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Driving Business-IT Convergence – The Evolving Role of the Business Relationship Manager (Part 2 of 2)


cloudIn Part 1 of this 2-part series I defined the BRM role – with the caveat that it is by no means standardized.  In fact, as far as IT Service Management standards such as ITIL® and ISO/IEC 20000 are formalizing the existence of the Business Relationship Manager (BRM) role and corresponding process as a new best practice, they are selling the role short in terms of its potential strategic impact to business.  I went on to describe the typical BRM in terms of their purposes, goals, responsibilities and accountabilities.  To the title of this post, I introduced the shift from business-IT Alignment to Convergence and why this is so important as every aspect of business strategy and operations is increasingly dependent upon information and IT.   Today, the BRM operates at the leading edge of the convergence movement – a movement being accelerated by the ‘consumerization of IT‘, digitization of everything, and by the “Internet of Things.”

In part 2 of this 2-part series, I’d like to discuss needed BRM competencies, how the BRM role changes over time with increasing maturity (of both the BRM and her business partner) and how the way that the BRM engages with the business partner shifts the nature of the relationship from one of order taker to that of strategic partner.

Typical Competencies Required of the BRM

Drives Value Realization

This might be the most important competency for a BRM.  It includes knowing how to surface, clarify and promote the best value-delivering opportunities for IT investments and assets, and how to ensure that these actually deliver on their promised value – delivered in ways that are felt and seen.  This requires skills in Program Management (with implied Project Management skills), Portfolio Management, influence, persuasion, communication, finance and organizational change.

Understands Business Environment

Driving value realization also requires a great understanding of the business, its ecosystem and its competitive landscape.  Successful BRMs have a keen sense of the top strategic business and IT issues – both short and long term, and how these issues relate to initiatives in their industry.  In short, they understand the “business of the business.”  They are viewed by business leaders as a proactive partner in finding the right solutions to business needs and not as a mere “order takers” for IT services.

Aligns IT with the Business

First, let me say that some readers will fume at the subheading.  “IT and the Business are one and the same!” they shout.  While this may reflect a laudable perspective (and one that will gradually materialize as IT-business convergence takes place) it is rarely, if ever, the case today.  Unless your business is information technology, then “business” is where profits are generated, and IT organizations work in support of that.

With that digression out of the way, alignment can be a tricky concept, and in some respects sounds inconsistent with my argument for business-IT convergence.  But alignment represents the necessary table stakes – business leaders and IT leaders need to be ‘on the same page’ in terms of mission, vision, values and goals for both IT and the business – and how these relate to each other.  Mismatches in any of these can spell disaster to the ability to build and sustain value-producing business-IT relationships, let alone converge business and IT capabilities.

Successful BRMs work closely with business leaders to predict demand for IT services and to manage that demand.  They take the lead in highlighting competing objectives.  They are effective at managing the flow of demand through negotiations and seek to iron out demand/supply disconnects between IT and business leaders.  Most important, they constantly seek ways to foster convergence – empowering business leaders – teaching them to fish, as it were, rather than always fish for them!

Manages Relationships

Any role with the word “relationship” in the title has to imply a high level of competence at creating, sustaining and developing strong relationships among stakeholders – especially between business units and the IT groups that support them.  Relationship skills do not come naturally, and are not easily developed in some people.  Effective BRMs are able to build and maintain relationships with senior IT and business leaders.  They are seen as a value-added participant in strategic business-level discussions (i.e., worthy of a “seat at the table”).  Successful BRMs are not shy in speaking up when the demand for IT services outpaces supply ability or capacity.

Manages Organizational Change

Another tough set of skills and behaviors to master!  This requires deep understanding of the organizational levers for making change (people, process, and technology) and how IT and business strategies translate into practical plans of action for change.

The successful facilitator of change engages in discussion with IT and business leaders on the intended and unintended consequences of change, and is willing to confront senior executive sponsors if they are not “walking the talk” and proactively leading the change themselves.  They understand the total cost – both technical and human – of end-to-end implementation.  They can surface the hidden costs and potential obstacles that could derail the change.

They have the ability to identify key stakeholders at the outset of a project, to assign decision-making roles, and ultimately hold leaders accountable for results.  They think and act in terms of outcomes, not deliverables.

Manages Projects and Programs

Successful BRMs typically have several years of project and, ideally, program management experience under their belts.  They have demonstrated competency in project management fundamentals and in the complexities of program management. They demonstrate the ability to get things done through others, even though they may lack ultimate authority.

Effective Communication

Successful BRMs are recognized for their ability to listen, speak, write and communicate clearly and effectively. They demonstrate the ability to negotiate win-win, or at least buy-in, in situations where there are opposing viewpoints.  They are effective at influencing those that they hold no real power over.  They have the ability to recognize and surface disconnects between IT and business leaders and are able to resolve problems through difficult confrontations.

