Tag Archives: IT service management

Announcing the Business Relationship Management Institute!


BRMII’m excited to announce that I’ve joined forces with a couple of colleagues to begin a new venture – The Business Relationship Management Institute (BRMI). BRMI is a not-for-profit association for Business Relationship Management Professionals, providing professional training and certification, and facilitating exchange of knowledge and leading practices. My role as Principal with The Merlyn Group, my consulting firm and provider of the Symcordia® Knowledge Management and Collaboration platform, and my role as co-founder of Formicio in Europe will continue (yes, I’ve been a busy lad in my semi-retirement!)

Empowering the Emerging Business Relationship Management Role

Regular readers will be aware that Business Relationship Management (BRM) has been a recurring topic in this blog. It’s a topic I’ve been passionate about since the early 1990′s when a 3-year, longitudinal multi-company research study I was leading at Ernst & Young’s Center for Business Innovation surfaced the emerging BRM role as a key business-IT alignment mechanism. Those early beginnings culminate (or, at least kick off a new chapter) in the formation of the BRMI this week. Founded as a 501(c)(6) not-for-profit corporation, this represents an opportunity to connect even more deeply with the BRM community, and, corny as it may sound, ‘give back’ to that community and to the IT profession in the twilight years of my career.

How Did the Business Relationship Management Institute Come About?

It is said that the best stories narrate themselves. Founding Business Relationship Management Institute is just such a story. The three BRMI co-founders embarked on the journey to establish the Institute, years before we met each other.

I have been involved in the BRM profession since 1995, when I collaborated with professors from Oxford and Cranfield Universities in the United Kingdom and Nanyang University in Singapore to develop and teach a BRM program for a global oil company. I’ve continued to develop and lead training and development programs for BRMs and consult extensively on this subject via The Merlyn Group.

In 2010, Aaron Barnes, a senior BRM, who built and was leading a successful team of BRMs at a major big box retailer, felt the need for a forum for professional BRMs to share knowledge and develop their competencies. In January, 2011, Aaron formed the Professional Business Relationship Managers (PBRM) group on LinkedIn thus establishing a foundation for what would eventually evolve into the first official BRMI global community.

In late 2011, just as Aaron invited me to co-moderate the rapidly growing LinkedIn group, Dr. Aleksandr Zhuk, an expert technologist, professor, with years of experience in teaching online, and a fellow member of PBRM LinkedIn group, also saw the desperate need for a widely available BRM training and certification. Connecting the dots, Aleksandr conceived of a global professional organization to provide training, certification and serve all other needs of the rapidly growing BRM community. Business Relationship Management Institute was born.

In January 2013, Aaron invited Aleksandr to join us as co-moderator of PBRM group and all three of us met, for the first time, to exchange ideas on how to best serve the BRM community. As soon as Aleksandr brought up the idea of Business Relationship Management Institute, we recognized that each of us has already been working toward making it real. The time has come to join our forces to realize our shared vision for BRMI—a not-for-profit organization dedicated to serving the needs and protecting the interests of the global BRM community.

BRMI Logo

BRMI tri-petal, is a registered trademark of Business Relationship Management Institute.  The tri-petal symbolizes a well-balanced unity among the business relationship manager, the service provider, and the business partner.

Our Position on the BRM Role

In 2011, ITIL® and ISO/IEC 20000 standard for IT Service Management formalized the existence of a dedicated Business Relationship Manager (BRM) role and corresponding process, recognizing the need for BRM as a new best practice and IT Service Management standard requirement. According to ITIL®:

The role of the business relationship manager (BRM) was established to execute certain customer-facing activities in various processes, such as service level management. However, as the role matured it became clear that there was a discernible process to support the role…The purpose of the business relationship management process is two-fold:

  • Establish and maintain a business relationship between the service provider and the customer based on understanding the customer and their business needs.
  • Identify customer needs and ensure that the service provider is also able to meet these needs as business needs change over time and between circumstances.

