Mark P. McDonaldMore pixels, ink and paper have been given to the state of the business/IT relationship than just about any other topic. The relationship is often characterized as the odd couplewith each side so different that it’s a wonder the two can live in the same place. Alternatively researches see the relationship as one lost in translation each wanting the other to speak their language and know their challenges. Throughout all of this there is an undertone of tension between the two parties, perhaps created by research analysts looking to spread a little fear, uncertainty and doubt, but there none the less.
However, when you step back from all the ink and sound advice there are a few things that CIOs and IT executives do that makes it easier for the business to put IT down. Here are a few thoughts on how this happens:
- IT enabling the business – this was the mantra associated with IT for the last twenty years or so. Enable means to provide with the means or opportunity, to make possible, practical, or easy. Notice that enablement does not connote responsibility for results and that separates the business and IT.
- Defining the business as the customer. Defining an internal customer was part of the ‘customer/quality movement associated with business process re-engineering when everyone needed a customer. This may seem odd but when IT says the business is their customer it tells the business that IT is a support function, distant as the real customer is the one generating revenue.
- Focusing on requirements. Requirements are the basis for the business and IT conversation. However, this language requires the business to translate the problems and opportunities that it sees into terms IT can understand. What gets lost in translation separates the business from IT, particularly when the business says the system is inadequate and IT responds that it was built to requirements.
- Waiting to be asked. IT complains that they are order takers rather than business partners and they are when they wait for the business to develop an idea, recognize a problem or see an opportunity. CIOs and IT executives have a powerful tool in terms of the operational data that captures business performance and more importantly their potential associated performance drivers. When IT waits it takes a passive position it takes a back seat
- Benefits realization is the responsibility of the business. This point is connected to IT’s role as a business enabler. This point comes up whenever the CFO or business leaders seek to calculate the return on IT investment. This point sets the business and IT at odds and sets the context for expensive and timely change management activities.
- Technically oriented IT metrics. IF you are what you measure, then many IT organizations tell their business peers that IT is a back office function. Concentrating on systems availability, IT budget and the status of the investment portfolio tells the business what IT thinks is important. Response
Each of these factors are common practice in the average IT organization and they represented best practice at the time. That time was typified by IT building out the enterprise’s core transaction systems which did enable the business, serve functional processes, and require effectively manage its resources.
However, times change and with time so does the role of technology. Today IT systems process more than transactions; they automate complex business processes, provide business intelligence and provide direct support to customers and suppliers.
IT is no longer separate from the business and the enterprise can no longer afford to the separation.
Given these changes, its time for CIOs and IT executives to rethink the activities that separate IT from the business.
Category: CIO Strategy Tags: IT and Business, IT management, Technology Leadership
12 responses so far ↓
1 Probal DasGupta January 12, 2010 at 9:00 am
A good solution to the Business-IT Divide is Model Driven Architecture (MDA), a new software engineering paradigm formulated and standardized by the Object Management Group (OMG).
2 uberVU - social comments January 12, 2010 at 9:49 am
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3 Mark McDonald January 12, 2010 at 10:05 am
Probal,
While I am always up for a new modeling language I am having trouble seeing how having the business understand, learn and adopt a new modeling language would resolve the Business-IT Divide. Sounds like its the IT guys trying to get business to fit into an IT declared box which is not a relationship building activity.
Finally, how is this modeling language different from any of the other modeling language that attempted to address this issue.
After having learned Information Engineering/IDEF/Object oriented among other modeling language I am wondering if what you propose is just another version of business/IT Esperanto or a real solution.
There is more to the gap than language and I think that the language we need to use is the one used by the rest of the company not IT.
4 Jon Land January 12, 2010 at 4:00 pm
Having tried to “model” business to IT, it doesn’t work. Business thinks about what they need to do – not from an engineering perspective. IT thinks how to engineer is needed. That is a fundamental difference in how people think. The key to success is having people who are part of the either organization who understands both sides. Without this translator ability any requirements, modeling, engineering, strategy planning, etc exercise will most likely not meet needs.
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6 Defining the business as the customer is one of the ways CIOs make it easier to separate business from IT January 13, 2010 at 9:18 am
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7 IT enabling the business is one of the ways CIOs make it easier to separate business from IT January 13, 2010 at 9:19 am
[...] ← A few ways CIOs and IT executives make it easier to separate business from IT Defining the business as the customer is one of the ways CIOs make it easier to separate business [...]
8 Focusing on requirements is one of the ways CIOs make it easier to separate business from IT January 14, 2010 at 8:57 am
[...] IT separates itself from the rest of the enterprise. The first/keystone post can be found at thislink [...]
9 Waiting to be asked one of the ways CIOs and IT executives make it easier to separate business from IT January 15, 2010 at 7:53 am
[...] separates itself from the rest of the enterprise. The first/keystone post can be found at this link [...]
10 Benefits realization is the responsibility of the business one of the ways CIOs and IT executives make it easier to separate business from IT. January 20, 2010 at 10:41 am
[...] separates itself from the rest of the enterprise. The first/keystone post can be found at this link [...]
11 It is easy to see how the business becomes frustrated by IT July 20, 2011 at 8:06 am
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12 Thinking Small — Thinking value September 16, 2011 at 8:22 am
[...] better or what the business really needs. These are behaviors lead to working in ways that separate IT from the business. If they want to be part of the team, they need to be ‘onside’ with the business and nothing [...]
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