entire organization.

In a mining company, each department has its own way of measuring outputs, which often is incompatible with legal or shareholder requirements. An enterprise resource planning (ERP) system allows each department to use its own reporting measures. The ERP software transforms data bidirectionally to the standard (legal) business reporting. However, it is this use of disparate methods by departments that causes confusion within the mining company.

The manufacturing industry has learned that integrated scheduling, materials management, production manufacturing, and distribution are the keys to profitability. Yet in a mining company, what is understood in one business department, if managed by non-ERP software such as spreadsheets and tailored stand-alone software, is that financial integration is time-consuming and fraught with errors, and it does not allow a coherent view of the company’s operations or a true measure of annual profit.

Table 1 depicts similarities between the basic departmental structure of a mining company and a manufacturer, but this article focuses specifically on one overview of the departmental structure of mineral mining.
1. Exploration
Geologists are the mining company’s major explorers. Often the geologist’s work is to follow the ore vein at an existing mine, other times it is fieldwork. The geologist collaborates with the mining engineer in exploration and in extending operations at an existing site.

In the past, the land to be surveyed was walked; samples taken were labeled and put into knapsacks for later analysis. Newer methods now use aircraft with instrumentation to look at anomalies to the earth’s magnetic field as well as at soil colorations and vegetation as indications of vast ore bodies lying beneath the earth’s surface. This primary information is used to limit where the geologists begin the on-foot exploration and the extent of their survey. Once a potential ore-bearing area is targeted, the geologist arrives to take samples.

After a potential ore body is discovered, a secondary, in-depth analysis is performed to determine the economics of building a mine. Other (chemical) research determines the amount of the ores’ accompanying minerals, such as sulfur, gold, uranium, and others. Exploration costs include salaries, camps, insurances, aircraft and electromagnetic equipment, and other machinery and materials needed to estimate the ore body size.

Financial considerations that come after an adequate “ore body size” has been confirmed include a lifetime estimate of the mine (based on a prescribed rate of depletion), labor, installation and amortization of fixed assets; cost of converting currency and royalties; and taxes. All things being favorable, the infrastructure planning for roadways, railways, and so forth is done in conjunction with the ore extraction department.

Exploration costs are based on overheads and on time and materials. Typically, this cost is converted to a per diem charge (dollars per day, amortized over a year).

2. Ore Extraction and Excavation
In a typical manufacturing company, a production order is issued to respond to a sales order, sales contract, or a marketing request to make goods to forecasted sales. The mining industry operates in a similar way. The mining sales contract is more often a multiyear (10 years or more) deal. This deal marks the beginning of the refining or smelting process. Multiple sales contracts combined initiate the mining of the ore. Extraction and transportation of the ore is subject to sales and to seasonal requirements, and these operations are managed by the geologist and the engineering groups. In the extraction environment, analysis is performed to determine decline (the angle of a tunnel or the angle of the walls) at an open pit. This ongoing work allows for maximizing safety while ensuring the lowest cost of excavation possible as the dig expands. Too sharp an angle increases risk of collapse, whereas too shallow an angle cuts into the available area for excavation.

At a working mine, consumables and spare machinery parts are inventoried. Geologists now active in the quality control (QC) role measure the quality of the excavated material and its accompanying minerals. Extraction may be performed by many means, including strip, pit, or in-situ mining (the latter of which uses solutions to dissolve desired metals). As much as possible, the ore is separated from the soil and other accompanying material.

New environmental laws require mining companies to minimize the pollution they might create, with overburden being a prime example. Overburden is the unwanted material that is excavated along with the ore. After separation from the ore, overburden is spread over the exhausted area and covered with topsoil. Other pollutants are recyclable, permitting reuse with a minimal increase in excavation costs. Typically, the financial exercise at the mine is to derive a standard cost per metric ton of metal and to establish a standard quantity of ore that can be extracted to produce a metric ton of metal.

Consumables (e.g., diamond drill bits, dynamite, chemicals, fuel, food, etc.) and fixed assets (e.g., buildings, heavy haul equipment, generators for electricity, air conditioning, etc.) are factored into the cost equation.

Amortizations, depreciation, and the like feed into a set of financial ledgers, weighting factors, and a few transformation rules assigned to each variable, when manipulated, and a cost per metric ton of the ore is derived.

