“Ade McCormack sounds a much-needed clarion call for IT to "grow up" and become a mature business function.”
Nicholas Carr, author of Does IT Matter? and The Big Switch. Former executive editor – Harvard Business Review
The COA Solutions blog just posted this review of The IT Value Stack.
COA Solutions is the largest supplier of business accounting software, business management and information systems to the UK mid-market service sector.
Many thanks for the review.
In my recent FT piece I drew a parallel with influential musician David Bowie. His career has spanned 5 decades, which is about the same duration as the modern IT industry. Unlike Bowie the IT industry has changed very little over that time. Same old problems:
But some new trends are emerging:
So the IT department has a choice, either become irrelevant or change. My suggestion is that the CIO:
I am curious to know what your views are on this. Do you feel the IT industry as we know it has peaked in terms of the value it can offer the business?
I was recently interviewed on Cognos BI Radio where discussed these points and more.
View/download the podcast (choose episode 12)
Anna Farmery of The Engaging Brand has posted my podcast with her, How IT Can Add Value and Engage Business.
In the podcast we discuss:
I have just read a book entitled Smart (Enough) Systems – How to Deliver Competitive Advantage by Automating Hidden Decisions. A couple of things struck me when one of the authors, James Taylor, kindly sent it to me (the coauthor is Neil Raden). Firstly at almost 400 pages it was no Who moved my Cheese? short-haul read. Secondly the Einstein-like graphic on the front cover suggested that a similar intellect would be required to grasp the concepts of the book.
These two factors contributed to my delayed review. Apologies James and Neil. However, having picked it up, I am pleased to say that it is written in such a way that the concepts are easy to grasp and the book’s logical structure suit both an end-to-end and reference-style reading approach.
These guys are ahead of the curve in terms of where IT meets business. The book uses the nascent (to most people) model of Enterprise Decision Management (EDM) as the paradigm for automating business decision-making.
Smart Enough Systems provides a model that enables the automation of business decision making without having to make the leap into the world of artificial intelligence. Consequently it is more likely that this model will gain traction in the business arena. Given the number of real-world case studies detailed in the book, the model is more than just a theoretical concept.
The book is divided in two. The first half makes the business case and is written with both business and technical readers in mind. The second half is written for technologists and addresses how to implement smart enough systems.
The first-half (actually a third of the book) makes a compelling case for enterprise decision-management. It is very in tune with the times, making reference to themes such as Web 2.0 and even Web 3.0, in a measured rather than ‘caught up in the hype’ style. I would encourage business leaders to read this section.
The logic behind Smart Enough Systems is surprisingly simple; pull the business decision-making logic out of the applications so that it can be managed without major IT surgery each time the business or even the market forces a change in the decision-making rules. Treating the ‘decisions’ as corporate assets is an intriguing thought. In essence, in a fast moving market those that manage their decision-making assets most effectively win. Given the accelerating pace of change EDM will move mainstream sooner than most people think and thus the authors need to be heeded.
Whilst most management books with an IT theme allude to the elimination of people as organisations become more tech-centric, the authors suggest that EDM can be used to improve the productivity of your staff. Thus the EDM model offers an evolutionary rather than revolutionary approach to talent management.
The book is content-rich. My temptation would be to package the first third of the book as a business management read. Whilst technologists will benefit from this part of the book, business-only readers may feel that the book as a whole was not written for them, and given the strength of the business messages I would not want business leaders in particular to overlook this book.
The authors are skilled communicators who appear comfortable across the complete ‘bits to boardroom’ spectrum. Their book will give many organisations a competitive edge today. But it won’t be long before heeding their message becomes a market entry condition.
It is true that there appears to be a dearth of right brain (creative) thinking, as Ed Granger-Happ points out. I think the business challenge is that we appear to be paid to do rather than think. Hitting the keyboard furiously seems to impress most managers more than resting your head on your desk (devising a creative solution to a business problem). Its difficult to express creativity in a spreadsheet so the CFO isn't likely to be that interested in it! The fact that creativity is risky and difficult to plan makes it unattractive to many senior executives.
Its a big issue in the tech sector. IT departments are built on logic with the technologists as carbon-based peripherals. IT has the power to totally disrupt business models and deliver competitive advantage, if only someone in the IT function stopped to think about it.
The wsj.com piece on
how men and women differ in terms of their programming style is both interesting
and supports some of the less controversial gender stereotypes. Thus we ignore
this at our peril. The heart of the message is that we need more females in the
IT industry, if we want to raise the bar in terms of the IT industry's service
record. Unfortunately the IT industry is somewhat macho in that 'cleverness' is
revered more so that 'helpfulness'.
Attracting females
into the IT industry is the challenge. The hierarchical and often dysfunctional
nature of IT teams make it difficult to 'graft' female staff to existing teams,
unless they comply with the idiosyncrasies of the alpha techie. In most cases
this means joining females need to act like a male and suppress their real
characters, to the detriment of the team.
IT leaders need to
address this for the sake of the industry, their teams and most importantly
their customers.
A few weeks ago I was one of the 'cabaret acts' on the IT Director Forum boat. On board were circa 300 CIOs, suppliers and speakers / workshop facilitators such as myself. My focus was in providing guidance on how CIOs can lead IT into the boardroom. The theme proved popular with the many delegates attending my sessions.
There was general agreement that both the CIO and IT function as we know them will change. As technology becomes commoditised and pushed further down the supply chain to the 'utility' providers, CIOs have to work out what their new role will be.
The emerging thoughts were that the CIO needs to morph into the Chief Process Officer or even Chief Change Officer. Whilst I agree with these perspectives, my view is more ambitious. I think the CIO should prepare themselves to become the Chief Executive Officer.
Let me know if you would like to receive a copy of my slides.
My recent FT piece focused on how business leaders typically respond to a recession in respect of their IT budgets. I also suggest an alternative approach given the nature of the threat may be somewhat different to previous recessions.
In short most CEOs follow the herd and simply slash their IT spend. Smart CEOs will use the imminent downturn to steal a march on their competitors by continuing to invest in IT with a view to seeking out disruptive technologies that will change the rules of the game in their markets.
I am interested in hearing from organisations that appear to get this. My concern is that the CFO is often too influential in IT budget decision making. Consequently the focus is on cost management rather than innovation. I am thus especially interested in hearing from CFOs that look beyond IT as a cost and see IT from a business value perspective.
My latest FT column:
I do not want to be the bearer of bad news, but I think there is sufficient economic uncertainty for it to be prudent to revisit our strategic objectives.
There is a tendency for business leaders to mimic their peers: following the herd is a safety mechanism. Should the herd start running, one instinctively follows, regardless of the threat. More often than not this makes sense, unless the threat has changed but the herd responses have not.
So we see talk of innovation and competitive advantage instantly replaced by sustainability and survival. "Bringing costs into line with revenues" becomes the new mantra.
