Monday, February 13, 2012
Monday, January 16, 2012
Bridging the IT and Business Terminology Chasm.
With CIO’s becoming more business oriented and CFO’s becoming more IT savvy, where does this leave the CEO and how should they change or adapt to fit into the IT planning puzzle.
How can your technical teams adapt and change to help bring your business and CEO into IT pre-implementation planning discussions?
I attended a Prince2 User Group meeting in New Zealand late last year where presenters and attendees discussed typical issues that they encounter when communicating IT project planning needs to business or non-technical executives.
One example given was in:
‘Discerning what “Tolerances” to factor into a project’.
Business people not versed in Prince2 terminology didn’t grasp the significance and implications of “Tolerances” leaving IT hanging without a satisfactory response that they could factor into their planning.
Another instance was where the terms “Actors, Artifacts and Use-Cases” were thrown into the conversation at a business meeting. Needless to say – Blank looks abounded!
One key issue with having so many different technical and methodology specific terms and jargon, is that the chance of business executives understanding what you are talking about is pretty remote.
In the event that business doesn’t understand what IT is talking about, often the question will be side-stepped or they may even agree with what you are suggesting without even knowing what it is that they are agreeing to because business executives are not inclined to question techno-speak!
Acknowledging that qualifications in Enterprise Architecture, Process and Business Analysis, and Project Management methodologies are hard won, it is no wonder that we like to use our specific terms when we can. It is also certainly handy to have commonality of terms across IT teams.
However, business and executives require business terminology for understanding and clarity in order to be more involved, committed, and accountable for the “pre-implementing planning and IT investment decision making phases” of IT projects.
This is where "Profiling-Pro" comes into the picture.
In a nut-shell, Profiling-Pro is a cloud computing service that produces presentation quality reports in business-speak aimed specifically at the pre-implementation planning and decision-making phase. It bridges the chasm between IT people struggling to get their IT Projects approved and on the right track and C-Level executives who need to be reassured that all bases have been covered and that matters such as diligence in requirements gathering have been addressed.
Because these phases are critical to project success it is a very good idea to ensure that business, IT and executives are all speaking the same language and understand what is being proposed or asked for at the outset.
Consequently, CEO’s need to have a very clear picture and a broader view from a business perspective of what elements need to be addressed during IT project pre-implementation planning phases if they want to begin bridging the chasm rather than just going along for the ride with their cheque book.
Additionally, we need project teams that can not only think like Architects, Analysts and Project Managers but can also relate specialty technical concepts in business terms to mitigate any cross communications or understandings.
A small change can make a big impact!
Kind regards
Sarah Runge
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Top Down Accountability For IT Project Success
So how can we manage C-level executives of organizations before their next IT Projects commence?
Specifically, they need to be kept fully accountable for their initial input and project decisions that they make *before* the project commences. This is because these are the critical investment and pre-implementation decisions that will drive subsequent business processes for these IT projects.
As HP CEO, Mark Hurd, went on to say about the job of the CEO: "At the end of the day, [the CEO has] gotta get this part [business processes] of the business right to be able to align IT throughout the company. It's no different than aligning your sales organization, aligning your R&D, aligning any other piece of it."
Rather than letting CEO’s and Chief executives lay the early foundations for IT project failures (through poorly made, unfounded and unaccountable decisions), organizations needs to manage and delegate upwards. This will prevent them sitting back while their minions, who actually execute the project, take the fall for what they could have prevented at the projects outset. By making better decisions and hence ensuring robust project processes, accountability of all executive strategic project decisions will be assured.
A point that James Taylor makes in his article, “Make Better Decisions”, is that organizations, and especially senior executives, should conduct some form of decision making discovery. This is a critical issue that I support and one that I believe should predominantly also include C-level executives.
Even the best Project Managers and project management tools, cannot ensure the success of a project if the initial strategic investment and project decisions made by C-level and senior executives are poor, devoid of input, lack hard facts and where the executives making them are not held accountable.
Critical project discipline decisions, as outlined below, all result in the development of important pre-project planning and business processes. If these decisions are delegated, glossed over or taken without sufficient collaboration and input from the *appropriate* parties, then the supporting business processes will thereby also lack substance.