ISO/IEC 20000 standard for IT Service Management adds that:

For each customer, the service provider shall have a designated individual [BRM] who is responsible for managing the customer relationship and customer satisfaction.”2 According to ISO/IEC 20000-2:2012, to be effective, “The BRM process should ensure that mechanisms are established to manage the relationship between the service provider and customer(s).”

At BRMI, we fully recognize the importance of structured well-tuned processes and agree with ITIL® definition of the two key functions fulfilled by the BRM. We also believe that ISO/IEC 20000 standard’s requirement for having a dedicated BRM for each business customer provides a solid guideline for establishing a well-balanced effective relationship between a business customer and a service provider with the BRM acting as advocate for the customer.

Yet, many years of our collective experience in the field also suggest that effective business relationship management is as much, if not more, about strategic-level leadership as it is about effective processes. Being a successful BRM means much more than periodically interfacing with business stakeholders and IT process owners by means of a process—regardless of how well-tuned this process might be.  An effective business relationship manager is, by definition, a master of building working strategic-level relationships, one who possesses all the interpersonal and business skills this entails.  Effective BRMs carry real strategic weight in their organizations. Therefore, the BRMs who deliver maximum business value hold senior management positions placed in well-balanced alignment with senior business and IT executives.

At BRMI, we also believe that, like anything else in the age of turbulent changes, the BRM role is not static—it evolves. Therefore, the BRM role is best approached through a maturity perspective—both the maturity of business demand for IT services and products, with regard to its ability to turn IT investments into realized business value, and the maturity of IT service provider and its ability to fulfill evolving business needs. Maturity of business demand and IT supply affect the BRM role and its ability to deliver results.

We will be exploring these viewpoints, and many other aspects of the BRM role through the BRMI blog. We’ll also develop an evolving “blog roll” of sites we believe should be in every BRMs reading list. We hope you will all join with us on the BRMI site in this global conversation about the emerging and evolving role of the Business Relationship Manager!

Related articles
Enhanced by Zemanta
About these ads

Why Business Relationship Manager Success Hangs On So Many Variables! (Part 1 of 2)


breaking-barriers-300x225My regular readers (yes, both of them – my brother and my cat) will have noticed that I’ve been posting more about the Business Relationship Manager role lately.  It seems that there’s a surge (resurgence?) of interest in this crucial and challenging role.  I’ve been wondering why this is, and thinking about the reasons why the role is so challenging?

Why the Business Relationship Manager Role is Gaining Traction

I have several theories about the increasing interest in the Business Relationship Manager (BRM) role:

  1. BRM as a product of Service Management standards.  IT Service Management standards (e.g., ITIL® and ISO/IEC 20000) formalized the dedicated BRM role as a new best practice and IT Service Management standard requirement. As I’ve posted before, this is a mixed blessing – one the one hand it is creating awareness and legitimization for the BRM – that is good.  One the other hand, it positions the BRM rather tactically – a champion for IT service management rather than a strategic channel for creating business value from IT.  Yes, I acknowledge that IT Service Management is an important enabler of IT business value, but it does not reach the highest points in the value chain. If that’s all the BRM aspires to (or is seen as) then the value of the BRM will be constrained, and sooner or later, they will be seen as ‘overhead.’  The analogy that comes to mind is general education – yes, K through 12 provides a critical and foundational educational experience, but it won’t in of itself ensure a career path beyond minimum wage.  For that, you need either higher education in some specialty that is in demand, special talents, or an amazing amount of luck!
  2. BRM as the Silver Bullet!  After years of attempts by CIOs to get their business partners to love and value the IT function, the deployment of the BRM role perhaps might be the missing bullet!  At the very least, it’s the next intervention to try – what harm can it do?
  3. The Emerging BRM Success.  Some BRMs are emerging naturally (even without that formal title or role.)  A typical scenario is that the CIO begins to notice that the relationship with supply chain, for example, has improved by leaps and bounds over the last couple of years.  Thinking about the reasons behind this, the CIO recognizes that general improvements in IT infrastructure services have helped – but these have also helped the other business functions and processes, so that alone does not explain the new found happy relationship.  She also recognizes that the ERP deployment, painful as it was, is now through the worst, and is starting to deliver on its supply chain improvement promises.  So this is a factor, but the ERP contributed to other key business processes, and while it has helped lift the relationships with the executives responsible for those processes, they still aren’t showering IT with accolades!  Then there’s the frequent positive messages the CIO keeps seeing and hearing about Samantha, the IT executive that led the supply chain ERP implementation, and seems to spend a lot of time with the supply chain business teams.  The CIO knows they love Samantha, who’s clearly seen as a champion for them, and as the ‘go to’ person for things related to (and sometimes unrelated) to supply chain IT.  The CIO realizes that Samantha is managing the IT-supply chain relationships.  “Bingo,” thinks the CIO.  “Samantha is a ‘business relationship manager’ and maybe I need to formalize that role and create more of them!”

