Dried Goat Sandwich

UK hits the wall on IT innovation and starts packing a new lunch. ...

... "For a sector supposedly driven by innovation, times are tougher than a dried goat sandwich. " ...

Via Computing UK: Lack of innovation

Project Connections

Connections are key to project success. Team members connect to build project performance. Tasks and activities are connected to create a realistic project schedule. The project's deliverables are connected with the goals and objectives of the organization. And, those goals will have a connection to the strategies of the enterprise. ...

... "When people know how a project affects their corner of the company, they develop a personal stake. But they also have to see how an IT project affects the bottom line, so that they fully grasp how the IT strategy plays into the health of the business. " ...

Via CIO Asia: Make the connection between IT and business strategy

Alignment for Small Enterprise

The case is made for business and IT strategy alignment for small and medium enterprises, where service provider arrangements may be the key to improvement. ...

... "So it is important that businesses have long-term strategies supported by short-term goals that are consistently revisited to ensure that the IT environment continues to support them. " ...

Via Computing SA: Business strategy alignment

IT Investment in the Crunch

Financial firm is expected to increase its IT investment during the contraction in the credit market, which is a contrarian strategy. ...

... "The impact of the credit crunch on HSBC's accounts is unlikely to have a knock-on effect in the group's IT strategy ... " ...

Via UK Computing: HSBC

CIO Role Shifts Reporting Relationships

To keep IT relevant and better connected to the overall business strategy, shouldn't the CIO report to the CEO? The data supports a different trend. As CIOs have aligned more investments with the business, has their influence dimished? Or, is reporting relationship irrelevant in the grand scheme of things? No doubt about it ... the sand keeps shifting ...

... "The increasing prominence of the CFO in IT management signals a change in the way companies view technology strategy and deployment. " ...

Via CIO Insight: Meet Your New Boss

IT Sustainability Role

IT has a role to play in an enterprise's sustainability program, from power consumption to the appropriate utilization of the computing assets. Sustainable business is IT's business. ...

... "The increasing energy requirements of data storage can no longer be ignored by the IT manager. The growing amount of uncontrolled storage cannot be allowed to carry on indefinitely. " ...

Via CRM Today: Sustainability for IT Management

Holistic Strategy Looks Beyond Competition to a Different Place

I like Oren's thoughts on differentiating your company from the competition with a visionary business strategy. I think the same applies to formulating an IT strategy --> asking yourself how will this IT strategy differentiate the enterprise in its market? ...

... "That's a given for corporate survival. But when an organization's strategy revolves around its competition, you can bet that the strategy will be more defensive and reactive than groundbreaking ... " ...

Via Oren Harari: Essence of Strategy

Breakthrough CIO Behaviors

CIO tips for transitioning from the operational to the business strategic. Behaviors include shifting the business conversations and emphasizing new organizational competencies focusing on business processes. The results are business IT projects that deliver on the value proposition. ...

... "Rather than managing the daily operations, the Breakthrough CIO identifies and executes on these projects, and tracks their returns and corresponding risk levels, until IT becomes a predictable investment. " ...

Via CXO Today: The Breakthrough CIO Role

Government IT Strategy Sees Smart Island

Malta sets new IT strategy to create a smart island. ...

... "In terms of the new strategy, the government wanted to see IT in every aspect of life, with the country exploiting all the opportunities which IT offered and all the people benefiting from these gains. " ...

Via Times of Malta: Smart Island

TOGAF Enterprise Architecture: A Framework

Documenting an enterprise architecture can be challenging, especially if the business environment is dynamic. The Open Group's TOGAF approach may be just the approach for providing the framework and structure for your IT strategy. ...

... "An enterprise architecture addresses this need, by providing a strategic context for the evolution of the IT system in response to the constantly changing needs of the business environment. Furthermore, a good enterprise architecture enables you to achieve the right balance between IT efficiency and business innovation. It allows individual business units to innovate safely in their pursuit of competitive advantage. " ...

Via The Open Group: TOGAF Version 8

Green is INnovative

Sun offers advice on green IT strategy and provides assessment toolkit as part of its eco initiative launch. ...

... "1. Assess Your Datacenter: Sun has resources available that you can use to measure the current efficiency and environmental impact of your datacenter, or we can do it for you. Based on the results, we can recommend ways to optimize space, power, and cooling for better efficiency and utilization across your IT infrastructure.

2. Optimize Your Infrastructure: Customers can upgrade their old equipment to new models that are the most energy efficient and powerful systems possible. Sun systems can deliver improved performance, power and cooling efficiencies as well as provide additional capacity in your facility.