* Communications
* Requirements gathering
* Stakeholder support and involvement
* Management support
* User support and involvement
* Strategy alignment
* Success and Progress Metrics
* IT Risk and Governance
* Solution and Vendor Selection
* Change Management
* Training and development
* Communications
* Requirements gathering
* Stakeholder support and involvement
* Management support
* User support and involvement
* Strategy alignment
* Success and Progress Metrics
* IT Risk and Governance
* Solution and Vendor Selection
* Change Management
* Training and development
Each of these strategic project disciplines and business process decisions should be orchestrated at the top of the organization by the CEO and C-level executives. In order that these disciplines don't become "Reasons for Failure", critical decisions about "Who" and "How" to execute and manage each discipline must be made at the top of the organization.
Because many of these disciplines and business processes are already incumbent within organizations, a general blaze attitude to addressing them can become prevalent. For this reason, C-level executives unfortunately often abdicate any responsibility for making these discipline decisions, thereby removing most of their accountability.
This may all seem a bit harsh, however I have rarely (if ever) seen any CEO or C-level executive become a scapegoat for a failed IT Project - (other than the unfortunate CIO).
Kind regards
Sarah
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
Monday, September 21, 2009
IT Project Failure - The Root Causes behind every Reason for IT Project Failure
Simply put, IT projects fail not because of what we do, but because of what we haven’t done!
Conventional wisdom suggests that we can identify a set of reasons for project failures post implementation. As Michael Krigsman highlighted in his blog "Six types of IT project failure", classifying the reasons for failure can often illuminate Root Cause for project failure. However, in my opinion by simply categorizing failures often leads organizations to incorrectly believe that there were only one or two aspects of their project that caused it to fail.
My research has identified that the genesis of project failures is in fact an organization's pre-implementation strategic decision making (or lack thereof). The symptoms or reasons for the failure are easily classified but the root cause is often buried because it becomes almost impossible to unravel the causes after a protracted period once the project has failed.
Furthermore, I have found that simply identifying reasons for IT project failures can in itself lead to "Scapegoating" of the parties that were responsible for that element of the project (e.g. the Project Sponsor, Vendor or Project Manager ).
In the case of the Project Sponsor, mentioned in Michael Krigsmans blog, they need to be given the authority and accountability to make project decisions otherwise they will not remain actively and positively involved in the project. If they are not actively involved (with skin in the game), then they are just the "Go To” person, (which can be a pretty unenviable and arduous position to be in). This is just one example (not assigning accountability) of how poor strategic decision making by the organization before the project is initiated puts IT projects at risk.
"Failure is not a single, cataclysmic event. You don't fail overnight. Instead, failure is a few errors in judgment, repeated every day" Jim Rohn.
More often than not, what I have found is that the "Root Cause" is generally embedded in the organization as an underlying and fundamental flaw in its pre-investment strategic planning and pre-implementation strategic decision making processes.
These are executive decisions that provide the strategy for How the project will commence and What and Who needs to be included or involved.
Many of the reasons for IT project failures that I have identified, and that Mike Kavis has covered extensively, can be eliminated by addressing these key strategic decisions at the outset of a project, because the potential Root Cause will thereby be identified and addressed before the project has even begun.
Kind Regards
Sarah
Conventional wisdom suggests that we can identify a set of reasons for project failures post implementation. As Michael Krigsman highlighted in his blog "Six types of IT project failure", classifying the reasons for failure can often illuminate Root Cause for project failure. However, in my opinion by simply categorizing failures often leads organizations to incorrectly believe that there were only one or two aspects of their project that caused it to fail.
My research has identified that the genesis of project failures is in fact an organization's pre-implementation strategic decision making (or lack thereof). The symptoms or reasons for the failure are easily classified but the root cause is often buried because it becomes almost impossible to unravel the causes after a protracted period once the project has failed.
Furthermore, I have found that simply identifying reasons for IT project failures can in itself lead to "Scapegoating" of the parties that were responsible for that element of the project (e.g. the Project Sponsor, Vendor or Project Manager ).
