1. Cloud-based backup. It's insecure, bound to be hacked - never mind the encryption, teh haxxors can get around that stuff! So we're back to tapes and DVDs before you know it.
2. Virtual machines, but only if I make the mistake of telling them. It gives some people the willies for the same reason as (1) above, plus the supposed problems of a "shared" server. Also, if a server is outside our firewall they think it's less secure.
3. Google mail. They prefer Exchange for reasons which remain a mystery to me. I hate Exchange, love Google Mail and everything that comes with it. Even using Gmail via Outlook is mysteriously deficient for my colleagues.
4. Google Docs. Being able to collaborate on-line is not a very big benefit. The familiarity of MS Office is.
Things which do work:
1. iPads. This is the machine which will put me, an IT tech, out of work. Hasten the day.
2. Dropbox. Simple paradigm and works with the iPad.
3. All the clunky, difficult-to-manage, badly-designed software they've been using for years and have come to love in all their ugliness. It makes me weep.
The thing which will change this is the arrival of younger, more IT-literate people in the workplace. I have no problems at all with the under-30s; all the problems in the world with people older than that (not all of them but enough to be a permanent drag on progress). The simple fact is that these people will even shy away from something as superb as MailChimp's or Google's admin interfaces: too many buttons! They always get me to do it for them, and I will have a job in IT for as long as I want it.