3. Deploy Virtualization Technologies: Sun's virtualization solution is built upon industry-proven virtualization technologies – from desktop, to server, to disk and tape, and includes the free and open Solaris OS that runs across more than 890 Sun and non-Sun systems and has built-in virtualization and Predictive Self-Healing features. These products, combined with innovative programs, tools, services, and strategic partnerships can help customers achieve greater utilization, greater manageability, and significant savings, while bypassing power and space limitations. " ...

Via Sun Micro: Sun Eco Innovation Initiative

Build IT 2.0 Strategy

Advice on incorporating Web2.0 concepts into today's IT strategy. ...

... "Incorporate user-generated feedback into your IT strategy to help make IT decisions more transparent - offer comment sections, forums and content-tagging. " ...

Via National Computing Centre: IT 2.0

Don't Align, Synchronize

Forrester defines a new role for IT in the strategy of a business. ...

... "But achieving a state of 100% alignment will no longer be possible - if it ever was - as firms evolve over the next five years toward business technology (BT), the pervasive technology use that drives business results. " ...

Via Forrester Research: Alignment

IT Strategy Is On Board-Room Back-Burner

Deloitte survey provides insights into boardroom perspectives on IT strategy. While boards don't have more time to focus on IT strategy, the limited time available should be used effectively. ...

... "But they don't plan to work toward improving the strategy: 52 percent said their board won't spend any more time on IT over the next three years than it does now. " ...

Via CIO: Board Perspectives on IT

Chargeback IT Strategy Takes Standardization

Here's successful use of IT chargeback model, which leverages standards and shared service organization models. ...

... "Kaushik's hard work does come with great returns. He says Ivanhoe was selected by consulting firm Deloitte Touche as one of the top 5 per cent companies in the world with the best IT strategy. With a standardised IT infrastructure, the company is able to achieve a network with full redundancy at a communication cost that has gone down by 50 percent. " ...

Via MISWeb: Successful IT Chargeback Strategy

ROI of SOA

SOA hype is high. Is there an ROI? Certainly, reusability, possibly speed - if robust set of architecture services exist. ...

... "And that is to define and prove ROI for SOA on a project basis, not on the holistic and longterm IT-strategy basis. " ...

Via ZDNet: SOA ROI For Real?

Board Level View of IT

What is the right level of board involvement, awareness of IT, and influence on IT strategy? Boards are definitely concerned with business strategy. What is the right equilibrium for board-level IT discussion - %of time and frequency? Are the amounts in the referenced survey out-of-whack? I'm not sure ... I would want the board to focus on business strategy. And, if IT were aligned with it, would a lower frequency and amount of discussion be ok? Maybe, if the quality of the minimal discussion was high. What are the thoughts in the blogosphere? ...

... "Yes, directors say the right things about the importance of IT, and make the by now obvious connection between effectively executing IT strategy and better financial performance. But their lack of attention to IT ought to concern CIOs and shareholders. " ...

Via CIO Insight: Survey of Board Views on IT

IT Governance: Board of Director Involvement

Corning demonstrates leading practices in board-level governance of IT - setting strategy, shaping the portfolio, understanding business impact, and sustaining benefit realization. The company expects growth through innovation in display technologies, diesel products, and telecommunications. Corning has a history of innovation and continues to invest in longer-term emerging technologies. ...

... "They play an active, creative role in helping to set IT strategy, make sure they know what's in the technology pipeline and what it will mean to the bottom line, and ride the results hard. " ...

Via Corporate Board Member Magazine: Board Level Governance of IT

Virtual Infrastructure: Grid Perspective

Grid-computing provider discusses the characteristics of managing a successful distributed computing infrastructure, which is of interest to companies that are aiming for a more lights-out, virtual infrastructure. ...

... "It is in the interest of application providers to meet the demands of their customers, and some of their largest customers are demanding grid-enablement as part of their overall IT strategy in the data center. " ...

Via Grid Today: Read

Technology Investment: Time Is Ripe

Implementation of IT strategy requires fresh approach: New standards of performance and greater accountability for achievement. C Davis Fogg discusses actions needed to emphasize a bias for action and points out the potential of IT to innovate. ...

... "IT is such an underutilised power in the marketplace, I would expect right now is a very good time to be thinking about powerful investments to improve market position and efficiency. Particularly if you have cash and your competitors don't. " ...

Via CIO Australia: Implementation of IT Strategy

Leadership Practices: Sound Advice

There's an excellent article on leadership practices in this month's CIO Magazine from Susan Cramm, an executive coach and president of the coaching firm, Valuedance.