So, What Can Derail the BRMs Success?

Just about everything!  First, it’s important to realize that BRM is often in a role that wields significant influence, but actually has no authority over any of the many individuals and groups necessary for the BRMs efforts to pay off.  For example:

  • The Service Management Glitch.  If basic IT services (email, helpdesk, mobile support) are less than excellent, the BRMs business partner is going to complain. And here begins the vicious cycle – the BRM intervenes, uses her relationships and relationship skills to escalate the problem and pulls off a minor miracle.  Two bad things follow – first, the problem was solved though heroics – the heroes are celebrated and the idea that heroes keep the lights on and the trains running on time (metaphorically speaking!) gets reinforced.  Second, the business partner begins to see the BRM as the go-to person for IT operational problems.  When that BRM wonders why she was not invited to the metaphorical ‘strategy table’, the reason is clear – why would anyone invite the janitor to help formulate strategy?  (With all due respect to the hard working and effective janitors out there!)
  • The Solution Delivery Gulch.  If solutions delivery does not perform with excellence – somehow meeting never-ending business demand, delivering solutions that work the first time, on time, within budget, preferably in less than a month from initial request – then anything the BRM does to stimulate and surface demand is going to backfire.
  • The Maintenance and Break-Fix Gotcha!  If solutions maintenance is not responsive, proactive and prescient, and business process are interrupted, the BRM is going to get dragged into the fray – and again lose their license to be strategic.

The Subtler Sources of BRM Failure

In many respects the bullet points above are obvious – though that does not make them any less real or easy to deal with.  But there are some more subtle unintended consequences the BRM faces, and I’ll cover these in Part 2 in this 2-part series.

Image courtesy of Ruthida Namubiru.com

Related articles
Enhanced by Zemanta

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

Related articles
Enhanced by Zemanta

Driving Business-IT Convergence – The Evolving Role of the Business Relationship Manager (Part 1 of 2)


WhitePaperCoverI’m seeing a surge of interest in the emerging role of the Business Relationship Manager (BRM) as a key position that sits between a shared services organization (most frequently IT) and its business partner.  This is an internal role that should not be confused with the similarly titled externally-facing role common in banks and financial services organizations. I have referenced the BRM role many times over the last 6 years, and covered the topic at some length in January (see ITIL and the Business Relationship Manager: Avoiding the Performance Trap and Design Thinking and Emerging IT Roles.)  Recently, I’ve been getting an inbox full of questions about the role, so I decided to satisfy that interest with a new 2-part post looking at how the role is evolving.

Defining the BRM Role

The BRM role is by no means ‘standardized’, even as the IT Service Management movement tries to place it in its standards as a rather tactical position, mostly focused on steady-state IT services.  High quality steady-state services are certainly an important aspect for any IT organization – table stakes, if you will, for getting a “seat at the business table”.  (Please excuse the double table metaphor!)  But once the business partner experiences the BRM as negotiator for and arbiter of services, service levels and the like, they are unlikely to invite that BRM to the next strategy offsite to help figure out how the business strategy should address increasing business digitization, for example!