3. Transportation
In the transportation department of large manufacturing organizations, management (logistics) plays a major role in minimizing costs and optimizing delivery routes. But companies in the mining industry have a larger requirement. These companies often need to build their own routes as well as purchase all their rolling stock, since mines are usually located some distance from the smelter or the stockpile area. This stockpile area could be at a wharf, at a smelter, or can even be the ore in transit. (In transit, ore and refined metal are parts of the inventory, and they are added to the measured inventory).

Specific to the mine operation are capital investments for roads, railways, and wharfs and barges needed to haul the ore to the smelter or the delivery of work-in-process metal or finished goods. Actual transportation of product requires another method of costing, based on weight and distance. Truck, rail, and boat each have their weight-distance rates. Costs for fixed assets (overhead cranes or vehicles required for ore transfer from one form of transport mode to another, based on destination) are apportioned out. The operational costs are generally converted and blended to provide an amount per ton–kilometer.

4. Smelting
In a manufacturing factory, inventoried material is scheduled, and the work in process passes multiple workstations, where at every station value is added. A mine operation is somewhat similar. Smelting or refining is the process of converting ore to metal. This is a continuous operation, with ore introduced at the end of the furnace where heating begins. As different metals have different melting points, the ore, which contains these metals, will have each metal siphoned away once its melting point is reached. Value is added as precious metals are extracted from the ore.

Sulfur, an element that accompanies almost every ore, is part of the “raw ore material,” which is consumed in the furnace as part of the mineral extraction process. Sulfur can be the fuel responsible for more then half the heat required to create molten metal. The molten metal is transferred to secondary mixing furnaces. QC activities for blending alloying ingredients, ensuring the purity of the product, and other processing then takes place.

Some internal or external customer contracts demand that the molten metal be poured into molds and then forged to a rough finished product. Other customers take ingot bars for further cold processing. Costs consist of the base smelting, the mixing, the purifying, and transportation. The transportation cost (ton-kilometer rates) is elevated, as the goods shipped require improved handling. The addition of alloys to make a special form of metal increases the finishing or work-in-process costs.

The Seven Deadly Sins of Software Marketing

Marketing collateral does not come cheap. Costs associated with textual content, graphic design, and production quickly add up. Obviously, you want to get an appropriate return on your investment. This article looks at seven common mistakes, or "sins," made when developing marketing collateral for the software industry. The sins discussed consider such concepts as targeting your market, lowering costs, and making it convenient for your potential customers to use your marketing collateral. Also considered are the various forms of marketing, such as hard copy, electronic, and e-mail. Finally, we consider the cost of changing marketing collateral and its reproduction.

However, before we start confessing our sins, we need to state the obvious. Marketing collateral must be tailored to your marketplace and products. To sell a car, you probably would emphasize miles per gallon, passenger accommodation, and maintenance costs. Applying these same metrics to software may not make a lot of sense or demonstrate the strengths of your software products. While it may go without saying, never lose sight of the obvious—know your marketplace. This simple statement is not considered one of the deadly sins because if you are committing this grievous offense, you need to go back to the basics and seriously rethink your marketing plan.

The good news is that committing one sin may not condemn you to marketing hell, but committing enough of them surely will. So, grab your holy water, prayer beads, or whatever your religion provides for protection, and let's proceed.

Sin #1. Hiding Your Message

Have you ever gone to a web site that is plastered with customer testimonials, but with either no indication of what it is selling or, at best, with its products or services written in small print? It's like lighting a candle and covering it with a basket. You need to tell your audience what you are selling, what services you offer, and what support you provide. Tell them up front that "We offer software designed for the process manufacturing industry," "We cater to the food and beverage industry," or "Our software was developed to support the field services industry."

To avoid the "hard sell" approach, it may be helpful to ease into the description of what you have to offer. Consider the example below for the food industry.

They say that "it's the ingredients that make food taste good." However, in a rapidly changing marketplace, it takes a lot more than ingredients to compete effectively and efficiently in the food industry. Our software is designed to take care of the production and operational issues of the food industry so you can focus on the freshness of the ingredients.

Don't assume that your audience already knows what you do. If they did, they probably would not need a marketing brochure in the first place. In creating marketing collateral, assume that the reader is seeing your company and its products for the first time. Stating the obvious is not a bad thing. With marketing collateral—hard copy or electronic—readers already familiar with a particular content can simply read on or scroll down.

