Move fast, move forward, have impact
Stephen Burke
?? CIO | CTO | CPO | SaaS, Cloud & Cybersecurity Strategist | IT Growth & Cost Optimization
Your IT Operating Model must Enable Your Strategy & Describe How You Support Business Goals
Moving towards a client-focused technology target state demands an IT leadership team that is acting and taking decisions consistent with the priorities of its’ clients. Shifting the focus from what maybe core competency for the IT to what your clients really need to sustain their business will require the high ambition IT leader to move from traditional comfort zones to an elevated level of leadership and focus.
Client Focus – IT Maxims that define what the business really want
It is useful to think of the business as a consumer (whether internal or external) and the role of IT is to increase the consumption of the IT assets by adding significantly better value (aligned services at reducing cost) to those consumers. The following four points are the key thrusts that can be termed ‘IT Maxims’ which I believe define an effective IT- Business relationship
1.???Partnership with business to understand and successfully deliver change
2.???Focus on managing and driving down operational risks and how technology can accelerate this effort
3.???Improvement in end-user experience and productivity by technical support for cross business unit services
4.???Streamlined and integrated product support function that intercepts IT service failures before the user’s do and takes steps through proactive monitoring to isolate and insulate issues that can cause significant business service downtime or interruption
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The future IT – doing more with less
Each of the above maxims can be further broken down to create goals and objectives which the higher ambition CIO or CTO should be driving to create value for the business and be seen as an enabler. At its heart these drivers must also touch on quality of service, risk management, operational agility and cost and efficiency in order to get traction and deliver on stated objectives. That’s a lot to swallow in one bite and in today’s cash-strapped businesses, investing in IT is possibly not seen as creating the biggest bang for buck, but that would be the wrong view given we operate in a more integrated, data driven world and this trend will only increase in pace and reach.
What is needed is for IT leadership to assume front to back accountability for provisioned services as a partner to the business rather than the federated approach that is common today.?The High Ambition CIO will need to behave differently and operate more like a CEO with stronger contribution to business operation excellence and bottom line revenue generation by:
Such a list as this could be the job description of any CIO/CTO, but having the means to deliver it is the consistent problem that leaves many well-meaning IT leaders struggling to meet the expectations of their business – and themselves. It can reach the point where both stop reaching forward together on the ideal target state and retreat into their own boxes of separate business, separate IT agendas with no further discussion on how to be effective partners.?
Steve Burke is an IT Management Consultant who delivers not just the ways but the means to achieve such Client Focus. Whether it be business alignment or shared services that is required to reduce complexity to complete projects, or to leverage technology assets across the firm or deliver better utilization of sourcing arrangements to optimize workforce capacity planning he has a capability that can help.