We see common variations in BRM:

  • Seniority – and the level of business executive with whom the BRM partners.
  • Scope – and the number of business unit executives and managers the BRM works with.
  • Purpose – especially in the balance of the BRM focus between supply and demand.
  • Title (e.g., Business Partner Director, Account Manager, Client Relationship Manager, IT Business Partner, Business IT Partner, etc.)
  • ‘Supply side’ focus (i.e, many BRMs represent the IT organization, some represent HR, Finance, and so on.  A small number represent multiple “shared services”.)
  • ‘Demand side’ focus (e.g., Line of Business, geographic region, major business process, corporate functions, etc.)
  • Size of the BRMs team – from sole practitioner to leader of a team of 8 or 9.

The Typical BRM

While typical, as with averages, can be misleading, the most common model for the BRM includes:

  • The BRM sits at the intersection of IT and its business partner – representing the business partner(s) to IT and IT to the business partner(s).
  • The BRM stimulates, surfaces and shapes business demand for IT projects, services, capabilities and investments in order to maximize their business value.  This means taking a proactive role in educating the business partner, suppressing demand for low value activities while stimulating demand for high value activities.
  • Ideally, the BRM is a member of both business and IT leadership teams, contributing to both business and strategy and planning, identifying how information and IT can support and advance business objectives, and helping translate demand into supply.
  • The BRM partners with appropriate supply resources to ensure supply-demand alignment.
  • The BRM helps create project and program charters.
  • The BRM oversees initiatives and helps manage business process change to ensure that the value predicted by a business case is actually realized.
  • The BRM monitors business partner satisfaction and facilitates continuous improvement in the business partner experience with IT (or HR, etc.)
  • To accomplish all the above, the BRM typically manages a small team comprising “junior BRMs”, business analysts and other specialized resources required to ensure an effective business-IT relationship.

If that sounds like a lot of responsibility, it is!  In fact, at their best, IT BRMs are thought of as “mini-CIOs” and are often on a succession path to the CIO position.

BRM Responsibilities

Common responsibilities include:

  • Active member of both the business partner and IT leadership teams.
  • Joint accountability (with the business partner) for business case development and value realization.
  • Accountable for development and execution of the business partner IT investment portfolio.
  • Partnering with the IT Solution Delivery Organizations to manage expectations and ensure efficient and effective delivery of all IT services.
  • Accountable for business partner awareness of systems security requirements and responsibilities.
  • Orchestrating key roles on behalf of their business partner (e.g., Project Manager, Enterprise Architect, Business Analyst).
  • The BRM acts as a broker for needed resources and capabilities (e.g., Vendor Management, Service Management, Organization Development).

From Alignment to Convergence

I’ve posted on this important concept before – with all due credit to Professor James Cash, Harvard Business School, with whom I helped design and deliver a relationship manager development program some years back.  He first helped me to the insight that alignment was no longer sufficient – CIOs needed to recognize that business and IT were converging as every aspect of business strategy and operations was increasingly dependent upon information and IT.  Today, it is largely the BRM who operates at the leading edge of the convergence movement – a movement being accelerated by the ‘consumerization of IT’.

Teaser for Part 2

I’ll pick up in Part 2 of this 2-part series with examples of needed BRM competencies, a discussion of 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 relationship from one of order taker to that of strategic partner.

Graphic courtesy of Acre Resources Limited

Related articles
Enhanced by Zemanta

ITIL and the Business Relationship Manager: Avoiding the Performance Trap!


order-taker

I have good news, and I have bad news!

The Good News…

The IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) 2011 edition and the ISO/IEC 20000 standard for IT Service Management formalized the existence of the Business Relationship Manager (BRM) role and corresponding Business Relationship Management process as a new best practice and international IT Service Management standard requirement.  This is good – for professional BRMs around the world, for the IT profession in general, and for improving the business return on IT investments, as technology becomes ever more deeply embedded in business processes.