In the case of the Project Sponsor, mentioned in Michael Krigsmans blog, they need to be given the authority and accountability to make project decisions otherwise they will not remain actively and positively involved in the project. If they are not actively involved (with skin in the game), then they are just the "Go To” person, (which can be a pretty unenviable and arduous position to be in). This is just one example (not assigning accountability) of how poor strategic decision making by the organization before the project is initiated puts IT projects at risk.
"Failure is not a single, cataclysmic event. You don't fail overnight. Instead, failure is a few errors in judgment, repeated every day" Jim Rohn.
More often than not, what I have found is that the "Root Cause" is generally embedded in the organization as an underlying and fundamental flaw in its pre-investment strategic planning and pre-implementation strategic decision making processes.
These are executive decisions that provide the strategy for How the project will commence and What and Who needs to be included or involved.
Many of the reasons for IT project failures that I have identified, and that Mike Kavis has covered extensively, can be eliminated by addressing these key strategic decisions at the outset of a project, because the potential Root Cause will thereby be identified and addressed before the project has even begun.
Kind Regards
Sarah
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Taking the risk out of IT Risk and Governance
,Do IT Risk and Governance measures really help organizations to avoid IT Project failures?
To coin a phrase used by a fellow Twitterer “No process at all is better than a bad process”.
So how many resources, either dollars or human, do organizations invest in establishing IT risk and Governance frameworks? How much time is spent administering, managing and monitoring these processes and what is an organization’s ROI for their IT governance investment?
For all of the above, most organizations would probably respond “Too much”!
It is surprising to find that many large organizations and government bodies that claim to have or would be required by stakeholders to have stringent IT Risk and Governance frameworks still have rogue, run-away or failed IT projects. The following are some of the many examples of organizations and government bodies who experienced the chaos of rogue IT projects:
To coin a phrase used by a fellow Twitterer “No process at all is better than a bad process”.
So how many resources, either dollars or human, do organizations invest in establishing IT risk and Governance frameworks? How much time is spent administering, managing and monitoring these processes and what is an organization’s ROI for their IT governance investment?
For all of the above, most organizations would probably respond “Too much”!
It is surprising to find that many large organizations and government bodies that claim to have or would be required by stakeholders to have stringent IT Risk and Governance frameworks still have rogue, run-away or failed IT projects. The following are some of the many examples of organizations and government bodies who experienced the chaos of rogue IT projects:
If an organization’s IT risk umbrella covers IT governance with a comprehensive IT risk portfolio, then how do organizations still get lumbered with runaway and failed IT Projects?
An underlying cause is that IT Risk and Governance frameworks are focused almost exclusively on the “tangibles” of the organization and the direct outcomes of projects giving insufficient attention to the important “soft” intangibles of their organization. This is most critical at the crucial “pre-investment” IT decision making and process planning phase when identifying and determining how to achieve these project outcomes needs to take place.
IT governance will take into account the amount of human and financial resources required for the project and an IT risk portfolio will monitor IT projects, IT service continuity, service providers, information assets, new and emergent technologies, software applications and infrastructure to ensure they are integrated with management, the business benefits and their alignment with strategy.
As critical as these governance and risk measures are to the success of an IT Project, they will fail to deliver if left to act in isolation. Simply put, IT risk and governance measures do not address the internal psycho-analytical aspects of an organization, including its decision making process. Nor do they analyze the “What”, “Why”, “Who”, “When” “Where” and “How” decisions needed in investing in or undertaking IT projects.
These key decisions are fundamental to organizations in determining whether projects will succeed or not and are the foundations and key drivers for determining IT project success. They must therefore be diligently made by C-level executives and senior management *before* projects commence.
In short, all of these key decisions are uncovered and addressed when applying Corporate Profiling to an organization before initiating an IT Project.
Indeed, Corporate Profiling can assist organizations in achieving their expected ROI and other benefits from their IT and Risk Governance processes in delivering IT projects.
“Nothing and nobody fails as badly as when undertaking something that someone else has failed to plan” (Sarah Runge).