Financial Savvy

Successful BRMs have good knowledge of finance and accounting – they know their ROIs from their NPVs and know how to build a business case that is compelling.  They understand Portfolio Management and have at least basic knowledge of Options theory.  They understand the financial drivers of the business and the drivers of the industry within which the company operates.

The BRM Maturity Journey

BRM Maturity - The Merlyn Group

The graphic above shows how the quality of the Business Partner experience grows and the BRMs maturity increases.

Ad Hoc Relationship

At the lowest maturity level, the BRM role has typically not been formalized.  As such it is being handled in an ad hoc way – the ‘squeaky wheel’ Business Partner gets the most attention.  Or, in some cases, the least demanding Business Partner, regardless of their potential to use IT for high value purposes get the most attention.

Order Taker Relationship

I see this most frequently. Typically, IT supply has been badly broken and the business-IT relationship is hostile, so the BRM role is introduced to “patch things up!”  The BRM, in her ignorance, believes the best way to improve the relationship is to say “yes” to any and all business demands.  This is nearly always a losing proposition.  IT can’t meet the demand, and if they did, there’s little to no business value to be gained.

Advisor

This is a more constructive and productive relationship, where the Business Partner sees the BRM as an advisor.  By this time, there has usually been some formalization of the BRM role and its rules of engagement.  There’s also been some level of training for the BRM – or at least some thought put into the selection of people for the role.

Strategic Partner

The ‘Holy Grail’ of BRM implementations.  This should be the clear ambition – one that is understood and shared by the BRM and her Business Partner – with the recognition that you aren’t a Strategic Partner because you say you are, or because you want to be.  You reach that elevated position because you’ve earned it – and because your Business Partner sees you that way.

IT Matures as the BRM Role Matures

At the risk of pointing out the obvious, the BRM role does not act in isolation.  It is inextricably linked to IT supply.  If IT supply is broken, the BRM role will be limited, and might not even make it to Order Taker.  This, from my experience, is a common situation.  Things are bad, so the BRM role is introduced.  Unless supply improves, the BRM is doomed to failure – and may actually make things worse.  Promises are made and expectations set that cannot be kept.  On top of lousy supply, the BRM is seen by the business partner as ‘overhead’ – yet more evidence that the IT team is clueless, always adding cost without demonstrating value!

To reach the Holy Grail of Strategic Partner, IT supply has to be excellent – both with steady state services (networks, email, help desk, etc.) and with solution delivery (projects and programs).  The “strategic” BRM needs IT supply to work flawlessly.  IT supply needs the BRM to suppress low value demand while stimulating demand that delivers real business value.  That way, everyone is happy and a virtuous cycle is sustained.

Image courtesy of TradeArabia

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What’s Really Meant By Business-IT Engagement and How Do You Achieve It?


This is another post triggered by a reader’s question emailed to me.  Here’s his question (some details have been omitted to preserve anonymity).

I was searching for information around Business-IT engagement but have yet to really come across anything with substance.  I’m looking to better connect with the business unit managers to formulate an IT strategy. The unit managers have a track record of operating in their own silos, often making IT decisions without talking to IT which has ultimately cost the company money.  I was thinking about putting a plan together to engage. Structured via, face-to-face, email, social media, newsletter and even survey. Ultimately, from start to finish, I build the picture and connect and portray the message that IT is an enabler and there is benefit in engaging.  I wondered if you knew of anything which may help me?”

This is an interesting question and a common challenge.

What Do We Mean by Business-IT Engagement?

A little research into the term “Business-IT engagement” found a reference to “Employee Engagement“, which Wikipedia defines as:

An ‘engaged employee’ is one who is fully involved in, and enthusiastic about their work, and thus will act in a way that furthers their organization’s interests. According to Scarlett Surveys, ‘Employee Engagement is a measurable degree of an employee’s positive or negative emotional attachment to their job, colleagues and organization that profoundly influences their willingness to learn and perform at work’. Thus engagement is distinctively different from employee satisfaction, motivation and organisational culture.”

I don’t think it’s an unreasonable stretch to derive from this a definition of business-IT engagement:

Business-IT Engagement exists when business unit leaders are fully involved in, and enthusiastic about their IT capabilities, and thus will act in a way that furthers the business value of those capabilities.  Business-IT Engagement is a measurable degree of a business executive’s positive or negative emotional attachment to their IT capabilities, IT colleagues and IT organization that profoundly influences their willingness to participate in the use of IT for business value.”

IT Engagement Model

I also found an IT Engagement Model from our friends at the Center for Information Systems Research:

The IT engagement model is defined as the system of governance mechanisms that brings together key stakeholders to ensure that projects achieve both local and company-wide objectives. The model consists of three general components:

  • Company-wide IT Governance – decision rights and accountability of company level and business unit level stakeholders to define company-wide objectives and encourage desirable behavior in the use of IT
  • Project management – a formalized project management process, with clear deliverables and regular well-defined checkpoints, that encourages disciplined, predicatable behaviour for project teams.
  • Linking mechanisms – processes and decision-making bodies that connect project-level activities to the overall IT governance.

