My expectations? Exceeded. My sense of accomplishment and reward in that position was the highest in my career.

But, it took me a while to find, and it and didn't exactly happen by accident.

Al Kuebler was CIO for AT&T Universal Card, Los Angeles County, Alcatel and McGraw-Hill and director of process engineering for Citicorp. He also directed the consulting activity for CSC Europe. He is now a general management and IT consultant and graduate school lecturer at NYU, De Paul and UCLA. He can be reached at .