Things that go 'blip' in the night.

Got a PC on your desk? A laptop in your briefcase? A cell phone cradled in your palm? Are you surfing the Not every chance you get? Sending e-mails to everyone up and down your supply chain? Keep it up, and someday you my even be able to talk with your CIO!

Things that go "beep," "blip," and "brrrring" can drive a CEO crazier than a gyrating stock market. Systems crash; reams of e-mail messages clutter the mailbox; cell phones go dead.

But oh, how they love the convenience! Not long ago, it was easy to find a majority of CEOs personally eschewing technology in favor of such old-fashioned tools as a paper and pen. Today, though, it seems many have discovered the joys of electronics - even as they struggle mightily to master all the gizmos. We recently checked in with six CEOs to get a sense of how well they each have mastered the technology game - and how far they feel they still have to go. If you've been fearing taking the plunge, maybe their experiences will embolden you.

"IN DANGER OF BEING A NERD"

David F. D'Alessandro, President and COO, John Hancock Mutual Life Insurance Co.

If you're looking for David F. D'Alessandro at 3 o'clock in the morning, you might find him on the Internet. Since he doesn't need much sleep, D'Alessandro finds that hour to be the perfect time to surf the Web. "You never get a busy signal, and it's a lot faster," he laughs. These days, the president and COO of the Boston-based life insurance giant does a good portion of his shopping on-line; he has just, in fact, purchased a cashmere sweater from Scotland, 10 pounds of Kona coffee from Hawaii, and a set of golf clubs for when he eventually takes up the game - all at a 30 to 50 percent discount, compared to retail stores. He also uses his on-line connection to read the major newspapers, which come up at midnight. "My teenage son says I'm on the computer so much I'm in danger of becoming a nerd," he says.

While D'Alessandro admits that in the past few years he has become a Webmeister simply for the enjoyment of it, he also sees how important this sort of mastery is for him as president of an $8.8 billion colossus. "You have to be enthused about on-line activity to be open to the proposals that are coming in, including a $9 million one for the electronic commerce of life insurance," he says. "My familiarity and comfort helps me tell my people that they had better have a product to sell on the Internet soon for two-thirds the cost, because if you can do it for coffee, there is no reason you can't do it for insurance, too."

Surprisingly, the 47-year-old D'Alessandro doesn't have a computer in his office. Having that modem and keyboard nearby would prove distracting, he claims. "I'd want to look up all kinds of personal stuff that I shouldn't want to look up. This way I can focus on what I get paid for." He also refuses to be hooked up to e-mail, so people will be forced to come in and "have a conversation."

When he travels, D'Alessandro does take his laptop with him, primarily for its Internet accessibility -this time for business. "I can run a check on the chairman of a company before I have cocktails with him. It's easier than having to hunt for the latest Wall Street Journal." He also accesses company reports through his laptop, cutting down on the material that once had to be faxed.

As far as his IT staff is concerned, D'Alessandro -who learned to type in journalism school and first became familiar with computers during his 10 years at Control Data -would rather be thought of as a nincompoop than a nerd. "I never pretend around the senior technology people here that I know anything, because then they go into this Star Trek talk, racheting up the conversation with their own vocabulary to levels that I can't understand. I prefer to let them think of me as a simpleton," he says. Let's hope none of them spot him hanging 10 on the Web at 3 A.M.!

"A SHORTFALL AND A CHALLENGE"

John S. Chalsty, Chairman and CEO, Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette

Ten years ago, John Chalsty decided it was time to dive headlong into computers. He bought a PC, read the manual, and started pecking away (his "somewhat slow" typing is still a minor drawback). "With all technologies, you learn mostly by doing," Chalsty says. "Every day that you work the computer, you learn."

Chalsty has been working it pretty much every day since, to the point where he believes he is now "facile enough" with his growing cache of machines. That includes home and office PCs, a laptop, and a hand-held Palm Pilot-brand organizer. The 64-year-old head of the New York-based securities and investment banking firm comfortably uses these computers to plug into his company's intranet and otherwise access corporate financial information, as well as to respond to e-mail messages. The home PC sees additional action writing the family's checks, playing CD-ROMs with the grandchildren, and indulging Chalsty's fascination with the Library of Congress's Web site. ("It's just extraordinary. You can find information on almost anything!" he enthuses.) The Pilot, which he has carried with him like a security blanket in the year-plus since its release, easily connects to the office computer, keeping him up-to-date on both his daily schedule and his list of contacts.