In the case of the cluttered web site, consider your own buying practices. If you were buying a car, would you start by finding out what current customers say, or by finding the car that meets your needs? Your next-door neighbor may be enthusiastic about his truck, but you're hauling kids, not lumber. Marketing collateral, which includes the web site, must clearly state what you are about and leave no room for doubt. When developing a piece of marketing material, remember that this is probably a prospect's first introduction to your company and its products and services.

When driving down a highway late at night on a business trip, looking for a place to stop, does the bright neon sign say in big letters "Free HBO" and in small letters "Motel"? Of course not. Likewise, if your marketing material emphasizes effective formula management before you mention that you cater to the chemical industry, you may want to reverse the order.

Sin #2. Swerving off Course

Too often we give up before the finish line is in sight. We become impatient if the results of a marketing campaign are not immediate. Here are some simple facts. Getting more than a 1 percent hit ratio for a marketing campaign is considered a success. So, if you send out a mailer with a response card to 100 prospects and 1 responds, don't give up. It usually takes between eight and ten contacts before you can expect to get your foot into your prospect's door. Accordingly, when planning a monthly e-mailer campaign, make sure you have enough material for at least eight months, hopefully avoiding repetition. Think about your reading habits. If you are extremely busy, you probably push unsolicited mail into your wastebasket and e-mail into your "deleted items" folder. On those rare occasions when you have time, you may actually peruse the mail, if only briefly. This is why success takes so long. The mail habits of your prospects are not much different from yours. However, if you incorporate consistent, eye-catching graphics, the chances are better that visual recognition will kick in a little sooner than normal.

Constantly changing directions confuses your prospects. Let's say your most recent sell was to a computer manufacturer. Now you want to switch to the discrete manufacturing space, when all along you have been proclaiming software development for process. Sure, make the sale, but don't let it change your focus—at least not after the first sale. Constantly changing your marketing plan destroys your credibility. Trying to be all things to all prospects is a bad business plan—and a worse marketing strategy.

There was a local dentist whose slogan was "We cater to cowards." On every piece of literature he sent out, the slogan was prominently displayed. Now, he did not have the advertising budget that most companies have, but after three years, whenever someone mentioned his name, the response was "Oh, the dentist who caters to cowards." Staying the course does pay off.

Sin #3. Failure to Create Reusable Material

Being able to use a piece of marketing collateral for multiple purposes can significantly reduce your overall marketing costs and time to deployment. If considered from the onset, this is not a difficult objective to achieve. If not, there could be a lot of redundant effort.

Let's look at a simple example to illustrate this point. Typically, marketing collateral is available in hard copy for one-on-one meetings, and electronically for ease of transmission. A nice, professional-looking, hard-copy format is an 11 x 17 inch paper folded in half, giving four 8.5 x 11 inch sides to the brochure. While you could easily convert this to a PDF format for electronic transmission, anyone who has tried to read such a document online knows it is like paying Pac-Man with your scroll bar. Left, right, up, and down just to center the content on your screen, making it difficult for the reader to maintain a steady train of thought. However, the advantage of the 11 x 17 inch format is that it can be easily converted into four 8.5 x 11 inch pages. When this document is converted to a PDF, you just read straight down as you would a normal paper document. When advance consideration is given to the various ways of using a piece of marketing material, your overall costs can be reduced.

Agreeing on a standard format and content can eliminate the typical floundering phase that goes into any creative process. Don't be afraid to reuse textual content. An example will illustrate this idea. In process manufacturing, you are always talking about formulas, pack recipes, ingredients, and scalability. If one of the sections of the marketing piece talks about software functions and features, it is all right to repeat these common aspects in a brochure for the food and beverage industry as well as for the chemical industry. Some might say that you are being redundant. Of course you are. The industries are both process-manufacturing-oriented. Furthermore, you are not going to send the same prospect both the food and beverage and the chemical brochures. With this approach, you need only pepper the functions and features with the uniqueness of each industry—say, catch weight for food and beverage, and carcinogenic reporting for chemicals.