Cramm lists a number of things that IT leaders can do to practice "safe leadership." It seems like motherhood and apple pie, but it's a good reminder of the basics that we so easily forget. This includes the following (I've paraphrased the descriptions in parenthesis):

Foster good relationships (Learn the business and get around more among your customers.)

Forge a shared IT vision, strategy, and tactical objectives (Co-create this with your customers and other IT leaders. Agree on decision responsibilities. Understand the appropriate technical and business areas involved.)

Deliver on time, on budget (But beware of big, waterfall-style projects. Limit the number of projects. Less is more.)

Develop quality solutions (Have appropriately scaled methodologies, frameworks, policies, and tools, but beware.. It's easy to lose credibility here.)

Realize business value from IT investments (Use operational measures meaningful to the business. Measure during and after the project to insure business value is achieved. Hold business partners accountable for insuring benefits realization.)

Here's the full editorial...

Leadership Under the Influence - Editorial - CIO

Business Results: IT Strategy

Today's IT career path requires evolving your role into a challenging place - the potential to impact business results - which comes with its set of risks. However, standing still increases the risk of outsourcing, or worse yet, irrelevance. ...

... "If they're not in the decision-making stream, playing some role that's accountable for real results from IT strategy, even on a very local, project level, they're at greater risk both to outsourcing and stalling wages. They need to work themselves into a position that's closer to business results and end customers. " ...

Via InformationWeek Weblog: Read

Growth: Enabled By IT Strategy

Even non-profit orgs have growth plans enabled by IT strategy. ...

... "But his IT strategy doesn't sound much different from those in the for-profit world: Expand globally, improve mobility, drive growth. " ...

Via InformationWeek: College CIO

IT Architecture: Cross-Over Potential

Computer architecture principles are applied to treatment of ADHD and dyslexia with positive results. IT strategist contributes to advancement of our understanding of these disabilities. ...

... "Eugen Oetringer is an infrastructure consultant in the information technology industry. His areas of expertise include capacity management, information management, storage management, IT architecture, IT strategies, processes and complexity. He is the main inventor and author of The IT Strategy Management Process, which describes a simple way to manage important information in the midst of information overload. " ...

Root Cause Proposal for ADHD, Dyslexia, Headaches and other Conditions – Public Request for Research

Lean IT Strategy: Virgin America

Virgin America needs a cost-effective, yet differentiated strategy, in the US market and its IT strategy must be based on a low-cost model. Its CIO plans to run an efficient data center, negotiate smart contracts, and leverage open-source platforms. ...

... "And their IT strategy will be, of course, lean and mean. " ...

Via CIO: Link ...

Company Info: A U.S. majority owned and controlled company, Virgin America intends to launch domestic U.S. scheduled airline service utilizing new Airbus A320 family aircraft beginning in 2006. The company has announced agreements to take firm deliveries of 34 A320 family aircraft including 19 purchased aircraft from Airbus and 15 leased aircraft from GE Capital Aviation Services. Virgin America's corporate headquarters is in the San Francisco Bay Area, and its principal base of operations is at the San Francisco International Airport. Virgin America's goal is to build an innovative, creative travel brand based on safe and efficient operations, low costs, outstanding guest service, and a unique level of engagement by its team. Its mission is to create an airline people love.

CIO CFO CEO Reporting Relationship Affects IT Performance ...

Good article shows the stats for CIO's that report to CFO's. I wonder, though, how much of this is related to the CFO's own (in)ability to align with business strategy and position the company for success --- ultimately relegating the IT organization to a utilitarian role. Good leadership whether in finance or IT needs to enable business success, not impede it. ...

... "Running projects--More CIOs who report to the CFO spend time running projects (49%) than those who report to CEOs (39%) " ...

Via CIO Blog: CIOs reporting to CFOs: The Numbers Do the Talking ...

Technology Evolution: Call to Green Action ...

As computing density increases, power consumption is spiraling out of control. It is time for the Information Technology industry to do its part in energy conservation and management. ...

... "Chief information officers need to wake up to the issues of spiralling energy consumption and environmental legislation, and develop greener approaches to IT, according to Gartner. " ...

Via ITNews Australia: Gartner urges IT to go green ...

A green strategy can include server virtualization which increases asset utilization and lowers the energy footprint of the datacenter ...

