Spark!

Spark!
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What Will Happen After the Spark?

If I have a thousand ideas and only one turns out to be good, I am satisfied.  – Alfred Bernhard Nobel

Spark.

The sound of an idea coming to life.  Once born, it will seek out other ideas and inspire people to build on it, growing into and morphing into many other shapes and sizes.

The casual insight that someone mentions in the elevator to a colleague is overheard by a fellow passenger who connects the idea with something they read about in an industry journal.   A new idea is formed, still embryonic but having more substance, solving a problem that he has been experienced.  He posts his new idea on a blog and emails two of his colleagues.  The blog post is read by many people, all with different perspectives and circles of people they spend time with.

A research scientist finds in interesting and applies it to a theory she has been working on.  A consultant connects the idea with other ideas that are particularly sticky at one of her clients and puts together an innovative solution.  A screenwriter sees the post and it sparks another idea which ends up in a scene of sitcom.   A concerned parent reads the post and inextricably connects this with the worries they have with one of their kids, putting their mind at ease and changing their way of thinking.

Over time the ideas will grow.  The director of the sitcom remembers the scene and incorporates it into a movie which he directs a couple of years later, the actors in the movie talk about it over drinks at a reunion the following summer.   The research scientist finds that her theory is invalid, but that the spark has led to other sparks that lead to more research and furthering of the body of knowledge.   The consultant finds that the opportunity he thought existed didn’t have a market outside his specific client, but for that client it solved a couple hundred thousand dollar problem.

This is one of the major benefits of social media and the technologies that facilitate the spreading of ideas.  While difficult to quantify, difficult to place an ROI against, difficult to incorporate in a controlled sense inside corporations, there is no denying that ideas carry with them value.  Even incomplete unformed ideas have value.  Their value exponentially increases as they are shared.  They cannot be managed in the classic sense, and in many ways only thrive when put into circulation with as broad an audience as possible.  Not all ideas will take flight – only a few will.  Some will have negative consequences – but not many.

As organizations share more and develop a culture of sharing, the greater the reward of what they receive in terms of what has been shared with them. This is a different mindset from that of controlling of all knowledge within the corporate walls, but a challenge worth taking.  It is also the challenge of those people who champion such ideas inside corporations.

Spark.    Where will your next idea go?

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Next Level Thinking

Next Level Thinking
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Next Level Thinking

The third-rate mind is only happy when it is thinking with the majority. The second-rate mind is only happy when it is thinking with the minority. The first-rate mind is only happy when it is thinking.   -A. A. Milne

Changing your way of thinking is not easy. Culture, habit, and time pressures conspire to keep the things as they are.  Getting to the next level, regardless of what level that may be, requires this very change however.

I was fortunate to stumble upon an article titled “The sexual life of ideas: flirtation, promiscuity, procreation, and seminal creativity but no virgin births“.  The insight presented by Ross Dawson is simple. Ideas do not survive alone. They need to socialize with other ideas and mingle. When other similar ideas are encountered they create new ideas, sharing traits of their parents.

Environment. When trying to get to the next level of thinking within your organization perhaps the most important fundamental element to put in place is an environment which will encourage ideas to brought forward. Ideas which are not shared have no chance to grow – the acorn cannot become the oak.

The Right People. The next element to establish is the blend of people.  Diversity of thought and diversity of concept are necessary.  Deep thinkers and broad thinkers need to intermingle.  Internal people with comprehensive knowledge of the culture and environment need to explore with external people having extensive knowledge of leading edge thinking. This is a great place to leverage your ecosystem.

The Seed.  Some people like to start with a vision of the desired end state.  I prefer to start with a seed of an idea.  This may be an end-state.  It may be a directional statement.   It may be simply a concept.  From this seed the ideas will feed each other until a complete picture is formed (or the amount of time alloted is exhausted). In my experience, this seed can form might oaks quite quickly given the right environment and people.

Technology.   In recent years social / collaborative technologies have moved closer to having mainstream status. While not a silver bullet unto themselves, used properly and placed in the right environment they can both accelerate progress of both depth and breadth of thinking. One of the reasons for this is that the mechanics of these tools typically do not get in the way of the thought process.

It is worth noting that these elements are all necessary to get to next level thinking. They should be considered necessary but not sufficient. Above all else you need a desire to change, an understanding of why you want to change, and a dedication to follow through on the commitment to change.