Kind regards
Sarah
An underlying cause is that IT Risk and Governance frameworks are focused almost exclusively on the “tangibles” of the organization and the direct outcomes of projects giving insufficient attention to the important “soft” intangibles of their organization. This is most critical at the crucial “pre-investment” IT decision making and process planning phase when identifying and determining how to achieve these project outcomes needs to take place.
IT governance will take into account the amount of human and financial resources required for the project and an IT risk portfolio will monitor IT projects, IT service continuity, service providers, information assets, new and emergent technologies, software applications and infrastructure to ensure they are integrated with management, the business benefits and their alignment with strategy.
As critical as these governance and risk measures are to the success of an IT Project, they will fail to deliver if left to act in isolation. Simply put, IT risk and governance measures do not address the internal psycho-analytical aspects of an organization, including its decision making process. Nor do they analyze the “What”, “Why”, “Who”, “When” “Where” and “How” decisions needed in investing in or undertaking IT projects.
These key decisions are fundamental to organizations in determining whether projects will succeed or not and are the foundations and key drivers for determining IT project success. They must therefore be diligently made by C-level executives and senior management *before* projects commence.
In short, all of these key decisions are uncovered and addressed when applying Corporate Profiling to an organization before initiating an IT Project.
Indeed, Corporate Profiling can assist organizations in achieving their expected ROI and other benefits from their IT and Risk Governance processes in delivering IT projects.
“Nothing and nobody fails as badly as when undertaking something that someone else has failed to plan” (Sarah Runge).
Kind regards
Sarah
Friday, April 24, 2009
Do the decades differentiate IT Project failures?
So, how does Corporate Profiling influence the successful outcomes of IT Projects – including Agile Development, Cloud Computing, SOA’s and any other type of IT project?
Today's technologies are a far cry from the times of paper tape input and card deck readers of mainframe computers that required real estate approximately the size of the White House in the early 1970s just to supply a fraction of the computing power of a single modern server.
In the famous words of Albert Einstein:
Has technology outsmarted us and exceeded our ability to keep pace in today’s information age?
Are organizations fooled into believing that a natural outcome of these technology advancements is that their next IT project that utilizes Agile Development, Cloud Computing, SOA or other advanced packaged solutions will have more chance of succeeding than IT projects of the ‘70s?
Most top level executives can conceptualize how technology works and what it is capable of delivering, but very few actually comprehend the complexities involved.
The fact remains that these technologies still rely on human factors. Unfortunately they therefore still face the same risk of failure and are still subject to ongoing issues regarding support, communications, requirements, management and poor decisions.
So, what does Corporate Profiling change and do differently that can help organization to minimize the risk of project failures?
As we have all come to realize, there is no panacea, no silver bullet and no “10 point plan” or easy path to guarantee an IT project’s success. Corporate Profiling, however, does reduce the risk of a “ready, fire, aim” approach.
In a nutshell, it is a pre-implementation/pre-investment process undertaken by organizations before they embark on their next IT project. This is done ahead of and is not a replacement for methodologies such as process modeling.
And according to Plato:
Firstly, Corporate Profiling provides an extensive framework of key decisions and questions that need to be addressed by an organization’s leaders and executives. Their answers validate the decision to pursue the project and underpins its success by mandating core strategies vital to the project’s execution and flow.
These decisions require collaboration between relevant parties and peers to ensure consensus that leads to fully supported decisions. All decisions require executive accountability to ensure the quality of these decisions. The resulting decisions and derived information at this initial stage of an IT project forms the basis for further development of a Corporate Profile which will then provide the answers and input required for each subsequent critical step within the pre-implementation framework and process.
Corporate Profiling promotes three key principles: Visibility, Collaboration and Accountability. All three are required to ensure that a solid foundation is established before a project commences.
Visibility of an organization’s key elements and processes is critical to developing a blue-print of the organization and allows for the accurate identification of correct and extensive project requirements, communication points, information sources, interlinked relationships, strengths and weaknesses and the most appropriate people or parties to be involved in the project.
Often it is the less obvious or indirect factors that adversely impact upon a project if they are not identified at the outset. Visibility also alerts an organization to other not so obvious parties that need to be involved in providing input into the key project discipline decisions.