IBM VIRTUALIZATION SERVES UP COOLER SYSTEMS FOR US OPEN TENNIS EVENT: "Virtualization technology, which IBM has been providing to clients since before Arthur Ashe won his first US Open title in 1968, allows many computing resources to act as one and, more commonly, one computer, storage device or server to divide its own workload and act as many different resources. By reducing the number of computers and servers in use, virtualization helps minimize the often strenuous and expensive power and cooling demands of datacenters and eliminate unnecessary maintenance expenses. "

Talent Strategy: Workplace Flexibility ...

Article discusses forms of workplace flexibility that range from flexible working hours to career flexibility, such as sabbaticals or special assignments, which when implemented well can be a significant boost to an organization's talent managment business strategy. ...

... "Workplace flexibility is no longer just an employee accommodation; it is a key management strategy that can positively affect employee performance and can improve an organization's financial performance. " ...

Via CCH: Workplace flexibility is more than just an accommodation; it’s a business strategy

Project Failure: Asset Impairment Charge: IT Strategy Rationalization ...

IT integration projects are a tough business. Failures can be expensive, impact the bottom line, and affect careers. Here's a clear example ...

... "LCH.Clearnet has decided to close down its Generic Clearing System (GCS) project. A review of the GCS programme in 2005 had already concluded that part of the GCS investment would not be brought into economic use and an impairment charge of EUR20.1 million was therefore recognised in the 2005 interim accounts. Further work completed in June 2006 concluded that the further development of GCS was not economically or technically viable, and the Group has therefore decided not to continue to use assets from GCS within its technology strategy. An impairment charge of EUR47.8 million, which substantially relates to those assets, has been recognised and will be reported in the LCH.Clearnet Group Limited 2006 half year results to be published in August." ...

Project Failure: Asset Impairment Charge: IT Strategy Rationalization: Via LCH ClearNet: LCH.Clearnet Rationalises IT Strategy ...

ITIL Business Case ...

Evergreen offers whitepaper on the business value associated with ITIL implementation, with benefits seen in operational efficiency, customer satisfaction, and risk minimization. ...

... "The white paper references a number of data points taken from current research and enterprise IT process improvement case studies consistently documenting a 20-40% reduction in the effort required for ongoing IT operations, powered by the implementation of ITIL process improvements. The same research clearly links ITIL with strategic gains in customer service quality, accuracy and efficiency and IT risk and compliance work. The development of an ITIL strategy is also discussed and an incremental approach is recommended, one which starts with small steps but shows measurable gains quickly. " ...

Evergreen Systems Releases White Paper on Building the Business Case for ITIL ...

Performance Management: Super Metrics ...

Definition of a super- or banner- metric, in combination with incentives, can galvanize the workforce to successfully navigate through a transformation and align towards the common goal. The super-metric is usually simpler to communicate than a collection of inter-related measures. ...

... "Some firms direct their strategy with one primary measure. We call it a Super-Measure. A Super-Measure aligns the behaviors and actions of the various parts of a firm with its customers' needs. A Super-Measure focuses a firm more intensely on its strategy than would a complex set of measures. " ...

Performance Management: Super Metrics: Via Babson Insight: Aligning Strategy through Super-Measure Management ...

Elusive IT Project Value: Book Tells How To Achieve It

I've just finished reading an excellent book on achieving value from IT projects, The Information Paradox: Realizing the Business Benefits of Information Technology, by John Thorp and the Fujitsu Consulting's Center for Strategic Leadership.

Thorp and company claim that today's IT projects are evolving more and more from simple automation efforts to complex "information" initiatives, and even further---to complete business transformation initiatives. This calls for a different approach and requires IT and Business collaboration.

As the book points out, the classic "let's buy a product and assume it comes with automatic benefits" approach doesn't work in today's more complex arena (and in fact it probably never did). In a complex business transformation initiative, trying to assume that an IT project in isolation will deliver value is wishful thinking.

The book also points out the four critical dimensions of complexity, which it says are blind spots in traditional thinking:

1) Linkage - to other related initiatives and to business strategy
2) Reach - those areas of organizational structure or supply chain processes that may be impacted by the change, or that need revisiting in order to bring about the benefits
3) People- those affected by the change and/or that need to be engaged (i.e. proactive change leadership and stakeholder analysis)
4) Time - the time it takes to manage the overall initiative, including the above dimensions, to fully realize the benefits (most companies grossly underestimate this)

Unfortunately, many IT projects just focus on on-time and on-budget delivery (resulting in a situation that the book describes as, "the operation was successful but the patient died"). Thorp and company refer to this as "investment myopia."

Instead, a committment to business value, ongoing process improvements, frequent iterations of delivery, and better project selection techniques are key. Most of all, we need to be aware of the blind spots mentioned above.

