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Stories about the plight of IT remind me of commercials that feature the haggard, overextended information worker who really could manage the work if he had eight minds working for him at the same time on the tasks at hand.

With each new device comes another load of work to support the people who bring in the new smartphone or increasingly, the iPad. The work is ever mounting.

Google announced the Google Apps Certification Program today. The program will certify IT professionals who have demonstrated the ability to sell, deploy, develop and support Google Apps. The first certification is the Goolge Apps Certified Deployment Specialist, "which certifies IT professionals who have demonstrated the fundamental knowledge and skills required to migrate to, configure, and deploy Google Apps."

Forrester released today a report called Caution: IT Investment May Be Hurting US Job Growth. The report's authors - Andrew Bartels, Christopher Mines and Sarah Musto - note that despite record corporate profits, unemployment remains unchanged. Forrester notes that poor job growth both causes and is caused by poor economic growth. It's a vicious cycle.

The report suggests that corporations are investing in IT instead of hiring workers. The analysts looked at research from 62 industries to find out what's going on. The report says that the industries with the highest IT investment are also the ones with the biggest decline in jobs. The analysts conclude that there is a causal connection between IT investment growth and the lack of employment growth.

RedMonk's James Governor and EMC VP of Global Marketing Chuck Hollis are calling for enterprises to put information on the balance sheet. In other words, start considering useful information as an asset and poorly managed information as a liability.

"If you've got an expensive manufacturing machine, you invest periodically to keep the asset running in top shape, otherwise its value falls sharply over time," writes Hollis. "Are information bases any different? How many databases in your organization are providing declining value simply because there isn't a regular program of data maintenance and enhancement?"

According to the 2010 Practices & Salary Report from HDI, an IT service and technical support membership association, 67% of the IT help desks surveyed reported an increased number of support requests in 2010. Roughly the same number reported an increase in 2009. Meanwhile, a report from Computer Economics shows that spending on help desk support has decreased. Patrick Thibodeau covered both reports for computerworld.com.

Curtis Franklin Jr. has written a post for Enterprise Efficiency on becoming a better IT manager. Specifically, Franklin's advice is on how to manage IT teams - not contracts or technologies. He notes that although some elements are important for all managers, there are some distinct skills necessary for managing the sorts of people that gravitate towards careers in IT. Some of Franklin's points are obvious ("hire well"), but all bear repeating.

We talked to Michael Krigsman, the CEO of Asuret and writer of the IT Project Failures blog, about why IT projects fail and what can be done about it. Krigsman says there is no "magic bullet" for ensuring success or preventing failure but there are some common mistakes that can be avoided.

Customers, consultants, and vendors form The Devil's Triangle. These are the three parties that are a part of every major software deployment. Each has got to get its part of the deployment process right or the whole thing will be a bust. Krigsman told us the most crucial things each party needs to get right and gave some advice on how each party can reduce the chances of project failure.

Considering a job in IT? We've covered some of the reasons that perhaps you shouldn't and what could be done about them. But there are plenty of good reasons to consider a career in IT. For example: good pay, better than average job prospects and the chance to work with cutting edge technology. However, there are a few things you should know before you get into the industry. ZDNet's Jason Hiner has compiled a list of 10 dirty little secrets you should know about working in IT.

Last week ReadWriteEnterprise editor Alex Williams and I attended Salesforce.com's annual user conference Dreamforce. And we've got more coming up, like Lotusphere and SAPPHIRE NOW.

For journalists, these events are great because we get to cover new announcements and talk to both vendors and users. But I'm curious how users actually find these types of events. Do you find them helpful? If not, why not? Why do you go to user conferences?

BMC and Salesforce.com announced a new joint venture today: RemedyForce - a hosted IT management system based on BMC's popular Remedy product and the Force.com platform. In an announcement today, Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff described RemedyForce as "the next major Salesforce cloud offering." At the core of RemedyForce is IT Service Desk, formerly known as Service Desk on Force.com.