The Linking Mechanisms are further explained in the following graphic:

I find this to be a pretty comprehensive and easily understood way to define some of the major aspects of Business-IT engagement.

Key Business-IT Engagement Factors

The other key factors I pointed my reader to include:

  • The experience your unit managers have with IT – do they trust IT? Has IT served them reliably? Is there transparency into how IT charges?  Is the business value of IT recognized and celebrated?
  • How engaged are business and IT leadership with each other? Does the CIO sit on the Management Committee? Is there an effective business-IT governance board and related processes and structures?
  • The skills of those in the business-IT interface role (Business Relationship Managers, or BRM’s) – how well do they understand the business? Do they have good relationship skills? Are they co-located with the business unit leaders and sit in on business management meetings? Do they perform a business management role, or are they simply seen as technical people taking care of IT?  Are they primarily responsible for Demand Management?

To the balance of his question, I asked:

  • Are you really trying to formulate an IT strategy? Or is it going to be a business-IT strategy. (If I’m a business unit leader, why should I care about or want to be involved in an IT strategy – it sounds rather internal to IT to me, so I’d probably want to stay out of it – I’m busy enough as it is!)
  • Do you really understand the business problems and how IT can contribute to solving them? If you do, what’s the best way to “market” those ideas, and to whom should you be marketing them?
  • What are the cultural norms in the business – do ideas drift down from the top, or do they percolate up from the edges – the ‘front lines’?

Outside-in Versus Inside-out Thinking and Acting

Finally, I was troubled by an aspect of the language my reader used in his question:

I build the picture and connect and portray the message that IT is an enabler and there is benefit in engaging”

This is what I call Inside-out thinking – “We (IT) are good and can help you so you should engage with us!”  I think my reader might be on a better path to engagement if he can identify the specific business issues and needs and communicate how IT might contribute to addressing those issues and needs.

Don’t Engage – Empower!

Just as I was finalizing this post, Zemanta did its usual thing of suggesting links and related articles.  (I really like Zemanta – it’s been one of my little blogging secrets for a while!)  Among its suggestions for articles was Don’t Engage Employees, Empower Them!  I think that is an important dimension to Business-IT engagement – especially in this age of IT consumerization.   Too many IT leaders see there role as ‘protecting the business from the perils of IT.’  Empowering them – for example, Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) can be a powerful way of bringing the business into the business-IT dialog and engaging them in strategic and tactical dialog and decision making.

Graphic courtesy of The Social Workplace

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To Whom Should Business Relationship Managers Report?


I recently received this question from a reader:

We are evaluating a strategy to centralize IT and implement Business Relationship Management (BRM) roles as part of the centralization. Where do you typically see the BRM’s reporting into in a centralized IT organization? Should they report directly in to the CIO, or can they be effective a level or two below the CIO?”

Rule #1 – Reporting Lines Are Weak Determinants of Success for the BRM Role

I have found reporting relationships to be a very weak determinant of success for the Business Relationship Manager (BRM) role. Far more important are the competencies (especially business knowledge and relationship skills) of the BRM and the maturity of the business executives they partner with.

Rule #2 – Heft Matters!

Notwithstanding Rule #1, the “heft” of the BRM role – the weight and implied authority it carries does matter.  There’s a couple of reasons for this:

  1. BRM’s are often on a CIO succession path (either explicitly or implicitly) – i.e., have the skills and wherewithal to be a CIO down the road, and the BRM role may be seen as a developmental step.  This has implications for who you chose to fill BRM roles, and for their career paths.
  2. The story a CIO tells the business executives when establishing the BRM role is along the lines of, “I am giving you one of my senior staff members to help surface, shape and manage IT demand so that you get the highest possible value from IT investments and assets. In return for this ‘gift’ I expect you to treat this BRM as a member of your management team.”

As a result, the most common reporting relationship for successful BRM’s is directly to the CIO.  In some cases, the BRM has a dotted line relationship to the senior business executive for the unit they represent.  In other cases, the BRM role is solid line to the senior business executive and dotted line to the CIO.

Rule #3 – Context Matters!

There are many other contextual factors to consider here, including:

  • What is the scope of the BRM role – is it primarily demand management (shaping, surfacing and managing business demand for IT)?  Or does the role include supply management, service management or other responsibilities?
  • Do the BRM’s act as Project or Program Managers for major initiatives?
  • Do the BRM’s sit on any governance bodies, such as Portfolio Management or Service Management?
  • How do BRM’s engage with the supply side?  How do they engage with Enterprise Architects?
  • How mature is IT supply?
  • Howe mature is business demand?

BRM’s Can Be ‘Game Changers’!

