Tom Eller is a Managing Partner at Working Capital, LLC and my "go to guy" on any questions I have when I'm conducting a search for positions having anything to do with Business Intelligence, IT Strategy, and Business Strategy execution, or doing career coaching for these people.  Tom has led consulting for Oracle in the Southeast and before launching Working Capital was the VP of Ecommerce Technology for PRG-Schultz.  He has also served as CIO/CTO for several startups as well as consulted on IT and BI strategy for companies across multiple sectors. Tom earned his MBA at Emory University's Goizueta Business School.   

By Tom Eller

Considering the high volume of articles and discussions pertaining to Business and IT alignment, one can only conclude that the strategies defined to date must be limited in their success or at least the tools and methods employed to execute those strategies must be sorely lacking otherwise the problem would have been solved. 

To better understand the reason for this lack of progress let's take a minute to understand the difference in perspectives between Business and IT.  Business tends to think in terms of Objectives and Strategies while IT tends to think in terms of Infrastructure, Technologies, and Applications.  Both groups share a need for data and information, but usually do not have a shared vision for the usage of said information and data.

Given the lack of progress in this area for most organizations it's time for a new alignment strategy(defined as"the means by which objectives are consciously pursued and obtained over time")that provides a clear and measurable basis for the allocation of resources to meet the objectives of the business. This new strategy is information driven and will create Business and IT alignment by definition, as it requires tools and defined processes just like the other strategies in the business.

However, the new alignment strategy and associated tools have some demanding requirements.

  • It must be lightweight and pervasive. While the strategy is comprehensive, the implementation must be incremental and cannot unduly burden the organization with excessive work, and it must complement the existing processes for resource governance until such time that it replaces them.
  • The output from the alignment strategy must provide consolidated visibility into the requirements and resource demand.
  • While we will probably never achieve a totally objective allocation of resources, the alignment strategy must provide a quantitative prioritization and allocation of resources which minimizes internal political and personal influences of these allocations.
  • The alignment process must provide instant reprioritization and impact analysis capabilities to adjust to changing business conditions, including identification of resources that are no longer properly aligned with objectives.
  • The alignment strategy and process must contain clear feedback mechanisms and measurable results for the organization.

Up until this point, organizations have not had the ability to implement an agile, flexible, tool supported process for reasons too numerous to mention.  However, with the emergence of certain technologies and innovative thinking, organizations now have to ability to thoughtfully implement a reasonable alignment strategy that is quantitative, responsive, measurable and effective.

For example, a global optical manufacturer recently leveraged a combination of Open Source (Workflow, Process Management and DBMS), commercial software, and Java to create a graphical, web based solution to support the new alignment process.  The process created an immediate return including:

  • IT and Business agreed to stop all projects that were not contributing to the objectives and reassign those resources based on business unit objectives.

  • The quantitative evaluation of new projects and initiatives produces faster fact-based decisions enabling consensus and reducing conflicts on prioritization.

  • Consolidated visibility and impact analysis allows IT to respond to ad-hoc requests quickly and more efficiently.

  • Project budgeting and approval cycles were shortened based on a common understanding of objectives and resource alignment.

The experience of this company and a growing number of others proves that real alignment with the business can finally be acheived by IT leaders willing to try a new approach.

If you have any questions or comments contact Tom at (770) 335-9562, teller@n4m8n.com