The eWorld Radar

Are you amplifying the IT Value Chain?

There is a chain that runs from technology and people suppliers through the Procurement and HR functions respectively. It continues into the IT department and via the users to your organisation’s market.

Thus there are a number of actors involved in this IT value chain. They include:

• External recruiters.
• Business development staff of the IT service companies.
• HR staff.
• Procurement staff.
• Technologists.
• Users.

I would also add the IT function leadership and the senior executives associated with the organisation.

But value amplification means more than just sending the HR function a number of resumes that have the same buzzwords as those on the job specification. It means more than beating up suppliers to get the best price. It means more that having users who barely use the IT tools they are provided with because they have no real interest in ‘sweating’ them.

When this happens or worse, amplification turns into dampening. The CIO might be an easy target to blame when the investment in IT seems to deliver headaches more than anything else. And the CIO may be partially responsible but I would argue that anyone involved in the value chain has to take responsibility for this situation.

In many cases it is a lack of trust between adjoining parties in the chain. And this lack of trust in part is because many people along the chain lack both an ability to cultivate trust and a sufficiently mature understanding of IT to really add value.

With this in mind I have developed the eWorld Academy.

Take the test - Click here to see if you or your people need some game raising support.

Ade McCormack

Black digital gold

When it comes to IT leadership, the job title is pointedly not Chief Data Officer or Chief IT Manager Officer.

Data is like crude oil. It only has real value once refined. A pile of CVs has no value. But ‘how many candidates based in New York have Java skills?’ is valuable (to someone). So the pile is data and the answer to the query is information.

Being a Chief Data Officer would imply that the focus should be data management – storing the data securely and efficiently. If this was the oil industry the crude would never ever reach the refinery.

Being the Chief IT Manager Officer would be an improvement as the focus would be on storage as well as the processing of the data. At best we would have an efficient set of processes and technologies to extract and refine the oil.

I would like to suggest that the CIO does not focus on these activities, though they are important, but focuses on new ways of extracting value from the crude oil so to speak. That goes one step beyond the mindset of ‘this is what the organisation asked for’ (reactive) to ‘what other value-enhancing (innovative) things can we do with the crude oil’ (proactive).

In this respect data becomes an asset to the organisation and it becomes the CIO’s job to sweat that asset. So the CIO becomes the CFO of information.

In a digital economy, I believe this would propel the CIO from operational supplier to fully fledged c-suite player. CIOs that don’t get this need to be sent back to the oil rig.

Ade McCormack

CIO Screw up Log

Some might say that this is the unofficial name for the help desk ticketing system. And to some extent they are right.

But screw up is an unkind phrase for a failure. But failure is a key element in self development. As mentioned in an earlier post, failure is crucial, mistakes are unacceptable.

I encourage CIOs to keep a log of anything that takes place during the day that doesn’t conclude in a positive manner. These might include:

• The mis-launch of a new IT service.
• The strained meeting with the CFO.
• The heated exchange with the key supplier.
• The new innovation budget allocated to the CMO, which includes a substantial allocation for technology spend (that is not under the CIO’s control).

All of these came about because of something the CIO didn’t do correctly. So rather than go on to make the same mistakes day after day, they need to be logged. Assigning severity scores to the log entries will provide the information needed to prioritise the CIO’s personal development.

If the CIO is unwilling to do this, then HR might take on this responsibility. The log can then be used as either a development tool or exhibit A in the firing process.

Ade McCormack

CIO – A different carrot

What would happen if CIO compensation packages were based on business-relevant information output rather than size of technology estate / user community?

It is likely that CIOs would:

• Push as much technology out of the door / into the Cloud as possible.
• Engage with users as if their career depended on it.
• Help the organisation streamline processes.
• Become acutely aware of what the business leaders were focused on

It strikes me that many of the issues organisations face in relation to their IT leadership could easily be resolved by simply changing the carrot.

Ade McCormack

Chief Herbalist Officer

Organisations work well when the data, information, knowledge and wisdom flow easily to those that need it, when and where it is needed. Blockages in that flow lead to problems. This can lead to poor or sluggish decision making. Or worse can lead to misgovernance.