The BRM role is a tough one to get right, but from my experience, well worth the effort!  An effective BRM can:

  1. Elevate business maturity
  2. Ensure that IT resources are being focused on the highest potential value activities and initiatives
  3. Ensure that those initiatives capture the highest possible value

 

Graphic courtesy of Linda Galindo

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Questioning the Role of the Business Relationship Manager


I’ve been deeply into understanding and developing the role of Business Relationship Manager (BRM) since the early 1990′s when, as a Partner at Ernst & Young’s Center for Business Innovation, I began researching what was then an emerging role.  Since then, I’ve continued research into this important role, led many consulting engagements helping companies implement or improve the performance of the BRM role, and have been on the faculty for several global BRM development programs.

More recently, I’ve been a co-moderator of the Professional Business Relationship Manager Group on LinkedIn.  This has been a fascinating experience for me – some very interesting dialogs surface from time to time, and the diverse opinions and approaches to the BRM role become ever more evident each day.  Also, the sheer growth of this group over the last couple of years is remarkable, and speaks to the growing importance of the BRM role.

What is a Business Relationship Manager?

First, it is important to understand that this is a role, not a job title.  In fact the job titles for people who fill this role vary enormously.  Adding to the confusion around titles, “Relationship Manager” is a common title in banking, and we get a lot of applications to join the LinkedIn group from banking officers – not the intended audience!  Also, a number of pure “sales” jobs call themselves “relationship managers.”  I don’t have a problem with that, but it’s not the focus of the BRM group.

Second, the ways that the BRM role is implemented varies significantly.  Sometimes it is a sole practitioner – other times, the BRM leads a small team (anything from 1 or 2 business analysts to a larger team, including architects and even developers.)  Sometimes the BRM reports to the IT organization – typically as a direct report to the CIO.  Other times, it reports to a business leader – perhaps with a dotted line relationship to the CIO.

No matter what the variations in organization and structure, the common thread across BRM implementations is an interface between business and IT.  The common goal (though expressed and measured in myriad ways!) is to increase the value realized from IT investments (typically, new initiatives), assets (usually current systems and infrastructure) and capabilities (the services and products offered by the IT organization.)

This “interface” responsibility implies two ‘faces’ of the BRM role:

Representing the Business to IT

This is one of the BRM ‘faces’ – representing a given business unit (or units, or business process, or geography) to IT.  In this regard, the BRM’s primary role is in shaping and surfacing business demand – always with an eye to maximizing the business value of IT investments, assets and capabilities.

Representing IT to the Business

This is the other BRM ‘face’ – representing IT to the given business unit(s).  In this regard, the BRM’s primary role is in supply management – ensuring that the IT organization understands business needs and expectations, and is delivering against those expectations.

But, What is the Real Rationale for the BRM Role?

Implicit in the many debates I see in the BRM community (and behind some of the failures I see in making the BRM role successful) is the question:

What is the most important aspect for the BRM to focus on – demand management or supply management?”

There is no easy answer to this – it really is a function of both supply and demand maturity.  But, I will make some assertions based on a great deal of experience:

  1. If supply maturity is low (i.e., basic IT services are unreliable, unpredictable, unstable, unclear) the BRM role will almost certainly fail.  It cannot add real value, spends it’s time apologizing for IT and making excuses, and is quickly seen by the business partner as “overhead.”
  2. If supply maturity is moderate (i.e., basic IT services work well, but capacity is highly constrained, projects take too long to deliver and are prone to delays) the BRM role has to play a careful balancing act – stimulating and shaping demand while living within the constraints of supply.
  3. If supply maturity is high (i.e., a well regarded IT organization that delivers basic services and project work; that has ‘elastic’ supply that can flex with demand and can deliver with ‘agility’) the BRM role can and should focus almost exclusively on demand shaping and surfacing.

Of these three situations, scenario 1 is the most treacherous for the BRM.  It’s essentially a losing proposition.  My advice to clients is, “Don’t put BRM’s in place – fix the basic services first!”

Scenario 2 takes a great deal of finesse.  The temptation for the BRM is to either try to fix the problems of supply, or shield the business partner from those problems.  Fixing supply is best done with those on the supply side who are responsible and accountable for IT supply.  If you put the BRM in that role, they can’t be effective in their demand management role.  Once their business partners see them as part of the supply side, the BRM loses their credibility as valuable demand shapers.

Why would I invite you to my leadership team strategy retreat – you’re the person who’s fixing IT services!” might be the reaction of a business leader to a BRM who has asked to join the business unit’s strategy formulation retreat.

On the other hand, shielding the business partner from supply side woes is also a trap – what I refer to as “colluding with dysfunctional behavior” which is never a good idea!

Scenario 2 also takes great skill with the discipline of ‘value management’ – understanding how IT investments, assets and capabilities lead to business value – making sure that the constrained supply is working on the highest value possibilities, ensuring that low value requests do not get through the intake process and that value is actually ‘realized’ – felt and seen by the business.

