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The reason men oppose progress is not that they hate progress, but that they love inertia. – Elbert Hubbard
In a prior post I introduced the concept of Newtonian physics as it applies to IT organizations. This post begins the examination of one aspect of this, namely mass.
What is the mass of your IT organization?
Conceptually, we can think of mass as the collection of quantitative and qualitative attributes that can describe not only the size of an organization, but also the ability to deliver results to their customers. Mass connotes weight and with it inertia. Those people who have plied their trade in organizational change are all too familiar with the joys and pains of the inertia which allows organizations in motion to stay in motion, and organizations at rest to stay at rest.
A common form of measurement of size of an organization is headcount. While this can serve as a proxy for mass, there are several aspects to this simple attribute. The nuances within the variants of this term are important to think about in terms of assessing the IT organizations mass.
- Internal IT staff. This is the number of resources which are on the payroll and can be brought be bear to deliver and maintain the services requested by (or may be requested in the case of R&D or innovation types of groups). Theoretically, the greater the number of people the organization has the better it is able to respond.
- Shadow IT. Virtually all organizations have a group of people who provide development and on-going support for the technology inside the department but do not directly add mass to the IT organization. These people are often super-users of an application, Excel or Access specialists, or just the more technical people that informally serve as first line support before the call is made to the help desk.
- External IT staff – those people who provide labor for the organization, but are not on the payroll. These can be contractors, vendors, consultants, research analysts, etc. They all play a role and are important parts of a healthy IT organization. The important designation is that they are external to the organization and in times when an organization is looking to shed some of their mass, this is the first place people typically look, rightly or wrongly, certainly the easiest.
- Outsourced IT functions. A special category of external labor is outsourced functions. In recent history, many parts of an IT organization (or entire organizations) have been outsourced to third parties, often in different countries. It is important to recognize that there is still a number of people behind the scenes which are providing these services, but only indirectly contribute to the organizations mass.
While there are several layers and aspects to the value of headcount, it is important to recognize that each adds value and adds mass in its own way. Internal IT staff is directly attributed to the mass of the IT organization. The total headcount of people here is directly applied to the numerous challenges the IT organization faces. Shadow IT, while possibly the most relevant in terms of support to a business unit, is mass associated with the business unit, not the IT organization. External IT staff are temporary in nature and while extremely relevant to the support of a business unit, can be considered a strategic partner with the IT organization, adding high quality mass when needed and shed when not. Outsourced IT, is also a strategic partner to the IT organization, but a long term partner with long term implications. The mass of the people in the outsourced firm which support your organization contribute to the mass of your IT organization, but this mass cannot be adjusted except by terms of the contract.
The obvious question, “how much mass should my IT organization have?” cannot be easily answered. Based on a myriad of business, market, economic, and strategic factors, the overall mass and value produced by this mass can be adjusted. In times when more or less mass is required, this is one place (but not the only place) changes can be made.
This is a very interesting perspective, Russ! I’m wondering where you are going with this? It seems that some mass adds value, while other mass subtracts value. I see organizations where my promotion opportunities and “worth” are a function of how many headcount I have reporting to me. (I consider this a value subtracting factor), whereas other organizations where my value is a function of my competency footprint (a value adding factor).
Therefore, you might derive a scoring method, that looks at the sources of mass (employees, external, shadow, etc.) and which add versus subtract value.
As I say, I think you are on to something, and look forward to seeing where you take this.
Vaughan,
Well stated. There are many ways to look at mass. As with most things many people have their own lens they see the world through. While these varied viewpoints each provide value, a composite view in most cases provides the most informative look at the mass of an IT organization.
I do like your idea of a scorecard to assess mass. This would provide the necessary quantitative measures (from multiple diverse perspectives) which will allow for measurement and more concrete analysis of current state, and means to assess and quantify impact of future decisions. I look forward to further discussions with the blogosphere on this general topic.