Turnaround CIOs
Published on 29 Sep 2005 at 8:06 pm |
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Filed under The Cargo Cults of Business, Brain Trust, Business and Corporation Related, Information Technology.
I just noticed this article: Turnaround at CIO. It’s about a month old, but definitely still worth the read.
A few worthwhile quotes:
The need for turnaround CIOs may seem the exception rather than the rule. But with many companies still struggling in an up-and-down economy and the federal government’s closer scrutiny of corporate finances because of Sarbanes-Oxley, a large portion of corporations are looking for these hired guns to fulfill three roles: firefighter for a business beset with numerous problems, drill sergeant for an out-of-order IT department, or guide for an organization embarking on a transformation.
and
…six out of every 10 CIOs should be applying turnaround methods—even if they don’t face a classic turnaround situation.
The article is not terribly in depth, but makes some excellent points, and several of the comments which have been contributed by readers are well said. The only specific item I would add is that there is a danger that they don’t seem to mention. Or perhaps only allude to in passing. I know of several cases in which a successful use of turnaround techniques was used against the manager in question politically.
The reasoning is hard to follow, but essentially the contention appears to have been that since the improvement occurred, it was inevitable, therefore, the expenditures and changes which had taken place were unnecessary. It seems likely to me that this feeling of inevitability is rooted in a naive conception of IT issues and structures as very simple. Since the problems were simple and the solutions obvious, the elaborate and time and money consuming actions of the turnaround manager are seen as wasteful. Furthermore, that manager’s skill set is also devalued.
Factions within a company who either preferred the dysfunctional state of affairs, or always believed it would "get better on its own" seem, in some cases at least, to resent the changes. Once the problems have been solved, it seems to be fairly easy for these folks to submit the improved state of affairs to top management as evidence that the turnaround efforts were not needed. Of course, there’s also the all too common and pernicious idea that once an IT problem has been fixed it’s fixed for good and needs no further maintenance or management.
By way of attempting to solve this problem, I would add this to CIO’s list of six steps. Arguably it’s merely best practice, but I think it’s important enough to call out.
Get specific buy in from top management from day 1. This must include specific goals and metrics and specific acknowledgement that a problem exists. Choose a set of benchmarks based upon those goals, and consistently record them throughout the process. Communicate the progress and the improvement against the benchmarks to top management frequently.
This step may not entirely insulate you from political revisionism, but I believe it helps to keep top management buy in and bolsters a sense of ownership in the solution which may mitigate these effects.
Whether this works or not, it’s probably best to keep in mind that for most turnaround IT executives frequent job changes are probably inevitable. One commenter on the CIO article mentions a new job search every 18 months. That seems a little too often to me, but not by much. I’d have estimated 24 months.
-- John
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