Scenario 3 is the ‘holy grail’ for the BRM.  Unfortunately, by the time IT supply has reached that level of maturity, so has business demand, and the BRM role may be redundant.  But that’s a story for another post…

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When IT Is Your Company’s “Piggy Bank”


 

First, my apologies – this is old news!  But I was talking to a CIO last week and he made a statement I’ve heard many times over the years:  “The company views IT as ‘the piggy bank’ – it’s a place they can reliably come to when they need to cut costs!”  This reminded me that while I’ve had the good fortune over the last 5 to 10 years to work mostly with more mature IT organizations and their ‘clued in’ CIO’s, there’s a lot of CIO’s out there who should not be running enterprise IT functions – they are doing a terrible disservice to their employers!  Hence this post, intended to prompt less capable CIO’s (and maybe some CEO’s) into action!

Back to my anecdote.  I asked the CIO (knowing pretty much what his response would be), “How does the company feel about it’s IT capabilities?”  He said, “Well, no so great, actually!  They tell us we are delivering ok from a tactical perspective, but are not creating strategic value!”  I asked, (again, anticipating a predictable response) “How engaged are the members of the IT organization?”  His response, “Well, we do have an engagement problem – IT scored quite low on our latest engagement survey.”

The ‘Piggy Bank’ Trap

This CIO is caught in a familiar vicious cycle:

  1. While they’ve done a decent job ‘keeping the lights on and the trains running,’ IT has not delivered strategic value.
  2. As a result, when the company is looking to take out costs, IT is the first place they go.
  3. Feeling vulnerable and wanting to be a ‘team player’ the CIO makes some cuts and ‘ponies up’
  4. With budgets reduced, and with IT’s position as a tactical capability reinforced, the business units don’t look for strategic IT enablement, and the IT organization doesn’t have the bandwidth or capabilities to stimulate strategic demand.
  5. Inevitably, more cuts are requested of IT (as a dependable source of budget money) and the cycle continues!

IT Must Be highly Cost Effective!

Make no mistake – IT has to run its operational side in the most cost effective manner – provable through benchmarks.  (And, as it turns out, IT operations and support is one of the most easily and accurately benchmarkable aspects of IT.)  Often, getting to an acceptable benchmark in operational costs means working with business units to consolidate disparate systems, retire ancient and non-viable platforms, and exploit newer technologies such as virtualization and cloud computing.  There’s good news and bad news in this:

  • The bad news is, it can’t be done without business cooperation.
  • The good news – it forces business cooperation!  In other words, IT is not simply acting as a piggy bank – it is working with its users to increase efficiency and effectiveness.

The good news side of this equation helps position IT beyond a ‘back office’ mystery zone of geeks and propeller-heads, and towards a valued business partner.

IT Must be Strategic

But cost effective operations is just table stakes for the real mission – enabling business growth and innovation.  Not simply helping the bottom line, but growing the top line – and even creating new top lines enabled by information and technology.  You cannot cost cut your way into this role.  If, as CIO, you find you are repeatedly getting relegated to the company piggy bank, you need to look in the mirror.  As I’ve noted before, businesses get the IT they deserve!  And the corollary to that – CIO’s get the respect they deserve.

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Do You Have IT Organizational Clarity – Part 3


This picks up on Part 1 and Part 2 in this series on IT Organizational Clarity.

In Part 1, I discussed the importance of IT Organizational Clarity, the symptoms when clarity is compromised, and the challenges of trying to address those symptoms rather than the root causes that lead to compromised clarity.  Part 1 closed with a discussion of the two key dimensions along which IT Organizational Clarity can be tackled – scope (units of IT Capability) and meaningful and assessable characteristics for evaluating and improving IT Capabilities.

In Part 2, I discussed ways to define IT Capabilities and provided guidelines on the manageable number of IT Capabilities and appropriate depth of decomposition.  In this post, I will describe three different types of IT Capability.

Not All IT Capabilities Are Born Equal

It is helpful to classify IT Capabilities into one of three different types, as illustrated in the graphic above.

Value Chain Capabilities

At the core are those capabilities that take inputs, add value, and deliver outputs to a customer or end consumer (in the world of IT, these tend to be services and products).  Think of these Value Chain Capabilities as those that the end customer appreciates (hopefully!) and is willing to pay money for.

For example, as a business user, I may have a business problem I’d like IT help to solve.  That problem (or opportunity) is the input to a Value Chain.  The first Capability that will approach that problem adds value by analyzing the problem, identifying and proposing a solution.  As the business user, I appreciate that value has been added – drilling into my stated problem and offering (and perhaps demonstrating via a prototype) one or more proposed solutions.  The next Capability in the Value Chain might take the chosen solution and develop and deploy that solution.  Again, as the business user, value has been clearly added – taking a proposed solution and delivering it.  The final Capability where value can be added is supporting and maintaining that solution – again, a recognizable way of adding value for me, the customer.

Ultimately, as the business user or consumer, these are the only Capabilities I care about and am willing to pay for (directly or indirectly) because of the value they add for me.  Unfortunately, while these Value Chain Capabilities are necessary, they are not sufficient.