You also want to give some thought to the preferred method of delivery for marketing information to prospects. An electronic transmission with an attachment or an e-mail campaign is the least intrusive and least costly. The problem is getting the e-mail addresses. Unless you have made a concerted effort to obtain addresses over a sustained period of time, the campaign may not have much impact. While you can buy lists, you do not get the list. The owner of the list e-mails your message. Consequently, you must rebuy the list each time. E-books—brochures that you read online as if you were turning the pages of a book—present the most professional-looking, electronic delivery mechanism. Unfortunately, they are typically executable files, which many corporate servers reject as potential virus-spreading attachments.

Another technique is useful for trade shows, where you can expect to meet a cross section of prospects. For them, burn all of your marketing collateral onto a CD, indexed by industry and topic. Essentially, you are creating a highly adaptable CD-based marketing (CBM) environment. If you have ever been to a trade show, you know that repacking for the trip home can be a humbling and difficult experience. Let's face it: you have to leave room for the stress balls, tote bags, and, if there is still room, vendor brochures. CDs take up little room. Since marketing material rarely consumes all of the space on a CD, you can re-burn it with updated information. The major cost components—the physical CD, label, and case—are reusable.

Tamkeen hosts comprehensive workshop for partners

Tamkeen hosted one of the most comprehensive workshops for its training and consultancy partners, spelling out Tamkeen's priorities and way forward, the role of Tamkeen in empowering Bahrainis to become stakeholders in the leadership's Vision 2030 development matrix and its priorities in the months ahead.
Over 200 Tamkeen partners who handle training programmes, ranging from hospitality programmes to human resources and from accountancy programmes to occupational health and safety, in addition to private sector support programmes partners also attended the event.

Tamkeen's Chief Executive Mr. Abdulellah Al-Qassimi delivered an overview on 'Vision 2030 - The way forward' which detailed Tamkeen's role in realizing the leadership's goals and responding to the aspirations and needs of Bahrainis.

This theme was then taken forward by Dr. Nasser Al-Qaedi, Senior Manager in Tamkeen's Planning & Development department, whose topic 'Tamkeen's 2010 - 2014 strategy' touched upon Tamkeen's plans and how to put them into action.

Furthermore, Dr. Ahmed Al Shaikh, Vice President - Enterprise and Human Capital Development, gave a presentation on Tamkeen's achievements and the way forward, highlighting more than 50 programmes by Tamkeen for human capital development and private sector support with an investment of over BD100m.

Partners were given a detailed tour of Tamkeen's operations by Mrs. Suha Karzoun, Vice President of Finance and Support - with a detailed presentation on how projects are conceived, planned and tendered, what Tamkeen expects of its partners, how Tamkeen carries the message of change management and development and its resources to stakeholders.

As for Tamkeen's Communication strategy, Mrs. Hala Sulaiman - Marketing Communication Manager, focused on the importance of communicating Tamkeen's messages of change management and positive work attitudes to all stakeholders in the community.

commented Tamkeen's Marketing Communications Manager, Hala Suleiman.

"As an agency that is responsive to market needs and flexible to market changes, we believe that all our partners have to be on the same page if we are to succeed and this workshop is a channel of communication that we follow for maximum effect," she added.

Dell launches new system management features and new Dell PowerEdge servers

Today Dell introduced new system management features as well as new Dell PowerEdge servers to address the evolving technology demands of large enterprises, small-to-medium-sized businesses and public organisations, providing them flexible and reliable solutions to help them grow and thrive.

Dell is introducing nine PowerEdge blade, rack-mount and tower servers and three Dell Precision tower workstations updated with the new Intel Xeon 5600 "Westmere-EP" series of processors, as well as new enhancements to Dell Lifecycle Controller and Dell Management Console (DMC). These hardware and software solutions offer customers outstanding management capabilities while providing a robust IT platform for virtualisation, server consolidation, mission critical business and database applications.

Dell has designed and built its 11th generation of PowerEdge servers to be more responsive and "intelligent" with the inclusion of the industry's only embedded system management, Lifecycle Controller. The new Lifecycle Controller 1.3, an embedded technology on the Dell server motherboard can help simplify and speed the most time-consuming IT tasks such as system deployment, system updates, workload migration hardware configuration and diagnostics from the desktop to the data centre. Independent tests show that with Dell embedded management that the Dell PowerEdge R710 delivered 58 percent faster pre-OS deployment than the HP ProLiant DL380 G6.

