Kathryn Averyheart

[sayit]It may seem easy to buy a simple technology tool such as a laptop. But many questions can swirl around even such a modest purchase. When CDW works with organizations on hardware purchases, we talk about how staff members plan to use the devices, how much memory they will need and other factors such as…

Creating a solid use case for data is like cooking a great meal. You need the correct ingredients, or data. You also have to take special needs into consideration (is anyone allergic to any ingredients? is the data sensitive, subject to regulation?). With both food and data, you want to know where it’s sourced (is…

When I talk to customers about their initiatives, I hear most often about the Internet of Things and connected cities. Customers are enthusiastic about connected initiatives because they understand the value of efficient communication. If first responders share information, help will get where it needs to go faster, more accurately and with more intent than…

As a senior data center architect, I work regularly with organizations such as police forces, county health departments and state election agencies. These organizations face different challenges, and each has different ways that it wants to achieve its mission. But my conversations with the people in these organizations reveal meaningful similarities among them. Generally, the…

We live in uncertain times, when elections are often called into question, at the local, national and even global level. It is in this environment that we at CDW•G find ourselves having conversations with customers and partners about election security. While the security of election infrastructure is not the entire conversation, after all, hackers can…

In January 2003, I came to CDW from a career in the banking industry. I applied for a sales position — an area I was familiar with and one for which I was incredibly qualified. I didn’t know technology at the time, but I knew how to study and how to talk to people. Around…

Radio frequency identification (RFID) has been around for a long time. In the 1940s it was used successfully to identify airplanes. In the '60s and '70s, still a government technology, it was used to keep secrets safe and restrict access to sensitive areas. In the '80s, passive tags were created. This helped reduce the price…

The test and development process is central to how companies grow their offerings and reach a wider customer base. Today, customers are quick to jump ship for new features and better service level agreements. Development teams seek to deliver new products as quickly as possible, while operations struggle to keep pace. Helping development, operations and…

— by Kathryn Averyheart, Jim Dacey and Dan Shoultz The CDW data center team has become accustomed to seeing advance after advance in technology from the Nutanix team. It’s great to watch them, year after year, changing the technology conversation at so many of our customers, and generally making running and growing business easier and…

There are many words and phrases floating in the technosphere about Big Data. You may hear data-driven decision-making, analytics, Big Data, IoT, IoE, IoL, Hadoop, Hortonworks, Splunk, HPE Vertica, EMC Isilon, N4mative. Some of these are trendy phrases that don’t really help anyone be strategic about their data, and others are companies who have the…

“Be Greater than Average.” — NASA slogan In December 2002 I interviewed at CDW for an account manager position. I was so nervous I would be late that I took a cab from Union Station to the CDW offices, less than two blocks away. Chicago was gray, painted in unwelcoming wintry colors – but the…

In my last mPOS blog post, I talked about the definition of and the benefits behind mobile point of sale. To recap, mobile point of sale is essentially a smartphone, tablet or dedicated wireless device that acts as a cash register or electronic point of sale terminal (POSint-of-sale terminal). A bad point of sale experience can cost a…

According to David Gosman, CEO of pcAmerica, 26 percent of people will leave a brick-and-mortar store if they are having a bad customer service experience. And of those 26 percent, seven percent of those customers will leave permanently. That is a huge statistic. That means that retail store personnel can do everything correctly – merchandising…

Businesses live and die by metrics. Everywhere, the sheer volume of data is being examined, reexamined and leveraged. Let’s take a look at one part of the business world – more specifically, the retail space – to see what this industry is doing in Big Data. The term Big Data isn’t new and the idea…