Enabling Capabilities

Value Chain Capabilities typically draw upon other Capabilities that enable them.  Think of these as Shared Services that are common to other Capabilities, or to other instances of problems/solutions working their way through the Value Chain.  Examples of IT Services that might enable the Value Chain Capabilities include Project Management, IT Operations, and IT Supply.

Alignment and Governance Capabilities

Value Chain Capabilities also typically depend upon other Capabilities that ensure that the work they are doing is aligned and governed to ensure they are operating effectively and in the interests of the enterprise.  For example, determining which business problems will be addressed, which solutions will be selected, how staff and resources will be allocated are all important control that Value Chain Capabilities will be subject to.

Why These Distinctions Matter to IT Organizational Clarity

The distinctions between Value Chain, Enabling and Alignment/Governance Capabilities are significant:

  1. Different types of IT Capability tend to be optimized towards different value propositions, with implications for how they are organized.  For example, Enabling Capabilities tend to be optimized for Operational Excellence (as shared services, they need to deliver predictable, consistent, quality services at the lowest possible cost).  Value Chain Capabilities tend to be organized for Customer Intimacy, delivering what specific customers want; anticipating customer needs.  Alignment and Governance Capabilities tend to be more about decision-making – rather than delivering services, they make decisions or provide decision-making frameworks – think Enterprise Architecture and the mechanisms and structures that support it as Alignment and Governance Capabilities.  As such, these tend to be networked, linking stakeholders and decision makers, and optimized to maximize the business value delivered or enabled by IT Investments..
  2. Some types of IT Capability lend themselves to alternate sourcing more than others.  For example, Aligning and Governance Capabilities lend themselves the least to straight outsourcing approaches (do you want to pass decision rights to an external vendor?)
  3. Different types of IT Capability lend themselves to different funding models.  For example, Value Chain Capabilities lend themselves to direct business funding, whereas Enabling Capabilities lend themselves better to indirect funding models (e.g., overhead charge).

IT Capability Model Example

As an illustration, below is a ‘normative’ IT Capability Model.

The Fractal Nature of IT Capabilities

Note, that as you decompose any IT Capability, you will generally find that the decompositions will have a similar structure – a primary Value Chain, drawing upon underlying Enabling Capabilities and influenced by Alignment and Governance Capabilities.

For example, Manage Business-IT Portfolio & Programs might decompose into the following sub-Capabilities:

In the following post, we will look at the assessable characteristics of any IT Capability as a means of determining Capability Maturity and determining how to increase maturity and thereby improve performance.

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Do You Have IT Organizational Clarity – Part 2


My previous post introduced the topic of IT Organizational Clarity, discussed common symptoms arising from a lack of Organizational Clarity, and suggested two dimensions through which clarity can be assessed and improved:

  1. Bounding scope by defining “IT Capabilities” at an appropriate level of granularity. (Units of analysis).
  2. Defining meaningful and assessable characteristics for IT Capabilities. (Means of assessing and improving).

Note – the ultimate gauge of IT Organizational Clarity is in the ‘health’ of the IT Organization and the business results to which it contributes.  However, there are all sorts of demand-side complexities in assessing these things, so for now I will focus on the notion of capability maturity as a worthy proxy for and predictor of end results and the ability to continuously improve.

In this and the next couple of posts I will discuss the notion of IT Capabilities and how best to define them.  I will then address the assessable characteristics of IT Capabilities.

What Is an IT Capability?

In order to adequately define an IT Capability, we need to clarify a couple of common terms – Service and Process:

Service

A Service in the context of IT Capabilities is best described as the interface point between a provider and a consumer where value is exchanged.  Services should be defined from the perspective of the consumer.  They need to be ‘discoverable’ and the service interface understood by the consumer.  They need to have clarity on what they do, what they cost, how they are invoked, and how problems are reported and resolved.  The service provider should have a good understanding of the value received by the consumer, as well as the overall quality of the customer experience.  This may comprise both tangible and intangible elements, most of which are ultimately subjective.

Process

A Process is a sequence of interdependent and linked procedures which, at every stage, consume one or more resources (employee time, energy, money) to convert inputs (data, material, etc.) into outputs.  These outputs often serve as inputs for the next stage until a known goal or outcome is reached.

Capability

A Capability can be thought of as everything it takes behind the scenes that makes a service possible.  This will include:

  • One or more Processes.
  • Descriptions of the Roles needed to perform one or more of the procedures within a process (e.g., Project Manager, Business Analyst, Relationship Manager).
  • Descriptions of the Competencies needed to perform a given role (what the person performing the role needs to know, e.g., business knowledge, what skills they need, e.g., facilitation, and what behaviors they should exhibit, e.g., results orientation).
  • An adequate supply of competent human resources filling the given roles.
  • Tools and technologies needed to automate or execute necessary processes or procedures.
  • Management systems necessary to ensure the health and performance of the Capability, including funding, organizational will, personal incentives, and so on.

How Many IT Capabilities Should You Have?