Plus, every Dell PowerEdge server comes with the latest version of Dell Management Console (DMC), which provides IT administrators a unified view of their IT infrastructure. The latest release includes a new power monitoring feature that provides greater awareness of server power consumption, allowing more informed decisions which can lead to lower energy use and cost savings. It also provides "Out of Band" server BIOS and firmware updating that reduces administration time and improves flexibility. The net result is these enhanced systems management capabilities can reduce or eliminate manual processes allowing customers to spend more time on strategic projects.

Something for Everyone—Nine Dell PowerEdge Servers Featuring Intel Xeon 5600 Processors
Dell is offering the new Intel Xeon 5600 series processors across its entire line of two-socket PowerEdge servers, including two blade servers (M710, M610), four rack servers (R710, R610, R510, R410) and three tower servers (T710, T610, T410). With Intel Xeon 5600-based PowerEdge servers, customers can realise better overall system performance increases of up to 69% and energy efficiency improvements of up to 47% compared to Dell PowerEdge servers with Xeon 5500 processor technology.

In addition, customers can:

- Get more computing done with embedded virtualisation hypervisors, generous memory footprints and I/O capabilities on Dell PowerEdge 11th generation servers to consolidate the application workloads of several servers onto one.

- Help improve energy efficiency through Dell Energy Smart Design enhancements including power supply units right-sized for system requirements, enhanced system-level design efficiency, policy-driven power and thermal management and highly efficient, standards-based Energy Smart components. Energy Smart design focuses on maximising useful work performed per-watt consumed.

- Bolster system and data security with Intel Advanced Encryption Standard New Instructions (AES-NI) and Trusted Execution Technology (TXT) to help protect against emerging software attacks. AES-NI enables broader use of encryption throughout the data centre and can make the encryption and decryption process efficient for customers.

Dell's line of PowerEdge servers offers large enterprises, public organisations and small-to-medium sized businesses reliable, high-value IT solutions that help them grow and thrive. Dell PowerEdge servers powered by Intel Xeon 5600 processing technology are globally available through Dell and its PartnerDirect channel partners from 23rd March 2010.

New Rack Server for Small to Midsize Customers
Dell is also introducing the PowerEdge R310 in early April, a new high-performance, 1-socket 1U rack server with the right combination of scalable computing power, value and enterprise-class features to meet the diverse needs of small businesses and larger enterprises alike. The compact, energy efficient PowerEdge R310 with the Intel Xeon 3400 series processors is ideal for applications such as Microsoft Windows Small Business Server, Business Center Essentials, SQL Workgroup/Standard, Oracle 11g Standard, VMware, Active Directory and SharePoint. Like all 11th generation PowerEdge servers, the R310 takes advantage of simplified systems management via Dell's embedded Lifecycle Controller along with state-of-the-art serviceability and diagnostics with optional interactive LCD. Other features include:

- RAID configurations to help increase data reliability and/or increase I/O;
- Flexible choices in operating systems for flexibility for diverse computing workloads. Choose from Microsoft Windows, Red Hat, Novell SUSE, VMware XenServer and Solaris; and,
- Energy-optimised technologies, including lower wattage power supplies.

Dell Precision Tower Workstations featuring the Intel Xeon 5600 Processors
In addition to introducing nine new Dell PowerEdge servers based on Intel Xeon 5600 series processors, the company is making available three new workstations in the coming weeks—the Dell Precision T7500, T5500 and T3500 models. Tailored and optimised for 3D design and animation, engineering, oil and gas exploration, scientific visualisation and defense professionals who are seeking standards-based solutions that enable greater flexibility, improved performance and the ability to help their business thrive.

"Intel has focused on three key areas when developing our latest Xeon 5600 series processors—security, virtualisation and energy efficient performance," said Kirk Skaugen, vice president and general manager of Intel's Data Centre Group. "Dell has chosen to use the Xeon 5600 across its entire 2-socket portfolio, using unique-to-Intel features such more cores and cache, and new security features, making these servers an ideal cornerstone for any enterprise, capable of meeting the computing demands of businesses of all sizes."