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Decisions are Made by Individuals

Decisions are Made by Individuals
Decisions 300x225 Decisions are Made by Individuals

Decisions

Each decision we make, each action we take, is born out of an intention. — Sharon Salzberg.

Let’s be clear.  Decisions are made by people – by individuals.   Decisions are not made by groups or committees.

An organization I once consulted to was while wildly successful along many measures, but historically had a difficult time making, following up on, and seeing that decisions would stick.   Having experienced this first hand, I noticed that there was significant inconsistency in how decisions were being made, who made decisions, and how decisions were communication.  In many cases, it was unclear if decisions were being made or only communicated by specific designated people.

Further research into the matter revealed that part of the problem was that, in critical areas of the organization, the formal decision makers were designated as committees.  This had several unfortunate effects.  First the lack of an individual to make decisions allowed for each committee member to look to one another to make the decision.  Second, without an individual as the decision maker no one was accountable for the decision. Finally, by having a committee as decision maker prevents people from discussing the status of the decision with any individual.

Decisions need accountable owners in order for them to be made. Decisions require a process (or multiple processes) to have them made well.  While there are many decision models which may be followed, these fundamentals don’t change.

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How We Make Decisions

How We Make Decisions
iStock 000004375181Small 300x225 How We Make Decisions

How We Decide

Democracy is a process by which people are free to choose the man who will get the blame.  – Laurence J. Peter

Decisions. We all make them. We may all make them differently. In an earlier post, Anatomy of a Decision, I talked about the different dimensions of a decision. This post will discuss how decisions are made (or not).

First, let’s establish that decisions lie on a spectrum of importance and urgency. There are also personal decisions and business decisions. While it may be useful to think of these as a two by two matrix for each of personal and business decisions, these details are beyond the scope of this post.

What is important to think about is how we make decisions – the process behind this.   It is both a personal attribute (everyone makes decisions differently) and personal / corporate critical success factor.

At one extreme Seth Godin encourages people to make decisions – many decisions.  The insinuation is that this is not normal behavior for people - that many people don’t make decisions at all, they simply let things happen. Looking at the dimensions of a decision –fill out–

Stepping up from the non-decision are the iPhone/Android apps for helping you make decisions. Simple and intuitive decisions can be made with Hunch.  More logical and emotional decisions with Proconlists.  the process here is straight-forward. Enter a question and get back an answer to your decision. Whether you are abdicating the decision-making process or adding another decision (whether to trust the app with your decision) is a minor point.

There are many decisions which demand more attention than your smart phone app. These will typically score high on the dimensions of a decision. They can be personal, “should I changes jobs?” or business “should I stop / keep / extend the relationship with our vendor?”.

The Harvard Business Review recently presented a paper by Blenko, Mankins, and Rogers titled “The Decision-Driven Organization“. This article basically outlines how several successful companies structure themselves around the types of strategic decisions that will be made. These decisions are obviously art the furthest end of spectrum on many attributes of a decision.

It is often thought that big decisions need big process to support them. This is not necessarily so. Sometimes speed of decision is more important than the comprehensiveness of a “big process”. Let us be clear though, a process (formal / informal, structured / unstructured, instinctive / thoughtful) exists for all decisions, whether you realize it or not.

Having said this, it is also true what Charlene Li notes in her book Open Leadership, “Inevitably, we base many of our decisions on the thinnest sliver of information and evidence, or even more likely, our gut feeling.”  Everyone wants more information to make decisions, and for that information to to be objective and measurable.  This is simply doesn’t reflect reality.  The process here is “go with your gut.”

How do you make decision?  It is worth investing the time to think about this.

Decide well.

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Margin Notes

Margin Notes
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Meeting Notes

It is curious to note the old sea-margins of human thought.  Each subsiding century reveals some new mystery; we build where monsters used to hide themselves. — Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

How do you know what’s really going on inside an organization? Is it possible to set up a barometer to not only know what has happened but forecast what is coming over the horizon?

A fellow consultant listens to the language being used within an organization to quickly gauge the organizational maturity. Whenever the opportunityto discuss topics of interest with a client presents itself, especially a new client, I find the language being used particularly telling.  This barometer can show how what the organization values, what is important at the moment, and the maturity level of the organization.

