How to Get What You Want

I have many conversations about IT Transformation.  For the most part, everyone is in agreement, nodding their heads, and saying, “You’re preaching to the choir”.  With all of these technology folks on board, why aren’t more companies building out third generation architectures and creating third platform applications?

It all comes down to one thing:  Money.  IT is usually not a revenue-generating group; more often it is a budget black hole.  The roadblock to deploying new technology is IT’s status of a cost center rather than an innovator and contributor to the company’s profitability.  New possibilities mean IT can rise above its cost center status.  But, this is a bit of a chicken and the egg problem.   The lines of business must trust us to make the right decision.  But usually, they don’t see how these technologies correlate to drilling more oil, selling more merchandise in a store, increasing wealth management, etc.  This is why we must education them in their own language.

We must stop speaking about technology and widgets to these groups.  Their eyes will gloss over at words like Cloud Management System and Software-defined.  Instead we must think of terms of what is important to them - reduced cost and increased speed.  If we can truly provide this in a tangible way to the business, they will be our allies.

For example, a retail store cares nothing about self-service provisioning and highly virtualized data centers.  But as soon as you say, I can help you open the new location 30 days faster than the last and at half the cost, now they are listening.

The difficult aspect of gaining buy-in for this new approach is trust that we can deliver.  Budget must be allocated for the self-service project.  But how do we prove the worth without the dollars to begin?  Everyone will want to use it once it is built, but no one wants to take the risk of funding the implementation.  Below are my methods for kick-starting a rollout of a new concept.

1.    Find a “Friendly”

Enlist a business or application partner who will take a chance on you and a new technology. There will be at least one proponent of leaping into the future in the application side of the house.  Usually, you have helped this person in a previous project, and she sees the value you can bring to the table.

2.    Understand the Friendly’s Next Project

She is probably trying to achieve something new and great as well.  She might also be having a hard time getting the resources for the project or require technology that isn’t readily available in the current environment.  Show how your project will speed up the delivery of hers.  For example, if the Friendly believes that developing a new website or mobile application will unlock billions of dollars in revenue, connect the dots on how a self-service portal will allow her to develop on any platform she wants, instantly, without waiting the ten days for a request ticket to go through or swiping a credit card at AWS.

3.    Uncover “Keep the Lights On” Expenses

Another type of Friendly is the budget owner.  This one may even be more powerful than the first.  Statistics show that 70-80% of an IT budget is spent on keeping the lights on versus innovation.  If the new technology can reduce that spend by 5-10% that is a huge win.  Sit down with this VP to understand line item by line item how the budget is spent in maintenance activities.  This can be a support contract for solutions that can be removed due to redundancy, labor costs associated with break/fix, or replacing older technology on a one to one basis without improvement.  Create a matrix that shows how these numbers are reduced via specific technology capabilities.  Armed with this information it will be easy to show how the project can be self-funded and lower costs for the organization year over year.

4.    Agree to Success Criteria

Your Friendly is your best chance at proving the new way is the best way.  She might not understand what it is you will be able to provide and ask for things that seem blatantly unreasonable.  However, it isn’t malicious behavior on her part.  She is now a kid in a candy store and wants anything her imagination conjures.  It is important to clearly define the features of the new services.  Be very specific about what it can and cannot do in the proof of concept phase.  I do suggest painting the picture of the final vision, but keep her within the guardrails so she can be your advocate upon a successful completion.

5.    Request Good Press

After a job well done, it is imperative your Friendly sings your praises.  Create a project write-up and presentation to outline the specific and tangible benefits you both experienced as a result of this new technology and methodology.  Share this will leadership and request an audience with the CTO and CIO.  Be prepared with a business plan on how this will help the larger organization, not just the single use case from test.  Also, use informal lines of communication.  You want your Friendly to be the advocate for this new technology with her lines of business coworkers.   Illustrating how quickly she was able to begin coding in her brand new development environment, free of all the restrictions of “old IT” will be of large benefit to you.  Larger numbers requiring the same level of service are harder to ignore.

6.    Have a Plan for Production

In addition to the business plan mentioned above, it is important to identify the steps for a quick rollout of the new platform.  If the momentum is continued, there is a higher likely-hood of success.  If the technology is not implemented quickly, the folks who were on board will look for similar possibilities outside of IT.  Often this will be found in the ungoverned public cloud.  If they believe their needs are met, justification for implementation is once again difficult.  And the issue of rogue clouds are introduced or increased, which create management difficulties for IT in general.