"IT organisations are under increasing pressure to improve business productivity while prioritising technology spend within decreasing budgets. Dell's 11th generation Dell PowerEdge servers help customers spend more time on creating business value and less on planning, deploying and maintaining IT with customer inspired design and advanced systems management," said Mohamed Halawa, Dell's Enterprise marketing manager. "With massive performance gains from greater memory and processing power in our updated servers and built in reliability to minimise single points of failure, Dell is helping companies achieve better business results."

DTCM Showcases dynamic Dubai to the world at ITB

For the 21st consecutive year, the Dubai Department of Tourism and Commerce Marketing (DTCM) participated in the International Tourism Exchange (ITB), showcasing Dubai's tourism product offerings at the world's biggest tourism fair in Berlin.
Joining DTCM as co-participants at the five-day fair from March 10 to 14 were the emirate's tourism industry stakeholders, including hotels, tour operators, airlines, and destination management companies (DMCs).

The B2B platform for travel trade visitors, the ITB took place at hall numbers 1 to 26 of the Berlin Exhibition Grounds (ICC Berlin). The importance that this fair enjoys is reflected in the exhibitors' sales of about five billion Euros and an exhibitors' satisfaction rate of 92 per cent. This year's edition had an overall exhibition space of 160,000 square metres.

Approximately 11,000 exhibitors from more than 180 countries presented the latest travel trends and tourism products at the 44th edition of ITB. The world's leading travel trade show expected around 100,000 trade visitors and 70,000 members of the general public to attend.

Mr. Saleh Mohammed Al Geziry, DTCM Director of Overseas Promotions and Inward Missions, who headed the Dubai team, said: "The ITB remains an ideal event for us to aggressively promote and market Dubai in overseas markets. It again provided us the opportunity to showcase the best of Dubai to a global audience. We are confident that our co-partners will benefit immensely from the ITB."

He said the participation in ITB will also help Dubai tourism industry players to reach out to Germans who have been showing unfaltering interest in Dubai as a year-round business and leisure destination.

The DTCM delegation also included Mr. Abdullah bin Suwaidan, DTCM Deputy Director of Overseas Promotions, and Mr. Ali Abdul Wahab, Head of East and West Europe at DTCM Overseas Promotions.

Among the VIPs who visited the stand included Mr. Mohammed Khamis bin Hareb, Director General of UAE's National Council for Tourism and Antiquities, UAE ambassador to Germany, H.E Mohammed Ahmad Al Mahmoud, and Mr. Fadi Abboud, Lebanese Minister of Tourism.

Measuring 528 square metres, the double-decker Dubai Stand had 58 booths and 111 co-participants. There were 52 booths and 96 co-participants at the Dubai stand last year's edition.

Germany has remained a key source market for Dubai's vibrant tourism industry with a three per cent growth last year in the number of German hotel guests which stood at 283,319. The number of tour operators promoting Dubai in Germany went up by seven per cent to reach 296. The number of Germany nationals utilizing the Dubai airport in the year 2008 was 1,391,892, an increase of four per cent

Oman Air appoints Maitha Al Mahrouqi as Country Manager Oman

Oman Air announced the appointment of Maitha Al Mahrouqi as country manager for Oman. Born, brought up and partly educated in Oman, Maitha brings with her a wealth of experience and knowledge that she acquired within a span of a decade.

She also carries with her the tag of perhaps being the first female cartographer from the region, and the first Omani cartographer as well.

Maitha started her airlines stint with Emirates where she began her career as reservation and ticketing, sales and holidays officer and moved over to Gulf Air as the airline's Business Development Manager. She was subsequently promoted as the General Manager of Gulf Air for Oman, where she was in charge of the entire sales teams, their target and the projected growth.
As Country Manager for Oman Air, Maitha will be responsible for the target of key hub station - Oman, optimising the sales revenue and seeking ways and means of promoting Oman Air through various sales channels.

Abdulrazaq Alraisi, General Manager Worldwide Sales, Oman Air says: "Oman Air is very happy with the appointment of Maitha, as she brings with her exceptional qualities and qualifications required for this post. We are sure that Oman Air will greatly benefit from her expertise and experience and the persistent hard work that sets Maitha apart from others. We wish her all the best in her new role, which we are sure she would execute with elan and efficiency."

With her exposure of working with the major airlines of the region, Maitha has the knowledge and competence in leading sales operations, reservation, ticketing, holidays-packaging, revenue-optimisations techniques and the related support services.