Another tool I have found is to review margin notes of managers, directors, and above. When available, if you are able to take a look at meeting agenda’s, presentation handouts, status reports, and the like you may notice something quite interesting. The handwriting which people place on these documents are far more than simple markings. The handwriting which in the margins is the individual’s personal take on specific items. In a similar way that handwriting analysts are able to understand a writer from their handwriting (based a direct connection from brain to pen to paper), margin notes are created in the same way.

Personal aspects aside, if you were to collect the agendas from all meting attendees will display the collective perceptions of the people in the meeting. This collective perception is a telling barometer of where things stand, and potentially where things may be going.

For an even better view, follow the history of margin notes on serial meeting (status reports, issue management, operational incidents, etc) and you may notice trends in the margin notes which foretold the future.

I have done this for myself on several occasions and for the most part, I find clues in my notes which allowed me to connect the dots to a future event.

My challenge is to have you watch your own margin notes. See what you are thinking. Understand why you thought what you did at the time. What events did you foresee?

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Leading at the Edge

Leading at the Edge
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Leading at the Edge

The manager administers; the leader innovates. The manager is a copy; the leader is an original. The manager maintains; the leader develops. The manager focuses on systems and structure; the leader focuses on people. The manager relies on control; the leader inspires trust; The manager has a short-range view; the leader has a long-range perspective. The managers asks how and when; the leader asks what and why. Managers have their eyes on the bottom line; leaders have their eyes on the horizon; The manager imitates; the leader originates. The manager accepts the status quo; the leader challenges it. The manager is the classic good soldier; the leader is his own person. The manager does things right; the leader does the right thing.
– Warren Bennis

Leading is different from managing.  The Edge of IT is different from the Core of IT.

In a earlier post, Edge of IT, I explored the difference between Core and Edge IT functions.  At the Core of IT, the mission is to continually improve repeatable processes.  It is entirely possible to drive incredible efficiencies and realize much greater organizational effectiveness through exceptional management of Core IT.

At the edge, the action is about change.  The action is about identifying a vision and working towards transformation of an organization.  In the post noted above, Edge IT is defined as functions and services that rhyme with IT Strategy, workforce planning, financial and operational modelling, scalability and capacity planning.  This is an area where leadership makes all the difference.

Where do you want to go?  What is your vision of the future? How are you going to bring your future to life?  These are the questions that the Edge of IT serves to answer.  These are also the types of questions where leadership comes to the forefront.

The functions at the Edge of IT need you to think about the future.  They are periodic and episodic in nature.  The Edge functions are also mission critical.  Setting the IT strategy builds the foundation or future work and drives most high level decisions.  Building and refining the financial and operational models enables and liberates the IT organization, a welcome step for organizations which have not had these aspects of the organization put in place.

Change to a future state which you as the IT leader setting the direction, defining the future.  For the most part Edge IT require skills which are not typically present with the workforce which takes care of the Core.  For this reason, IT leaders typically bring in external advisors to aid with these functions.  The reason being is simple.  External advisors are specialists in these functions, and bringing this expertise to the periodic but critical Edge functions makes tremendous sense for the CIO, the IT organization, and the enterprise as a whole.

The bottom-line on Edge functions is that they are about change, the future you want to create, and your leadership skills in defining and executing to bring the future to life.

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Managing at the Core

Managing at the Core
iStock 000002968965Small 300x200 Managing at the Core

Management of Process

The physicist cannot simply surrender to the philosopher the critical contemplation of the theoretical foundations for he himself knows best and feels most surely where the shoe pinches…. he must try to make clear in his own mind just how far the concepts which he uses are justified… The whole of science is nothing more than a refinement of everyday thinking.
- Albert Einstein

In a prior post (Edge of IT), I looked at a useful construct in which IT services could be grouped into those at either the Core of IT, or the Edge of IT.  Core services were defined as those which play to the ongoing day-to-day success or failure of the IT organization.  Examples of this would be software development, package implementation, application support, help desk, project and program management.  You get the idea.  The front lines.

This is where management comes up big.  This is the world of process definition.  This is the world of execution.  This is the world of continuous improvement.

At the Core of IT, you will find a System Development Life Cycle (SDLC), the Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) and all their siblings.  In more mature organizations you will find a high level of adherence to these constructs, and possibly even customized versions of these frameworks tailored to the organization.

