Sandra Vaughan

The concept of organizations keeping a watchful eye on employees during company hours is nothing new. From the introduction of the time card 120 years ago, which required employees to clock in at the beginning and end of the work day, employee monitoring has evolved from simple confirmation that individuals are present and accounted for, to more detailed insight into employee activities taking place while "on the clock."

It's pretty unlikely that employees wished this holiday season for even more email and spam messages to be waiting for them in their inboxes each morning. However, the reality is that organizations - across all industries - have experienced a dramatic increase in inbound email over the past calendar year, much of which is spam, and inbound email volumes will likely continue to increase at a rapid pace during 2007.

When it comes to smart technology investments, few new technologies can match virtualization for drop-dead-obvious ROI. You don't need a degree in accounting to understand that the ability to increase server and storage capacity without having to invest a dime in additional hardware means huge cost savings. Savings not only in terms of hardware costs, but also in the power consumption, heat dissipation and management costs associated with deploying additional hardware. It is the ultimate in server consolidation.