This is a tricky question to answer.  First, of course it depends on the mission to be served by a given capability.  But more importantly, this is a question of granularity.  In the heady days of business process re-engineering, I learned that picking the right granularity for an end-to-end process is crucial, and perhaps as much art as science.

I think this question has more to do with the characteristics of and limitations to the workings of the human mind than anything else.  If you end up with, say, 3 IT capabilities, chances are that you are at too high a level of granularity to be really useful in terms of analytical and management discipline.  On the other hand, if you have 12 or more IT capabilities, you are at too low a level.  From my experience, between 7 and 9 is the right number of IT Capabilities to have in a ‘top-level’ IT Capability model.

How Many Levels of Decomposition Should You Go To?

Yes – you guessed it – it depends!  On the basis that you really don’t understand a Capability unless you can see a level of decomposition below it, I think the answer is at least two levels of decomposition are necessary.  Beyond that, it depends on the Capability you are trying to understand or improve.  Consider, for example, the Process aspect of an IT Capability.  Capabilities that are highly procedural, such as those found in IT Infrastructure and Operations, will typically need more levels of decomposition (i.e., more detailed process definitions).  Coincidentally, this is the domain of ITILv3, so you can effectively ‘buy’ process definitions and a process architecture off-the-shelf.

On the other hand, a Capability such as Opportunity Discovery may be more about analytical skills and the magical space between problem understanding and solution definition.  This space is much more about specially-skilled people and specific business domain knowledge rather than sequential, detailed and rigorously controlled processes (as in Statistical Process Control.)

We will pick this up in the next post and look at three different types of IT Capability  – Value Chain Capabilities, Aligning/Governing Capabilities and Enabling Capabilities – and examine the distinctions between these and why the distinctions are important.

Graphic courtesy of MassBay Organization Development Learning Blog

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Four Common Mistakes in IT Portfolio Management


Among my most popular topics, week after week, is Portfolio Management.  It’s a key discipline, especially crucial in driving Business-IT Maturity past the tricky mid-point where many IT organizations tend to get stuck.

IT Business Edge has just published a short slideshow on “Four Common Mistakes in IT Portfolio Management“, re-purposing a post of mine from January 2008.  I think they did a great job simplifying and bringing to life some of the key points in the original post.  Enjoy!

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Business-IT Alignment – The Relationship Dimension


Much has been written about “Business-IT Alignment” over the years.  Alignment can refer to Strategy – the degree to which IT strategy and business strategy are aligned.  (This, of course, is both ‘old news’ and yet often not the case in practice.  And there’s one school of thought that says there’s no such thing as IT strategy – it’s only business strategy with IT implications.)

Alignment can also refer to Structure – IT capabilities are structured to align with business structures and needs.  But there’s a crucial ‘third leg’ to the business-IT alignment stool, and that is the alignment of relationships that sit between business units and IT capabilities.

The Crucial Relationship Manager Role

Many IT organizations have created a role that bridges the business and IT.  Rarely actually called “Relationship Managers”, this role represents IT to the business and the business to IT. I’ve posted on this role before – see, for example The IT Relationship Manager’s Role in Expanding Business-IT Capability,  and From Supply-Constrained to Value-Constrained IT Business Model, and IT Maturity and the Role of the Relationship Management.  Sometimes called an IT Account Manager, or Business-IT Director, or some-such, the role is primarily responsible for ‘demand shaping‘ – stimulating an appetite for high value demand, and suppressing appetites for low value demand.  Sometimes, people in this Relationship Manager Role are effectively mini-CIO’s or Business Unit CIO’s – leveraging shared IT infrastructure (and often leveraging common applications and enterprise systems) but taking care of business unit-specific IT needs.

Relationship Alignment

There are at least three dimensions along which Relationship Managers can align with their business partners.  The first two dimensions are pretty obvious and generally handled well, but the third dimension is trickier and often not well addressed.  The dimensions are:

  1. Domain Expertise – the Relationship Manager (or whatever title this role operates under) needs to really understand the business domain for which they are responsible.  Be it marketing, supply chain, human resources, and so on, they need to have deep domain knowledge in order to bring real value to their business partners and have the credibility to have impact.
  2. Geography – as the real estate cliché goes, ‘location, location, location!’ so goes Relationship Management.  At its best, the Relationship Manager should be co-located with the senior managers of the business unit with which they are aligned.  At the very least, they need easy access.  The occasional ‘fly in’ to meet with their business partners typically doesn’t do it in terms of creating a productive business-IT partnership.
  3. Maturity – this is the tricky dimension, and one that is typically not well addressed.  Skilled Relationship Managers are a rare resource.  You want your most effective and creative Relationship Managers aligned with those business units and executives with the highest demand maturity – i.e., with the best  capacity to recognize and leverage high value IT-enabled opportunities.  Innovative, ‘change agent’ types of Relationship Managers will quickly become frustrated facing off against executives who are technologically in the dark ages, or who cherish the status quo.  Similarly, progressive, innovative business leaders will become quickly frustrated working with a Relationship Manager who lacks drive, a sense of urgency, the creativity to generate valuable ideas about IT possibilities, and the wherewithal to bring them to fruition.