Collaboration on all strategic project decisions by C-level and senior executives is critical to ensure that unbiased quality decisions are arrived at, consensus is achieved and that decisions are fully supported. Collaboration is also a prerequisite for requirements gathering to ensure that all input and feedback is received and correctly processed.
Accountability empowers employees to drive change and to feel involved rather than becoming cynical or resistant to change. Responsibility for key decisions more often than not just promotes issues such “agreement for ease of an answer”, “deferring to a higher power” or “self appointed decision makers for the group” to name a few. On the other hand holding parties fully accountable for results and outcomes is critical to ensure that quality input into strategic project planning decisions are obtained.
If you look back on your experience and encounters with IT Projects, I am willing to bet that the majority of the causes for failures would have been avoided if a Corporate Profile had been established at the outset.
Kind regards
Sarah
Today's technologies are a far cry from the times of paper tape input and card deck readers of mainframe computers that required real estate approximately the size of the White House in the early 1970s just to supply a fraction of the computing power of a single modern server.
In the famous words of Albert Einstein:
“It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity”
Albert EinsteinHas technology outsmarted us and exceeded our ability to keep pace in today’s information age?
Are organizations fooled into believing that a natural outcome of these technology advancements is that their next IT project that utilizes Agile Development, Cloud Computing, SOA or other advanced packaged solutions will have more chance of succeeding than IT projects of the ‘70s?
Most top level executives can conceptualize how technology works and what it is capable of delivering, but very few actually comprehend the complexities involved.
The fact remains that these technologies still rely on human factors. Unfortunately they therefore still face the same risk of failure and are still subject to ongoing issues regarding support, communications, requirements, management and poor decisions.
So, what does Corporate Profiling change and do differently that can help organization to minimize the risk of project failures?
As we have all come to realize, there is no panacea, no silver bullet and no “10 point plan” or easy path to guarantee an IT project’s success. Corporate Profiling, however, does reduce the risk of a “ready, fire, aim” approach.
In a nutshell, it is a pre-implementation/pre-investment process undertaken by organizations before they embark on their next IT project. This is done ahead of and is not a replacement for methodologies such as process modeling.
And according to Plato:
“The beginning is the most important part of the work” Plato
Firstly, Corporate Profiling provides an extensive framework of key decisions and questions that need to be addressed by an organization’s leaders and executives. Their answers validate the decision to pursue the project and underpins its success by mandating core strategies vital to the project’s execution and flow.
These decisions require collaboration between relevant parties and peers to ensure consensus that leads to fully supported decisions. All decisions require executive accountability to ensure the quality of these decisions. The resulting decisions and derived information at this initial stage of an IT project forms the basis for further development of a Corporate Profile which will then provide the answers and input required for each subsequent critical step within the pre-implementation framework and process.
Corporate Profiling promotes three key principles: Visibility, Collaboration and Accountability. All three are required to ensure that a solid foundation is established before a project commences.
Visibility of an organization’s key elements and processes is critical to developing a blue-print of the organization and allows for the accurate identification of correct and extensive project requirements, communication points, information sources, interlinked relationships, strengths and weaknesses and the most appropriate people or parties to be involved in the project.
Often it is the less obvious or indirect factors that adversely impact upon a project if they are not identified at the outset. Visibility also alerts an organization to other not so obvious parties that need to be involved in providing input into the key project discipline decisions.
Collaboration on all strategic project decisions by C-level and senior executives is critical to ensure that unbiased quality decisions are arrived at, consensus is achieved and that decisions are fully supported. Collaboration is also a prerequisite for requirements gathering to ensure that all input and feedback is received and correctly processed.
Accountability empowers employees to drive change and to feel involved rather than becoming cynical or resistant to change. Responsibility for key decisions more often than not just promotes issues such “agreement for ease of an answer”, “deferring to a higher power” or “self appointed decision makers for the group” to name a few. On the other hand holding parties fully accountable for results and outcomes is critical to ensure that quality input into strategic project planning decisions are obtained.
If you look back on your experience and encounters with IT Projects, I am willing to bet that the majority of the causes for failures would have been avoided if a Corporate Profile had been established at the outset.
Kind regards
Sarah
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
