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Risk #1: IT – Business disconnect

Posted on May 3, 2012 | Leave a comment

The first risk listed in the Six Key Risks a CIO Must Avoid post is, , ,

There is a reason why I listed this one first. I believe the biggest risk of all is when the IT organization is focused on “X, Y, and Z” and your company needs you to focus on “A,B and C”.

Studies have suggested for many years that over 50% of all IT organizations are out of sync with their company, , , i.e., the “business”. I’ve seen this firsthand in many situations and the interesting thing about it is that, , , the CIO doesn’t realize or think he or she is out of sync when it occurs.

It’s such a big deal that you see in most CEO and CIO surveys that this issue is almost always in the Top 3 of their List of Concerns.

It only takes an hour or two in an IT assessment to discover if the IT organization is “in sync” or “out of sync” with the business, , , not a lot of time.

So, why do CIO’s who are out of sync with their business clients not realize this?

There could be several reasons but I think it usually comes down to, , , they aren’t communicating with and listening to their client (senior managers and department managers of the company).

Let’s take a quick look at what you hear in an IT assessment when the IT organization is not aligned with the business, , , the “IT – Business disconnect” exists:

Senior managers say:

“We spend a lot of money in IT, but not always sure what it is for or why.”
“We aren’t always aware of what IT is working on.”

If your senior management team says these things, , , you are out of sync with the business.

Here is why, , , if you develop an IT strategy and communicate it with your senior management team and gain their agreement and commitment (meaning they will fund and support it), , , then there is no way for them to say the things I listed above.

Senior management becomes an integral part of your IT strategy. In fact, if you handle it properly, it becomes a “company strategy”, , , not an IT strategy. When other department managers learn about these plans, it comes across less confrontational when it is delivered as a “company plan” versus a set of “IT initiatives”.

So, the key to staying in sync with the business and avoiding an IT – Business disconnect is to:

Conduct an IT assessment to determine the business needs and issues your IT organization should address.
Develop an IT strategy based upon these needs and issues.
Communicate your strategy to the senior management team in order to:
1. Create awareness
2. Gain agreement that it is an appropriate set of initiatives for IT to focus on
3. Gain senior management’s commitment, , , they will fund and support the initiatives you recommend the IT organization should focus on

Do these things and there is no way for you to have an IT – Business disconnect in your company.

Where CIO’s get in trouble is that they don’t take time to conduct a thorough IT assessment and to develop an IT strategy based upon the business needs and issues they would discover. Often, this is because they are focusing on technology, , , and not the business.

It’s all about the business, , , it’s not about the technology.

Technology is only something that’s needed to achieve the ultimate goal of a company, , , technology is usually not the core competency of the company.

Technology is important certainly, , , even critical in most companies, , , but it is not the real focus of the company to achieve its goals and objectives.

Because most of us in IT are shy and introverted, we tend to skip the communication parts. We would prefer to just be able to go work on the projects and not have to communicate where we are going, why we need to do things, , , we would just like to have our teams go do the work.

Unfortunately, this won’t work.

Successful CIO’s know how important effective communication is in their success so they implement communication processes that forces their organization to communicate.

So, develop your recommended initiatives from the business needs and issues, communicate and gain agreement from senior management, , , and then, and only then invest time, resources and money on these projects.

Do this and your IT organization will always be aligned with the business.

Back away from the technical detail

Posted on March 18, 2011 | Leave a comment

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I received an interesting question from one of my Practical IT Manager Newsletter subscribers this morning. I get this type of question a lot so thought I would post it along with my response. It is a great question and I hope my response helps my subscriber and anyone who might read this post.

The situation and question asked
“I have been working with this organization for over 10 years now. I’m the IT manager, and initially started off with only one engineer working (permanent headcount) under me. Over the years the business grew, I now have four engineers (outsourced) reporting to me.

My bosses have informed me that I should take a step back in day to day operations, and have the senior engineer take the lead instead. They want me to focus more on aligning IT with the business, have coffee with the management team members, etc

Am sure you must have heard the above from your other students too. Its just that I am in a dilemma now, i.e., with such a small team how can I possibly restructure it to meet my bosses’ intentions?”

My response
Your management team is correct in wanting you to spend more time better understanding your client and their needs and issues and less time focusing on the technology. The fact you have been there for 10 years says they have a lot of confidence in you and that you are pretty much a permanent fixture with everyone, , , but probably more so as a technician than a true manager.

The other thing I picked up in your message is that they want you to spend more time with the other managers of the company. This is good stuff and yet another vote of confidence in you from your senior managers.

As you grow, your job must become more of a true manager role rather than a technical role. It’s understandable that you have had to be technical up until now and operate at best in a “player/coach” mode. Because of the minimal staff, you have had to handle much of the technical responsibilities yourself.

Your ability to pull away from being the technical expert should take place gradually over time. At even the small number of staff you have in place now, you need to become more of the visionary, planner and one who can delegate technology initiatives, , , not the doer.