The Bad News…

(And I know I will get hate mail and lose readership for saying this, but…) As defined by ITIL, the BRM role comes off as somewhat tactical – not something to get business leaders salivating over their new partnership with IT, nor hungry to innovate business products and services!  Let me be clear – the ITIL vision of BRM is necessary – but from my experience, it is insufficient to drive real business value beyond a certain point.  It will help an IT organization with poor service quality get better.  But it will not help an IT organization with good service quality to excite and delight their customers with the new business capabilities that are enabled by information and information technology!

Business Relationship Manager Role

I’ve posted extensively on this role in the past – the BRM is a bridge between the IT organization and its business clients (just as a good CIO is a bridge between the IT organization and corporate leadership).  As such, it both represents the business clients to IT, and IT to the business clients.  This role has surfaced over the last 10 years or so and Gartner predicts that the fraction of IT personnel dedicated to Relationship Management and Change Leadership functions will reach as much as 15% by the end of 2013 and grow up to 20% by 2016.  LinkedIn hosts two groups dedicated to the BRM role.  One group – IT Business Relationship Management - currently boasts over 1,800 members.  The other group, Professional Business Relationship Managers currently has over 2,600 members!  (In the interests of full disclosure, I co-manage the latter group.)

I’ve conducted a significant amount of consulting, assessment and training in the BRM space, including designing and leading BRM training and development programs for global companies with over 100 BRMs (as well as for those with fewer than 5 BRMs).  From that experience, and from my ongoing activity on the LinkedIn groups, I’ve seen two distinct ‘flavors’ of BRM – “Tactical” and “Strategic.”

BRM and Business-IT Maturity

To help understand “tactical” and “strategic” BRMs and how they’ve come to be, I’ll use my Business-IT Maturity Model (BITMM).  I’ve posted at length about the BITMM.  In its simplest form (see graphic below) the model represents both business demand maturity (highlighted in red to the left of the learning curve) and IT supply maturity (highlighted in blue to the right of the curve. These never move completely in tandem – sometimes demand is slightly ahead of supply, other times it is slightly behind.  If demand and supply get too far out of whack, there’s usually a change of CIO (or a turnover of the IT organization to an outsourcer!)

Slide1

The number of maturity levels is arbritary, but for simplicity let’s use three – business efficiency, business effectiveness and business transformation.  Where a company is at any point in time is a function of factors such as:

  • the industry it’s in
  • current business leadership
  • competitive and regulatory forces
  • quality of IT leadership
  • quality of service delivery

For example, the financial services industry tends to be highly information-intense, so is generally demonstrated higher business demand and IT supply maturity than say, manufacturing companies, which have traditionally been less dependent on information.  All that is changing, of course, as businesses and governments everywhere become increasingly digitized.

The ITIL Connection

Improving service delivery quality is where ITIL focuses.  According to its current owners (The APM Group Limited) ITIL is “the most widely accepted approach to IT service management in the world.”  Originally developed under the auspices of the UK Office of Government Commerce (OGC), ITIL is becoming a popular approach to service management.  Often loosely, and occasionally rigorously followed, ITIL documents processes and practices for service management.  This focus on service management is crucially important in moving IT supply maturity up from low Level 1 to mid-Level 2.

The Tactical BRM

The graphic below crudely cuts the BITMM in half.  The lower half is what I refer to as the “tactical” BRM space – focused on business efficiency and effectiveness.  The conceptual dividing line between these spaces is important.  Around the mid-point of Level 2 maturity, the learning curve changes direction.  This is also a common “sticking point” (see my earlier posts on “sticking points”) where IT organizations often become trapped and their efforts at performance improvement taper off.  In some cases, they actually fall back in performance.

Slide2

So, in the pursuit of service management quality, the BRM has an important role, establishing a strong business relationship with the customer by understanding their business and customer outcomes.   But the focus is service management, as opposed to the strategic possibilities for IT capability to enable new or improved business products and services.  Service management applies most to ‘steady state’ IT services – not to transformational projects and programs on behalf of business units.