The book goes on to describe how a system of program management, portfolio management, and governance, with a focus on benefits realization, can bring about results. It also cautions about the dangers of treating selections as a one-time annual event, making selections in isolation (instead of in the context of investment programs), and not looking at all aspects of value (i.e. going beyond simple financial measures).

I highly recommend the book for those struggling with determining the value of IT, or trying to bring about collaborative change in their organizations. If you look at any major successful transformation, it was brought about by a marriage of technology, business process, and organizational change, and with full backing from senior management. This book can go a long way toward helping make this happen.

ITIL Implementation: Cultural Change ...

IT manager laments the cultural challenges associated with implementing ITIL in an IT organization. This is a classical situation. Can a burning platform for action be created? Is there a baseline of performance data that compares unfavorably to industry benchmarks? Do competitive forces exist in the marketplace that indicate ITIL will help differentiate the organization? If the ITIL implementation cannot be aligned to the business strategy, why do it? ...

... "About a year ago I launched a serious attempt to institute ITIL throughout the IT organization I lead ... The short version: We've had a very hard time making it stick. Employees give it lip service, but that's about it, and our front-line managers haven't been much better. " ...

ITIL Implementation: Cultural Change: Via Advice Line by Bob Lewis: InfoWorld: Making ITIL happen ...

ITIL Service Management Acceleration ...

Many leading IT vendors have launched some type of ITIL accelerator. CA introduces its approach to ITIL acceleration, including a configuration management database, CMDB, and visual process maps. ...

... "This new solution, the CA Service Management Accelerator, will empower IT organizations to reduce costs, improve service levels, and more closely align IT and business by unifying and simplifying activities across ITIL processes. Manual ITIL implementations are costly and time-consuming, and they can compromise the uniformity of critical management processes. The CA Service Management Accelerator enables customers to unify people, processes and technology while automating all ITIL processes across both Service Support and Service Delivery—enabling low-cost delivery of superior service.



The CA Service Management Accelerator offers unique three-dimensional visual maps for ITIL processes based upon an underground transit system or subway system metaphor. ITIL Service Support and Service Delivery processes are presented as "tracks" and "subway stations," providing IT executives, strategists and implementers alike with a common reference point for viewing and prioritizing ITIL processes for automation. " ...

ITIL Service Management Acceleration: Via CA: CA Accelerates Mainstream Adoption of ITIL ...

IT Strategy: Transform to Value-Add from Cost Center ...

PharMerica CIO changes perceptions of IT through transformation of helpdesk performance, leveraging a common standardized architecture, and understanding costs and value of IT services. ...

... "So he was determined to demonstrate financial discipline by managing IT strategically, correcting inefficiencies to cut costs before he was asked to. " ...

IT Strategy: Transform to Value-Add from Cost Center: Trimming for Dollars: Via CIO ...

Via AmerisourceBergen: AmerisourceBergen Reports Record Operating Revenue of $14 Billion and $0.61 Diluted Earnings Per Share from Continuing Operations for the March Quarter: "PharMerica's revenue for the second quarter of fiscal 2006 was a record $412.7 million, a 6 percent increase over the previous year's second quarter. Operating income for the second quarter of fiscal 2006 was $16.2 million, compared to $32.0 million for the same quarter last year, reflecting increased bad debt expense and the cost of implementing Medicare Part D. Operating income as a percentage of revenue was 3.92 percent in the second quarter of fiscal 2006, below expectations. The second quarter of the previous fiscal year benefited from a $4.0 million reduction in sales tax liability. The Company continues to expect operating margins to be in the 4 percent to 5 percent range for fiscal year 2006. "

Globalization of Research and Development: EMC China Center ...

EMC Corporation will open its first China-based research and development facility next month, which is a a state-of-the-art software development center in Shanghai. It will play a strong role in the localization of EMC products for Asian markets. This center is a component of EMC's five-year China investment strategy. ...

... "The new center is part of EMC's global research and development investment, which is expected to be more than $1.2 billion in 2006. In China, EMC has established a comprehensive China Solutions Center network, deepened its relationships with key Chinese customers, created partnerships with software and systems integration solution providers, opened training centers to certify networked storage specialists, and made significant contributions to the academic community in China. " ...

Globalization of Research and Development: EMC China Center: Via EMC: EMC to Open Software Development Center in China

IT Strategy: Comprehensive Outsourcing in Healthcare IT ...

Phoenix gains renewal of comprehensive outsourcing of hospital's information