You also need to be able to spend more time with your clients to better understand their needs and issues, , , not in keeping your technical skills at an “expert” level.

As your company grows, senior management needs you to become more of a business manager who knows how to identify appropriate technology initiatives and place the appropriate focus on them in order to support the real business, , , your senior managers and department managers and their employees.

Pulling back is not easy. In fact, it may be the hardest transition you will ever go through, , , but it truly is necessary for you to gain a higher level perspective and to become a business manager and partner of your clients.

“Having coffee with the management team” is another way of saying they need you to raise your perspective of things from a purely technical focus to more of a business minded focus and someone who can become a true business partner with the managers in the company.

If your managers are suggesting you need to spend more time to insure technology is aligned with the business, they may already feel like your focus is not 100% focused on the business, , , in other words, you are working on things and spending money in areas they don’t fully understand the reasoning for or the business value it will have.

If they feel that way, even though they may not be able to articulate the issue very well, there is a very good chance you are out of sync with the business side of your company, , , and may not realize it.

Studies and surveys suggest that over 50% of IT organizations around the world are out of sync with their business client, , , and this trend seems to remain constant year after year.

The challenge is that most IT managers who are out of sync do not realize it and senior managers aren’t really sure. Even if they were sure, they probably don’t know how to tell you because they don’t really understand technology.

Be aware that if your management team is suggesting you need to focus more on keeping the IT organization “aligned with the business”, your focus may already be out of sync. If so, it is critical that you determine if this is the case and put into motion the things that will correct it.

A big part of the transition challenge is that you will want to keep your hands in the technology. It’s something we like to do, , , but as a company grows it needs something different from the IT manager.

I would look at your situation not so much as a restructuring of the organization but more of a refocus on how you go about day to day support. The manager employee structure essentially remains the same, , , it is where you spend your time on a daily basis that’s different. A gradual shift in focus is what makes sense from what I understand of your situation.

Here is what I would suggest you do:

1. Block out an hour or two to have some “think” time.

2. List all the responsibilities you have and also the type of work you do from day to day. You might need to create an activity log for a week or two to actually see what you do on a daily basis. I can almost guarantee you it’s a lot more technical detail than you probably think it is.

3. Take the list and determine what can be delegated to others on your team. Be specific and think about what you must do in order to transition each responsibility to someone else. This means you have to “let go” and it may require training your employees for them to take on certain responsibilities. Your focus needs to be able to develop other experts in these areas so the company can depend less and less on you personally. This might cause you concern, but if you are doing a good job in supporting your company, it will actually position you for more responsibility in the company. Remember, transitioning responsibility does not mean you are not involved or should not know what is going on, , , it simply means you have someone else doing the detail work. Part of the work should be to keep you informed.

4. Sit down with your senior management team and each department manager to determine what they think about the IT support you and your team is providing. Ask them a specific question as to whether they think your IT team is focused on the appropriate issues and needs of the company. Don’t try to justify yourself, , , listen objectively to what they have to say and put it into context with feedback from all the other managers.

A sample Client Satisfaction Survey is available at https://itlever.com/2010/05/24/are-your-clients-happy/. If you learn the answers to these questions, it will tell you quite a lot about how your clients feel about their IT support. Don’t send this survey out, , , visit your clients personally and interview them. You will get a lot more from an interview than you will from asking a survey to be filled out. Take a look at https://itlever.com/2011/01/08/dont-send-client-surveys/ to better understand this.

5. Analyze the data from the surveys and determine if there is a consistent message from your clients. If so, learn what the trends are and identify what you need to do to address their concerns.

6. Develop a transition plan that outlines your focus on transitioning specific technology responsibilities to others on your team and possibly to new hires you will add in the future. Place priority on the things that help you address client concerns from your survey.

7. Share your transition of responsibilities plan with your senior managers so they know you are serious about taking their advice. You will also need to provide insight in how you plan to spend more time with your clients to better understand their business needs and issues. My book, Acquisition: IT Due Diligence, can help you conduct an effective IT assessment and learn whether there is a disconnect between IT and the business. See http://www.mde.net/cio/page11.html for more information.

One last piece of information. In my career, I have worked with and observed hundreds of IT organizations and thousands of IT managers. In my opinion, there are three key reasons an IT organization fails, , , I call it the Triple Threat to IT Success. Take a look at a 20 Minute IT Manager session I developed on this topic and pay particular attention to slide 17. If you hear these things from your senior managers, you have a disconnect. Review the 20MITM session online at: http://www.20minuteitmanager.com/sessions/072202TRIPLETHREAT/

Summary
We see IT managers struggle to transition from the technical expert to a business manager all the time, , , it’s a truly difficult transition. Much of it is caused by our desire to focus on technology (we like it) and also our reluctance to let go and depend on others to do the job. You see, , , no one can do the work as well as we can do it or want it to be done so we tend to do things ourselves. Some call it being control oriented, , , I prefer to think of it as, “we like things done ‘our way’.”

Unless you are able to raise your perspective and back away from the technical detail, it is a recipe that will surely limit your career opportunities.