John Udell:

"Once upon a time, the PC was pitted against the mainframe in the tussle between freedom and control. Now it's PC versus PC. In this sound clip (1 min 15 secs, mp3) from yesterday's conversation with Ray Ozzie, we hear about an employee with two side-by-side laptops. He does all his work on the home PC, because it has the productivity tools he needs. Then he transfers the results to his locked-down work PC by way of a USB thumbdrive."

Ha! I guess I'm not the only one who does this.

Corporate IT departments follow the Peter Principle, where employees rise their level of incompetence. People are promoted until they suck so much they can't possibly be promoted any more. They stay stuck in a job for which they are neither qualified nor capable.

The company ends up with desktop support and security people who can't support or secure the computer systems, out of incompetence or laziness. They enact asinine policies. They create systems that are not suitable for serving their clients' needs. They create policies and procedures to overcome their personal failings.

So the smart people, those who are able to do their jobs, continue trying to get work done, or they just give up. The smart, capable people work around these bureaucratic impediments. Or they quit, looking for environments that aren't collapsing under their own weight.