This is also the area where truly great IT organizations separate themselves from their peers.  Organizations which are able to articulate the problems to solve, the benefits and costs in doing so, and have developed a well thought through approach in addressing the problem have a huge leg up.   By doing so, the organization can avoid false starts and mis-direction, early involvement of stakeholders instead of late, and the projects have a better chance of running to conclusion.  In general, this will provide a more efficient use of capital.

Organizations which are able to comprehensively look at a portfolio of well thought through candidate projects and, similar to a corporate venture fund, invest in those that will offer the greatest return (often beyond simply financial return), will be more effect.  The governing body which will select from this portfolio will be able to focus the organization through their decisions, on being more effective.  More effective in how they are run.  More effective in how they allocate resources.

Execution of projects is where the rubber meets the road.  Following a well-respected method which is appropriate for the organization is a good start.  Excellent management of the projects being executed will make a company great.     There will a continuous stream of issues to be addressed, risks to be managed,and  people issues to deal with.  A bad manager can take a stellar team and have the project fail miserably.  A good manager can routinely achieve the miraculous with little to work with.

ITIL is a wonderful framework for managing IT operations.  Those organizations which are more mature will more often than not follow ITIL (or a derivative) closely.  They will be monsters about deviation from the script – after all, the script works and works well.  They will take uptime, defect resolution, and availability seriously.  There will be a sense of pride in the way they execute their business and how this affects their end customers.

These are not the only areas at the Core, but certainly the ones which are front and center.  Management comes up big here.  Great management at the Core means happy IT customers and this translates into more effective and efficient IT organization.

Manage well.

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Edge of IT

Edge of IT
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Core and Edge IT Services

The Edge… there is no honest way to explain it because the only people who really know where it is are the ones who have gone over. — Hunter S Thompson

Several months ago, I was introduced to the concept of differentiating IT into “Core” and “Edge” functions or services.   This useful construct has significant implications to the way you can think about management and leadership of an IT department.

Core IT

Core IT refers to the nuts and bolts of an IT organization.  These are all the areas that you absolutely need to get right, and need to continuously improve.  These are also the areas where the perception of success or failure of an IT organization will originate.

Included in Core IT is the implementation and on-going support of the ERP, CRM, Supply Chain, and related mission critical systems the business partners depend on as part of their process execution.

Software development / package implementation and related system and application software architecture fits at the heart of Core IT as well.  Going along with the software development is the project and program management.  The Program Management Office is typically one of the key organizational structures that represent Core IT.

IT Operations is clearly part of Core IT as well.  The ongoing care and feeding of the system software, databases, servers, network, communications gear is all part and parcel of the core technology infrastructure.   The Help Desk and related support structures are typically pointed to as being representative of the Core IT as well.

Edge IT

Edge IT relates to aspects of IT which address different sets of problems, and necessarily address them differently.  An example of this include developing an IT Road Map / IT Strategy for the organization.  Similarly, it would naturally include technology assessments, research and discovery, and the application of new technologies to business enablement.

Workforce planning, financial and operational modelling, scalability and capacity planning are part of Edge IT.   You can also put legal and regulatory / compliance aspects of IT in Edge IT along with the Security and Privacy, Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity.

These items are not necessarily once and done, but performed periodically they establish the foundational success of the IT organization.

Application

It is interesting how different companies would group the “Core” and “Edge” activities.  Ssecurity and privacy, for example, are clearly at the core in some organizations, while in other organizations it is definitely at the edge.   Some items will migrate back and forth between “Core” and “Edge” over time, representing the gray area between these two categories.

As part of an organizational self-examination, it is interesting to see how much of the “Edge IT” is present in your organization.  As companies grow and mature the core services that IT provides expand and more of the edge services become necessary.  In this case, simply the presence of these activities indicates a more advanced maturity, providing the foundation for further leveraging IT within the enterprise by maturing not only the Core, but the Edge services as well.

How does your organization align itself?   Do you think of Core and Edge services differently?

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Angry Exec Ratio

Angry Exec Ratio
iStock 000001624654Small 300x199 Angry Exec Ratio

Angry Executive

Tomorrow is often the busiest time of year. — Danish Proverb

Making people happy is over rated. Making everyone happy is impossible.  Getting the job done, no matter how difficult, is enormously under rated.

Time is the most limited resource any manager or executive has. The higher up in the food chain, the more precious the minutes.  How you parcel out the minutes is critically important to the success of the role.  How you divide these minutes will what gets movement and what doesn’t.  The same can be said for your department as you personally have a fixed set of time and effort to allocate to your tasks.