The Strategic BRM

The upper half of the BITMM is the “strategic” BRM space – focused on business effectiveness and transformation.  While an IT organization must be careful not to slip back on IT service quality and customer satisfaction, simply delivering ever-improving services will not transform IT into a respected, value-producing business partner. Sooner or later, IT service management efforts reach a point of diminishing returns. Something quite different is then needed to further improve the business return on IT assets and investments.  While the “Tactial BRM” tends to focus on IT supply management processes and activities, the “Strategic BRM” focuses on business demand management – stimulating, surfacing and shaping demand for services, activities and initiatives with the highest potential business value.  The “Strategic BRM” works closely with her business partner to ensure that IT investments and capabilities yield real business value.

Leverage the Standard Frameworks – But Don’t Get Stuck

The message here is that it’s ok to leverage standards and frameworks such as ITIL, COBIT and TOGAF – but essential to do so with intelligence!  They have their place – and a context for which they were intended – that often being UK government entities.  Nothing wrong with that, but it tends to be a context of control – not innovation.  Control can help you get from low Level 1 to mid-Level 2 – but not to Level 3.  What kind of IT capability does your business need – controlling or innovating?

Thoughts on a postcard, please!

Graphic courtesy of giffconstable.com

Related articles
Enhanced by Zemanta

Do You Need an IT Operating Model?


This post was inspired by some recent discussion on the IT Operating Models Group on LinkedIn.  Pär Nilsson, the Group’s moderator, posted the question:

What do you see as the cornerstone of an IT operating model?”

This question created some interesting discussion, from the insightful to the disdainful (but accurate!) observation that:

Operating Model is one of those buzz phrases that can mean different things to different people.”

Every IT Organization Has an Operating Model!

One of the noteworthy aspects of the discussion was that several participants seemed to view an IT Operating Model as something you may or may not choose to have.  I think that’s wrong – all IT organizations have an IT Operating Model.  The only questions, for me, are the degree to which the IT Operating Model is:

  1. Effective? (i.e., delivers what the business needs in the most effective ways)
  2. Efficient? (i.e., makes the best possible use of assets and resources)
  3. Clear to all those that depend upon it? (i.e., stakeholders in and members of the IT organization)
  4. Healthy (i.e., continuously improving and sustainable)

Way Beyond the Organization Chart!

In many IT organizations, the only explicit manifestation of the Operating Model is an organization chart!  This is an incredibly limited (and limiting!) way of expressing an Operating Model.  It says who reports to whom, but not what gets done or how it gets done.  It tells you nothing about decision rights, key metrics or the portfolio of services.  It tells you nothing about needed competencies or rules of engagement between functions and groups, or between the IT organization and its clients/customers/partners.

So, wherever you are, you do have an IT Operating Model.  You might not understand it.  It might be implicit rather than explicit. It might be badly broken.  But you still have one or you would not be able to ‘operate’.

The Cornerstone is Context-Dependent!

My response to the initial question was:

I think that all depends on the business context and business demand maturity against IT supply maturity. For example, for some environments, IT processes are the cornerstone; for others, it is business-IT governance; for others it is figuring out the proper balance between IT services that should be shared across business units, versus those that should be embedded in business units.  Ultimately, all these aspects (and many more!) are key – but you can’t address them all in one go, so figuring out where to start is the first trick!”

The Keys Are Organizational Clarity and Health

So, I believe that the keys to IT organizational performance are:

  1. Defining what a healthy IT Operating Model would deliver – we might call this the IT Strategy
  2. Defining how a healthy IT Operating Model would deliver that IT Strategy
  3. Ensuring that the IT Operating Model is clear and transparent to its primary stakeholders

And I further believe that very best way to achieve these is to engage those primary stakeholders in:

  1. Clarifying the IT Strategy
  2. Clarifying the IT Operating Model
  3. Continuously improving the IT Strategy and Operating Model

Web 2.0, Anybody?

And it won’t surprise any of my clients, colleagues or regular readers that I believe that the tools, technologies and sensibilities sometimes referred to as Web 2.0 can be an excellent enabler of IT Strategy and Operating Model clarification and continuous refinement.

Graphic courtesy of Kinsale

Related articles
Enhanced by Zemanta

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.

Enhanced by Zemanta