Posted Date: 3/7/2011

The Gadgets I Can't Live Without: Pat Smith

Pat Smith
CIO, Our Kids of Miami-Dade/Monroe, Inc.

Pat Smith has more than 25 years of IT experience. She is currently the CIO at Our Kids of Miami-Dade/Monroe, Inc., an organization that creates safe havens for children and families through adoption and foster care. Prior to Our Kids, she spent 10 years at Stiefel Laboratories, Inc. (now GlaxoSmithKline), where she served as the global VP of IT.  She has won the 2009 Mobile Enterprise Mobilizer Award, the Intel IT Professional Award for Fleet Management, and the Miami Chamber of Commerce Technology Leader of the Year Award for 2010.   

---

Indispensable Travel Tool
BlackBerry 9700
One time I was held in immigration in India for 14 hours because of a mix-up in paperwork. The BlackBerry device had been available there for less than three weeks. It was my lifeline to my office, my family, and the embassy. I can’t imagine what it would have been like without it.

---

On My Desk
Anoto Digital Pen
We deployed this digital pen to the legal staff that works with our foster children in court. They keep the paper for their files; we scrape the data for our system, and children in foster care have their cases resolved quicker and are back to permanent homes. Everybody wins!

---

Strictly Personal
iPad
I almost put this under favorite entertainment device because I’m enthralled, delighted, and discover new things to do with it every time I use it. I always used to say that when I retired that I would give up technology. Having made a career in IT all my life, when I come home from work, I wanted to get away from IT. But the iPad has changed all that for me.  The intuitive interface, the beautiful screen, and the ease of using new applications has made me a convert and I almost miss it when I haven’t used it for awhile!

---

Entertainment
iPod
Portable, personal, and awesome sound.