There is a finite limit to the amount of work addressed in a given time period.   Simple math indicates that prioritization and selecting the right things to work on, at all times, is critical. If you are wise, this will be a collective prioritization not an individual one.  Regardless of how you prioritize,  it is critical it is to set expectations with every one involved as to where each persons requests fit into the sequence.

People will be upset.  Everyone will differ in their expectations as to what is important and why their requests are more important than anyone elses.   Life is full of compromises. It is all too common however that IT customers expect that the only ones to compromise are IT and figure out how to service all the demands at once.  After all, as the indoctrination goes IT is a “service organization” and service organizations exist only to serve.

It is rare that a true partnership exists where business and IT are true equals.  I have been fortunate enough to see where this partnership works well.  It is surprising how much more work can get accomplished in this environment.  I have also seen the other extreme where there is not a partnership and the IT organization is subservient to the business partners.  This inevitably leads to dissatisfaction within the IT organization and a productivity hit ensues.  Is there a little of “chicken and egg” going on?  Maybe.

Net-net, difficult decisions will always be made about how to marshall scarce resources to get a number of broad initiatives completed.  At the more strategic level of the organization many of the executive peers will not have their initiatives ranked as high as they would like and therefore not funded.  There will unhappy executives.  Maybe many.  With luck they will be unhappy for all the right reasons.  At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter if they are happy.  It matters that you get the job done, regardless of the difficulty.

As a colleague astutely pointed out, “if half of all the people an executive works with are not mad at them, they’re not doing their job.”

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Celebration of Shadow IT

Celebration of Shadow IT
iStock 000003772908Small 300x199 Celebration of Shadow IT

Shadow Workforce

What we need to do is learn to work in the system, by which I mean that everybody, every team, every platform, every division, every component, is there not for individual competitive profit or recognition, but for contribution to the system as a whole on a win-win basis.  – W. Edwards Deming

All those of you who have participated in a Sarbanes-Oxley audit hold up your hand?  Good.  Now, how many of you have been involved in documenting the processes under scrutiny by the Act?  I see fewer hands up.  For those of you with your hands still up, do you notice something interesting in each of these processes?  Thats’s right, there’s a healthy dose of technology inside these processes – and a healthy percentage of this was developed by people who don’t work within the IT organization.

How did these applications get there?  Who are these people who developed them?

Not only were these applications developed by carbon based life forms from the same star system as Core IT, but in many cases talented professionals who were formerly within Core IT did the work behind the scenes.  Meet Shadow IT.

There is no possible way for IT organizations to meet all the demands of the business partners.  In the world of accelerating demands for new technology, and limited and shrinking resources within IT, only the highest priority initiatives can be undertaken.  In some cases only a small percentage of the demand will be adequately addressed.  The rest of the demand is either begrudgingly dismissed or the business partners will find another way.

While those who perform in Shadow IT do so with much greater variability of skill than those in Core IT, the evidence of their work is in every business process.  Typically the work by Shadow IT stays in place for a considerable amount of time.

It’s important to note that Shadow IT typically doesn’t follow traditional SDLC processes, comprehensive testing, or thorough investigative research on needs or range of technology solutions.  At the high-end, Shadow IT will be practicing their own form of  ”agile” development, and will exceed anything which IT can put forth.  At the low-end, these practices are not followed and projects limp along until they either are put to sleep or put into production.

Shadow IT is not new.  The work from Shadow IT is all around the corporate world.  We need not be blind to Shadow IT but recognize the important role that they play in the support of technology across the enterprise.  Without Shadow IT, the demand serviced by them would not be met and the organizational dysfunction would be magnified.

The controls and consistency which comes with Core IT needs to find its way into the work of Shadow IT.  The broader perspective and inter-system integration from Core IT will be helpful as the applications from Shadow IT will .  There is a time and place where the work of Shadow IT can and should be brought into Core IT.

This can be accomplished with a couple of key items.  First, recognize the role and value of Shadow IT.  Second, create the understanding that the work from Shadow IT may come back into Core IT at some point, and finally, set up the broad limits for which Shadow IT should work within – just the basics (Java vs. .NET, central data stores vs. local,  etc).

Let us celebrate Shadow IT.  The fingers of the Shadow IT are filling more dike holes than Core IT can ever fill.

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