How Healthy Are Your Business-IT Relationships?

Clearly, the CIO is in many ways the ‘über-Relationship Manager’, setting the tone for demand shaping and the strategic context for IT, and typically ‘owning’ the business-IT relationships with the most senior executive team.  But no CIO has the bandwidth or domain expertise to handle all the relationships at all the management levels needed to surface and steer the best opportunities to create business value from IT.  So, how healthy and productive are your key relationships between business and IT? Do you even know what would be considered ‘key relationships’?  How would you know the degree to which they are fully delivering value against their potential?

Let me know your thoughts and experiences around Relationship Management effectiveness.

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Innovation and Web 2.0 – A Compelling Relationship?



I had a very interesting and exciting week!  I was a speaker at an nGenera Senior Executive Summit, which drew about 60 top executives from mostly large companies – CEO’s, CIO’s, CFO’s, HR and shared service heads, and even a couple of Lawyers and Platform/Brand managers.  It was an auspicious group – both in terms of participants and presenters/session leaders, which included Jim Collins, Michael Treacy, Don Tapscott, Tammy Erickson and Dartmouth’s Tuck School Professor, Chris Trimble.

I introduced my ideas about leveraging Web 2.0 (broadly defined) to significantly drive up the value of business innovation – specifically by following the principles and processes of Design Thinking.  I’ve been getting to this point in my last series of posts (Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3.)  In fact, those posts were largely written as I was developing my session materials.

Does ‘Design Thinking’ Have Legs?

Part of my thesis built upon the success of the Design Thinking movement that has gelled over the last 5 years.  I have found the success stories compelling, and the underlying principles resonate with my own experiences and values over the last 30 years in trying to leverage IT for increased innovation.  However, I was troubled by the recognition and acceptability of the term ‘Design Thinking’ – especially in the US.  The text of a 2007 speech by BusinessWeek‘s Bruce Nussbaum given in London tipped me off that there might be a problem here.

Nussbaum’s Banana…

In his 2007 speech to the Royal College of Art, Nussbaum noted:

In the US, CEOs and top managers hate the word “design.” Just believe me. No matter what they tell you, they believe that “design” only has something to do with curtains, wallpaper and maybe their suits. These guys, and they’re still mostly guys, prefer the term “innovation” because it has a masculine, military, engineering, tone to it. Think Six Sigma and you want to salute, right? I’ve tried and tried to explain that design goes way beyond aesthetics. It can have process, metrics all the good hard stuff managers love. But no, I can’t budge this bunch. So I have given up. Innovation, design, technology—I just call it all a banana. Peel that banana back and you find great design. Yummy design. . The kind of design that can change business culture and all of our civil society as well.”

One of the first to make the Web 2.0 connection, Nussbaum went on to say:

Innovation is no longer just about new technology per se. It is about new models of organization. Design is no longer just about form anymore but is a method of thinking that can let you to see around corners. And the high tech breakthroughs that do count today are not about speed and performance but about collaboration, conversation and co-creation. That’s what Web 2.0 is all about.”

I tested the waters of my Summit attendees, first by asking how many in the room had some familiarity with the term ‘Design Thinking’?   Three hands shot up, and a couple sort of hovered around shoulder level (presumably meaning, “I’ve heard of it, but please don’t call on me to talk about it!”).  Of the three hands, two were from companies for whom I had Design Thinking case studies about and who were listed in my very first slide (I had not at this point turned on the projector.)  The third hand was from a senior executive at a major Industrial Supply company that I had not expected to be particularly Design Thinking literate.  So, test 1 indicated that the term is not widely known.  Of course, this does not necessarily mean that Design Thinking is not widely practiced – perhaps all 60 companies in the room do in fact excel at Design Thinking, but refer to what they do as some variation of Nussbaum’s ‘banana’?  However, I truly doubt this.  In fact, the many one-on-one conversations that I had with the executives at this summit during the reception and dinner following my presentation supported my sense that explicit efforts to drive up the value of business innovation are relatively few and far between.

Are Design Thinkers Web 2.0 Enabled?

To the larger part of my thesis, there was little evidence at this Summit that any form of Web 2.0 was being explicitly leverage to support Design Thinking (or innovation, or the banana!)  There were a few ‘accidental experiments’ and emergent social networks – both internal and external – but nothing claimed as part of a deliberate, holistic effort to increase innovation through Web 2.0 technologies.  This for me was the big surprise.  The Senior Vice President of Strategy from one of the Design Thinking literate companies told me at the reception, “When you first connected Design Thinking and Web 2.0 in your presentation, I thought you’d completely lost it!  But as you gave examples, the light bulbs began to turn on – I think you are onto something!”  This was gratifying indeed – well worth the price of admission!

Graphic courtesy of RI Nexus

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