The above steps illustrate the effectiveness of an application and business centric approach of IT.  We are now measured on innovation gained, not just cost avoidance.  However, without attention to dollars spent, we cannot gain the support of the business to move forward with the deployment of cloud technologies.

Doing the Right Thing

We are faced with many visions, trends, and buzzwords daily.  It is difficult to decide where to focus.   In addition, so much needs our attention.  Where do we begin?  What deserves the most focus?  I am a firm believer in doing the right thing.  And, by targeting areas where we are most knowledgeable and passionate, we have the greatest impact.  Fortunately, I work in an industry and for a company where my knowledge and passion align.  It is my privilege to work with enterprises around the world and to determine the best path for their technology services teams.

The first step is to understand the business.  Now, don’t roll your eyes.  This isn’t a training class for selling or executive conversation.  This is how we do the right thing.  It is imperative to understand the business.  We cannot think in vague terms such as “reduce CapEx spend” or “become agile”.  We would only be playing boardroom bingo.  We need to roll up our sleeves: read annual reports and press releases, listen to quarterly earnings calls, talk to representatives from each line of business, read consumer feedback, read partner feedback, try it out ourselves, and live it as much as possible.

Are you working with a manufacturing company?  Walk a plant floor.  A hospital?  Follow around a doctor or nurse, carefully.  A financial institution?  Leverage a service from the website.  A retail store?  Go buy something.   A technology company?  Install a product and use it as anyone else would…  You can see where I am going with this.

All of this is hard work.  But, it is worth it!  With this newfound knowledge, we can do the right thing.   Instead of regurgitating sayings like “time to market” and “lower costs”, instead we can make meaningful conjectures about what will truly help the institution we are supporting.  This type of engagement is appropriate for anyone, at any level.  Are you a Cloud Architect wanting to create IT as a Service?  Are you a VP looking to achieve your MBOs?  Are you in sales trying to meet a quota?  By aligning ourselves to exactly what the business needs to be successful, we in turn, will excel at our jobs.  It is a win-win for us all.

If you are thinking, “What’s in it for me?” or “I’ve come this far without doing those things.,” that’s ok.  It is possible to continue in your career without proactive business alignment.  However, you will most likely be limiting yourself in advancement and opportunity.  If you map yourself, a project, or an initiative to a revenue stream, you will greatly increase your chance of success.  There are many things that motivate people, such as money, recognition, impactful contributions, self-satisfaction, et cetera.  I cannot think of a dimension of motivation that would not be fulfilled by aligning to what the business needs. 

By taking this path, you could begin a new program inside your company, create a new position for yourself, sell more products and services to your customers, or be a good corporate citizen.  It would be very difficult for anyone to say no to your proposal when it clearly meets the needs of the enterprise as a whole, not just an area of IT.  And if the company you work for or with vetoes your suggestions in favor of those that do not directly enable the business, then it is possible you are ready to expand your horizons to somewhere that is forward-thinking.

For those looking for more detail around questions you might ask yourself or others, these are a good start:

• What are the lines of business in the enterprise?
• How does each line of business generate revenue?
• What metrics does each line of business use to report success or failure?
• What type of  industry or consumer insight does each line of business need to be more successful?
• What types of new ventures is the company considering?
• Who or what is the target consumer for each line of business?
• How do the various business units interact today?
• How do the business units need to interact in the future?
• What types of merges and acquisitions occur and with what frequency?
• What new markets is the enterprise entering?
• What are the CEOs most important initiatives?
• What are the CIOs most important initiatives?
• How are the executives measured and what are their compensation plans?
• What are the company’s competitors doing?  Can the enterprise react quickly enough to or surpass these competitors with new offerings?
• What will attract new talent to the company?
• How does the enterprise measure employee satisfaction?
• How does communication occur to external partners and consumers?
• What is the biggest concern of the business three years out?

There are many more questions that you may think of after reading this list - please share them!  While the above thoughts are by no means exhaustive, it will begin a great journey of discovery.  Once we are armed with this information, we can create a roadmap of technology solutions and transformation activities that align to these needs and goals.  This roadmap will be the guide for all of us to do the right thing,.