"Shadow IT" Belongs in the Spotlight

Throughout my career, peers, colleagues, and bosses have regularly bemoaned the existence of "Shadow IT" within our organizations. For the uninitiated, Shadow IT is generally defined as someone in a non-technical role or department deploying a system without involving the IT department. I've always tried to see this type of activity from a more positive perspective.

More recently, I've chosen to be energized by the initiative, enthusiasm, and (most importantly) funding that can come along with Spotlight IT (see what I did there?). I told my team recently, "Hold on, someone got budget approval, devoted a ton of their teams' time, and deployed a system that works better for them than our existing enterprise solution?! That's great! They did our R&D, RFP, and Project Management for us!"

On a serious note, of course there are inefficiencies and process integration challenges when anything happens in a silo. However, if you can find someone that's already bought into the notion of investing their resources in helping to move the business forward, it normally just takes a phone call, video chat, or message to convert an adversary to an advocate (and partner). That's a heck of a lot better outcome than complaining about the inevitable.