You have probably read about the Queensland Department of Health payroll project, which ended in debacle with costs estimated at $1.2 billion. In the US, the Expeditionary Combat Support System project was cancelled after the US Air Force spent $1bn on its development.
As we all know, projects can often fail, end in disaster or are only partially successful. Therefore, having the right project or program manager (PM) is crucial to increasing the chances of a successful project delivery. But how do you find the right PM, and what attributes should the right PM have?
A recent Boston Consulting Group (BCG) study estimated that, by 2016, the digital economy will contribute 5.5 per cent or $US4.2 trillion dollars to the economies of the G20 countries (from $US2.3 trillion in 2010). The digital economy contributed $US44bn (3.3 per cent of GDP) to the overall Australian economy in 2010 and is expected to grow to $US67bn by 2016.
While economic uncertainties in the world continue, the momentum behind business growth and innovation remains strong. Global IT, business orocess and outsourcing company, CSC, recently published its top technology trends for enterprise IT in 2012 and predicts that technology innovations will continue to drive the agenda of enterprise IT.
More than 60 per cent of transformations fail, but why should this be a concern for CIOs? The fact is major technology projects are often transformation projects. These projects significantly change the way organisations conduct their business and how work gets done. Unfortunately, the reality is that the success rate of transformations is less than 40 per cent.
When you are a project owner, manager or a sponsor you are often asked what the project is about. It is important because bosses, employees, customers, and partners all need to ‘buy-in’ and become excited about your idea. They will form an initial impression in three minutes or less. This first impression is the lens through which everything else is viewed.
New and aspiring CIOs often ask how they can jump start their role. There was recently an interesting discussion on LinkedIn on the topic. It was started by a newly promoted CIO, with a lot of advice provided by many current and former CIOs. Some points raised in the discussion are worth sharing to help both CIOs and those who aspire to the role.
Think of talent management and we immediately think of managing bright, high potential employees. But although ‘star talent’ individuals are important in any business, just managing stars is not enough. A high performing team means managers must understand the performance and contribution from all the team and manage the talent pool.
We all know that we need to get more value from information technology investments. That means IT projects, portfolios and priorities must be aligned to those of the business. IT strategic planning is often used as a tool to achieve this alignment and turn the business needs into results. But it is often not that easy! Many organisations develop a strategic plan but successful implementation is still difficult. Like in golf or chess, rules are well known but consistent performance is still hard.
These days it is not difficult to find CIOs who are excellent communicators. Unfortunately, it is also common to see many IT leaders who struggle to communicate well. Some IT leaders are very good at communicating technical information with their teams, while others communicate well with business users. Many, however, find it hard to communicate effectively with all the stakeholders in the business. I have been thinking about why this is the case and what IT leaders at all levels can do to improve their message delivery, be effective at leading and motivating their team and engaging with the business.
IT magazine articles and whitepapers regularly publish articles on, ‘building a high performing team’, ‘reinventing the workforce’, ‘transforming the organisation’ and the like. They include stories from large — usually overseas — companies where the CIO has turned an under-performing organisation around (with the help of a brand name consulting firm with their brand name methodology). Local CIOs and IT managers read the articles and begin to believe they too need a major transformation program in order to turn their IT organisation into a ‘world-class’, ‘high-performing’ organisation.
Most IT service organisations have adopted ITIL or similar service management disciplines. Service management requires new processes for users. Service is provided only after a service request is raised, new initiatives need a business justification, service level agreements need to be in place, and the list goes on. Any experienced IT manager knows that certain disciples are necessary to be able to deliver reliable and cost effective IT service.
As both business and public sector organisations are becoming increasingly dependent on IT, there is growing recognition that governance of IT is an essential part of broader corporate governance. Governance is about who makes the decisions, how they are made and who is accountable for them. Many C-level executives still consider IT to be too complex, technical and difficult to govern. IT governance still is perceived as a CIO issue. Alignment between IT and business strategy as well as between IT and business governance remains weak.
"Over promise and under-deliver" is is just one of many myths about promises. Here's how to make promises you can keep.
What differentiates between success and mediocrity in organisations? Studies show that the high performing leaders are the ones most relied upon to drive the business performance in the years to come. Whether it is the delivery of strategic projects, cost stripping, or managing customer relationships, high performing leaders are the difference between success and mediocrity. High performing employees have a disproportionately higher impact on results. This means that identifying and developing future high performers is a critical priority for any organisation. CIOs have a responsibility to identify and nurture these star performers in IT organisations.