“Is IT strategy dead?”, I asked in an earlier post. Instead of tackling the question directly, I’m going to sneak up on it in a series of posts about what IT needs to look like in the 2010s from the perspective of the CIO (Chief Information Officer). I’m including the roles of the CTO (Chief Technology Officer) and CSO (Chief Security Officer) in the generic role of CIO.

In these posts, I’ll address “The Basics”, “Dancing with the Business”, and “Driving Innovation”. First, it is necessary to define the playing field.

The IT organization I’ll be describing is completely generic. It’s implementation will vary from enterprise to enterprise dependent on a variety of factors. Size of the organization, the skills and experience of people in key positions, and the needs of the enterprise all drive the variants. Yet, always, the generic organization is common to all.

The business school graduate in me (I try to keep him in the closet, well tied) wants to draw org charts and talk about roles and responsibilities, showing this as lines of communications and control and examining spans-of-control and such. Instead of that approach, and against the voice in my head of my former Organizational Behavior professor, I’ll be approaching the IT organization as a network of commitments to the enterprise. And, conversely, a set of commitments from the enterprise to the IT organization.

When I speak of a commitment, I’m referring to a specific, time bound, and clear promise made between two people. A vow or promise, if you will. Embedded in this promise is a way of measuring the outcome to see if satisfaction has been achieved. In this series of posts, there will be an overall set of promises the CIO makes to the CEO (Chief Executive Officer, an assumption that the CIO reports to the CEO) of the enterprise and a corresponding set of commitments made by the CEO to the CIO.

These promises are more than, “I’ll run your IT organization for you” and “I’ll fund your annual budget”. The generic promises, which will be developed more in the subsequent posts, cover each of the main areas of responsibility for the CIO, but they’ll take the form of “I promise to provide a base communications and communications infrastructure for the enterprise providing 99.999% uptime over the year andlevels of service foreach area of the organization over the year or quarter.”

Specific. Bounded by time. Clearly articulated. And, made between two, and only two, people. A customer and a provider. Yet, the commitments can also tie others into the network. For example, to provide Sales in the enterprise with a service level commitment, it requires the CIO to also make commitments to the head of sales. And, that person to make commitments to make commitments. For example, to provide people for training before new software is released!

So, what does all this have to do with IT Strategy? Nothing and everything. In most minds, I’m thinking of my b-school professors again, it has nothing to do with strategy. Yet, by recasting how we view the IT organization, we’ve created a strategic platform for the future. So, it is pure strategy. Each subsequent post in this series will show this more clearly.

Stay tuned for posts that begin with “IT 2010s:” and the subtitle.

I welcome feedback and comments.

John P

Did I miss the obituary in the last ten years?

When I left the corporate IT world eleven plus years ago, the buzzards were beginning to circle. The economic hits of the last tens years have not helped at all.

Yet, no “strategy” for IT is emerging. Instead, all that makes the news and is featured at the premier IT conferences is tactics, and questionable tactics at that. The pundits keep saying these tactics should be universal, adopted by all. The only “breakaway” strategies appear to be “social networks”.

The current “tactic as strategy”? Cloud computing.

First, let me say, that cloud computing in and of itself isn’t bad. There are wonderful and compelling cases for using a “cloud”. There are also some incredibly horrid downsides to it. The two biggest being security and privacy. Least we forget that strategic vector called control.

Cloud = Strategy? No more so than IBM Mainframe = Strategy in the 70s. Or, PC = Strategy in the 80s. Or Internet = Strategy in the 90s. We have no strategic driver for the Oughts. It is the IT Dead Decade. Now it appears to be “social networks” and “clouds”.

Nothing wrong with either one, but they are both tactics.

Strategy = what is IT going to do to leverage the strengths (or create new strengths) for their company? In the context of the current and future business environment?

Ted Turner figured out that IT could create a tower-based broadcast network and use satellites at the same time, with the same programming, and split the advertising feeds – horribly new concepts. Freddy Smith figured out that the Airbill (an invoice) could become a strategic document – and did the horribly insane by delivery letters overnight. Sam Turner (of Life of Virginia fame) figured out that IT could enable a whole new generation of life insurance products that acted more as investment vehicles than death assurance – single premium whole life and term insurance backed by investment vehicles.

They didn’t do this in a vacuum. They had strong and visionary IT people helping them achieve a business vision. And vice-versa.

A graduate level business course could be taught about the synergy of visionary IT and visionary business. The plain and simple of it is IT can’t drive business. Business can’t drive IT. The two have to work together to create that oft talked about, seldom achieved synergy. They have to be so much in sync that opportunities for greatness are created. And it ain’t universal. If everyone can do it, the only strategy is not being left behind.

Until the Great Debt Debacle is resolved, we won’t get back to days of old. Perhaps the strategy of IT should be helping business rationalize and manage the credit crisis?

The alarms have been ringing for 15+ years. It is time to wake up.

Strategy != follower. Strategy = CIO standing in a board meeting enabling the enterprise and having them scramble to invest in the dream. Not to mention the CEO smiling in the corner.

JP