Over the years, Chalsty has found the time to take a handful of classes, including one this past year for CEOs given by the New York Stock Exchange. Heading a $3.5 billion firm in the securities industry, he believes, has helped him keep a constant focus on technology as a business objective. "All securities firms put extraordinary emphasis on computers; every trader is connected; and we have thousands of screens in our firm alone," he says. Launching the company's new on-line brokerage, DLJ Direct, this year gave Chalsty a even greater appreciation for technology's prowess.

But being around 6,800 technological whizzes also has its drawbacks. "There are people who can use computers to do calculations, to investigate alternative cases and scenarios. I am envious of that," he says. But Chalsty isn't just sitting around feeling bad. "The lack of total computer literacy is both a shortfall and a challenge," he says. "I am working very hard at it."

"PRETTY NEAR THE BOTTOM"

T.J. Dermot Dunphy, Chairman and CEO, Sealed Air Corp.

T.J. Dermot Dunphy knows how to use his laptop computer to find his company's Web site, to check for stock prices, to e-mail employees, and to hunt for other easily available information. But he rarely takes the opportunity to do any of that. "I have found the old-fashioned way of getting information works better. I simply ask somebody to get it for me," Dunphy says.

The 65-year-old chief of the Saddle Brook, NJ-based bubble-wrap manufacturer prefers his information in hard copy, he says, because he does "a lot of reading and heavy-duty thought processing in a car, plane, or at my home"; because he feels it's easier to whip out a little pocket diary than a bigger, heavier machine; and because he prefers face-to-face communication to typing words into a static screen. "I spent a large part of my early business life discouraging memo writing because too many people do it to look good or to protect themselves, leading to abuse and a colossal waste of time. I now find myself carrying on the same charge in terms of resisting e-mail," he explains. "Neither I nor my secretary can be reached by e-mail, and I intend to keep it that way."

The technology Dunphy most prefers is voice mail, which he uses extensively to communicate with clients, employees, and anyone else needing to keep in touch.

But Dunphy is hardly oblivious to the important role computers play. "I am fairly advanced in the sense of understanding the uses of information technology on a global basis to change the way a company works," he says. His own $790 million company is, in fact, in the midst of developing a global information system, which will eventually enable any Sealed Air salesperson anywhere in the world to access real-time information about a customer or supplier instantaneously. That project will take on even greater significance as the 4,200-employee company acquires a division of W.R. Grace next year, boosting the head count to about 15,000.

While Dunphy has so far been content with his status "pretty near the bottom in terms of my own ability to use computers," he admits to being ambivalent about holding himself up as a Luddite-like poster boy. "I share a great sense of inferiority when it comes to technology, but I may have to get more up to speed. Technology is the overpowering work process for the entire organization and I know I ought to be more comfortable with it." Toward that end, Dunphy has taken a Computer Associates' CEO computer course and may resign himself to a few more lessons in the coming year.

"DIALING IN FROM RESTAURANTS"

Jim McCann, President 1-800-FLOWERS

In 1982, Jim McCann figured his eight - and growing - flower shops could benefit from their customer databases being on computers. With few employees and no IT personnel, he knew the job of learning about what he needed was his alone, so he got up one morning and headed for the nearest Computerland store. After playing around with the machines there, he bought an IBM PC for $5,500. What followed were many frustrating nights and weekends figuring out the commands for an expensive, complicated piece of hardware "that essentially did nothing," he jokingly recalls.

Today, with 150 franchised stores and $300 million in revenues, McCann's favorite computer toy is his palmtop, which cost $600 and does "10 times what that old PC did" -at a minuscule fraction of its weight. "I take it everywhere, and it allows me to do anything I want, because it has Microsoft Windows CE on it and I dial through a wireless modem to my office computers," McCann says. "I can often be found dialing in from restaurants to update information in my computers."

That cache of computers includes office desktop and portable models, a laptop, and a home PC, all networked together. McCann primarily uses these computers for scheduling, project management (with direct reports all having access to needed files), and on-line access. Push technology is also a hit with the time-pressed McCann. "I use PointCast on all my machines. It crystallizes the vast amount of information to the relevant stock information and stories that I need. A lot of that is even sent to my beeper."

For all his equipment and experience, however, McCann describes himself as "awkwardly competent" with technology. In one pocket he may carry his palmtop, he says, but in the other he has a regular old tape recorder, which he dictates into all the time. "Computers don't come as second nature to me as they do to my teenage boys," he says. "I worried when they were young that they were wasting time with those video games, but now I see that it was training them for all the technology they will encounter." (It was McCann's son who taught him to use the Internet, although, he jokes, "I wanted to skip some of the sites he selected to show me.")

As to his 2,000-employee, Westbury, NY-based florist business, McCann prides himself on helping it move to the technology vanguard. The company recently updated its system to allow it to quadruple in size without an MIS concern and now provides member florists with Internet access to everything from the flower auctions in Holland to the company's formerly place-based employee-training program.