Organisations tend not to think in terms of flow. The focus tends to be the customer, the supplier, the talent, finance and so on.

In many respects this is like Western medicine. You have a problem. The problem area is identified and the treatment is focused on regaining full functionality in the target area. But often the doctor is only treating the symptom of a more serious underlying cause.

With this in mind, I encourage business leaders to adopt a more Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) approach. In TCM the focus is on the energy flows around the body. The focus of the doctor is to identify flow blockages and unblock them.

I would argue that many of the issues organisations face today would be resolved if the data, information, knowledge and wisdom flowed freely. This is the job of the Chief Information (Flow) Officer.

Ade McCormack

 

Should the IT function be a factory?

Given the extent that organisations rely on IT, one would hope that the processes for developing and delivering the associated services ran in a predictable manner. This suggests a factory model and thus the aim is to continuously focus on efficiency with the end game being total automation.

This is the preferred model for technology management. The question is whether the CIO wants to preside over a factory. Surely a lab or studio would be more fulfilling?

A creative approach to IT is likely to be where the real value in having an IT function resides. Stretching the technology, the IT staff and the organisation by pushing technology innovation to the limit strikes me as much more fulfilling.

As technology management gets sucked into the Cloud perhaps the CIO can reinvent the IT function as more of an avant-garde art house a la Andy Warhol’s Factory of the sixties.

In today’s terms this might be called an innovation centre. However the focus needs to be on fearless unfettered creativity, not on slightly shinier versions of what the users already have.

Ade McCormack

Alignment versus entwinement

The next time your senior management talk about business-IT alignment, highlight the fact that alignment implies that the IT function needs to be a well behaved supplier, as opposed to a badly behaved one.

Pushing the alignment agenda will guarantee that your IT function will:

• Remain a victim of business strategy.
• Continue to take a reactive project-oriented approach to business requests.

We need entwinement, which implies that the IT function is a strategic partner to the organisation. With such a model the IT function will:

• Be a co-creator of business strategy.
• Become a proactive demand driven service provider.

So please let’s drop all talk of alignment if the intention is to maximise the ROI of the IT function.

Ade McCormack

CIO: Clouded Vision

Be aware. Harvard Business Review has just discovered the Cloud. HBR is important and it is often the thought source that flows through the c-suite’s collective head and on down through the organisation. Whether the source is correct or not is academic. HBR is highly influential.

Over the last few years CIOs have reached a degree of comfort in respect of embracing the Cloud, recognising that the it is generally not suitable for every situation, not least the  matter of legacy systems.

The CFO will be very keen on anything that:

• Offloads fast depreciating ‘assets’ from the balance sheet.
• Avoids cash outflow spikes.
• Dampens the financial risk associated with owning an IT function.

So now that HBR has blessed the Cloud model, expect to feel the heat of your CFO’s enthusiasm to move everything into the Cloud.

You might want to remind him that a similar enthusiasm was expressed for outsourcing after the dotcom crash. And that outsourcing everything including one’s controls was not a smart idea.

Click here to read the HBR article:

Ade McCormack

CIO - Behave like a customer

CxOs will continue to ask the CIO to fix their laptops if they perceive the CIO as the person in charge of the people that fix laptops.

So the first step for the CIO is to appoint an IT manager to do the job of IT management.

And then to behave as if they were a customer of the IT department and not the head of it.

At the next board meeting The CIO should make a point of comenting on a problem she is having with her laptop and how the guys from IT were quick to get on the case thanks to the new IT manager.

The CIO can now get on with the job of digital leadership which of course is not the same as IT management.

Ade McCormack

IT Pad Strategy

Two trends are taking place:

• Customers are increasingly using the web as their preferred route to services / products.
• Apple's iPad doesnt look in danger of relinquishing its dominant position in the tablet marketplace.

Thus it would be wise to take a customer-experience focus and put 'the app' at the heart of one's business strategy. Thus all major business process flows originate or terminate at the app.

This presents a great opportunity for the CIO to lead/shape business strategy rather than being a victim of it.

Ade McCormack