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“All bad precedents begin with justifiable measures.” — Julius Caesar
Today, in IT Organization 2017, Vaughan Merlyn makes the case that even if you have a good business case it does not ensure value realization. While the post goes on to talk in more detail about value realization, the post implies that most IT organizations (at least at the higher maturity levels) operate with strong business cases as support for the work they will undertake for the next quarter or next year. I am pleased to hear this.
I frequently work with organizations at the lower end of the maturity scale, due to no fault of their own. In many cases business has rapidly outgrown the IT capability or capacity to support them, or there was a conscious prior decision to outsource much of the IT operation and is now being brought back in house albeit without the people or process infrastructure to support it. In these cases, IT Departments which demand to have solid business cases before they undertake any new work are doing themselves and their organizations a disservice. The reasoning often is that they are deeply backlogged and taking on any new efforts without a solid business case would seemingly be irresponsible.
While this is true, it can also be a cop-out. In organizations at the lower maturity levels there often is an absence of fundamental controls. Due to the nature of rapid fire organizations and extreme demands on the IT organization, time and /or funds have never been allocated for the fundamentals. As a result, bullet proof backup and restore procedures are not in place, penetration tests are never performed, physical security is absent, incident management is not tracked, and so on. Having these basic controls in place is the equivalent of good IT hygiene. The absence of them is simply unacceptable. In cases like these I recommend that funds are secured from wherever possible to get these fundamentals in place, and to do so as soon as possible. The down side of not having these fundamentals in place is far more significant than the costs of doing them.
In these cases, business cases are optional.
Russ, I agree with you on your observations about lower maturity organizations. Also, for reasons I don’t fully understand, I have found myself working with lower business-IT maturity organizations in the last year. I’m not sure if this is a function of the economy, or of the universal need to drive value from IT is “lowering the water level” with consequently, more heads popping above the surface! Whatever the reason, there is something comforting about leveraging what we know so well within organizations that really need it and appreciate what we bring!
Superb site, where did you come up with the information in this piece? I’m glad I found it though, ill be checking back soon to see what other articles you have.