One thing McCann knows for sure is that customers don't care a whir about all the technology he and his MIS staff (15 new professionals this year alone) work so hard to deploy. "I used to think customers would be impressed to know how much we were spending on technology and what state-of-the-art equipment we were using," he says. "But I have come to see that they aren't. All they want to know is that we are making whatever investment is required to get the best product delivered on time for someone's special occasion." In other words, they want the technology to be as invisible and easy to use as McCann had initially prayed his '82 PC would be.

"E-MAIL IS WONDERFUL"

Robert B. Knutson, Chairman and CEO, Education Management Co.

In 1965, Robert B. Knutson, a staffer at Morgan Guaranty Trust (now J.P. Morgan) called on an electronics-company client who ushered him through its laboratory and proudly showed off the hand-held calculators the company had recently invented. "Then they told me they wouldn't be selling them in the near future," Knutson recalls, "because they thought the public wouldn't be accepting."

Knutson, who, thanks to several years as an Air Force fighter pilot, was quite comfortable with technological gizmos, was thrilled when those hand-held models finally appeared - released a few years later by a different company.

Today, the 63-year-old chief of 15 proprietary post-secondary schools -including the New York Restaurant School and numerous art institutions - eagerly awaits tomorrow's technology, too. "I'm looking forward to the day when we have phones, computers, and the like all rolled into one portable personal communicator, where we will always be trackable and can send and receive both voice and digital communication," Knutson says.

While he waits, his current technology collection includes a Motorola PageNet that provides both his messages and assorted financial and business news, and two laptops, which he uses largely for interactivity (in addition to his personal weekend passion: flight simulation games). He also uses a palmtop when traveling for storing phone files and other information.

The palmtop uses a modem, as do the laptops, to allow access to e-mail, the application that Knutson most adores - at least until that all-in-one communicator debuts. He spends between 20 and 40 minutes daily reading and reacting to the 30 or so messages he gets every day and composing his own letters and reports to his senior staff. His company has just 2,500 employees, but 1,800 have e-mail accounts. "E-mail is wonderful. You can get the word out and easily elicit responses. You have this terrific daisy-chain of people involved at the same time, just by the press of a button," he says.

About the only area where technology gets a thumbs-down from the head of the Pittsburgh-based, $183 million company is scheduling -thanks to the time a few years ago when his itinerary and phone contacts were lost when his laptop crashed during an important trip. Now his schedule is safely Stored in a paper planner.

Staying on top of the latest and greatest technology is easy for Knutson, since his graphics schools need to be equipped with cutting-edge machines. "I am constantly learning about what [is cutting edge] by listening in my office, seeing what companies are using when I'm on the road, and reading extensively. It requires continual study."

"HOW DID THE WOLVERINES DO?"

Woody Morcott, Chairman and CEO, Dana Corporation

Not long ago when Woody Morcott gave a speech, he used slides to illustrate his important points. Sometimes, the light would burn out on the projector or a slide would appear on screen upside down. And his speech had to be set in advance so the slides could be made; then it couldn't be tinkered with from one audience to another. No more. Morcott is a much happier man on the speaker's circuit now, thanks to PowerPoint, the Microsoft chart-making program that many say has revolutionized not only presentations but the thinking that goes into them. "I can change what I want to say right until the time of the speech, and we stay current with our images more easily and cost effectively," Morcott observes.

Morcott is a man delighted by the technological improvements that are making his work and home -life easier. He always travels with his laptop, both to access his office and to use for those malleable presentations. He keeps in touch with his grown children around the country by e-mailing them. He uses a high-speed modem to check out his own company's intranet and the Internet as well as his competitors' sites. And he has his eye on a Skytel pager currently worn by his CFO, "which not only gives the latest stock price, but can tell me how my Michigan Wolverines played the night before."

The 58-year-old head of the $7.6 billion Toledo, OH-based company that provides engineering, manufacturing, and distribution for auto engine and other industrial markets says it is his charge to remain on the cutting edge, since technology is one of the disciplines he has selected for overseeing for his world operating committee. "I need to stay current of the latest trends, which is easier said than done. I would like to describe myself as very technologically literate, though I'm sure there are some new applications that I haven't heard about yet," he says. And while he doesn't sit in on IT meetings-seeing himself "as the visionary who should set high standards for technology and let our people decide what advances they want to implement" -he is thrilled by the company's recent implementation of Oracle software, allowing Dana to assess the technological advances it might benefit from in the manufacturing arena.

Meryl Davids, a Fort Lauderdale, FL-based freelance writer, is a frequent contributor to Chief Executive. She recently took a close look at the chief executives running the CE100.