Customer Reviews

Six IT Decisions Your IT People Shouldn't Make (HBR OnPoint Enhanced Edition)

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The core of this ten-page enhanced article from the Harvard Business Review is that companies which successfully manage their IT "generate as much as 40% higher returns" than do others. The authors claim that these successful companies are the ones whose business executives articulate a clear strategy for IT in six specific areas.

This advice contrasts with the common wisdom that it is up to IT to "align their processes" with the business of the company. Without clear direction, IT directors push their staff to implement every technology that is considered standard for their industry. The result is a mishmash of expensive, generic systems that add little value to the company and an "overwhelmed and demoralized" IT department.

The authors address the question of outsourcing in a side-bar. Since they have identified CEO's who abdicate their leadership role as the prime cause of ineffective IT, it's not surprising that companies who simply outsource the whole IT function are often "dissatisfied" with the results. Ross and Weill offer the surprising advice that it would be better to retain IT in-house and let IT executives decide which functions "don't matter" and can be cost-effectively subcontracted.

The summary section in this enhanced article refers to "IT executives" who make "key decisions"; "IT people" who "shouldn't make decisions"; and an "IT department" to "blame" when an IT initiative fails. That confusion of terms may inadvertently say a great deal about the mismatch between external expectations of IT departments and their internal structure.

The article provides the careful reader a great deal to think about. It offers a useful counterweight and complement to Nicholas Carr's HBR article, "IT Doesn't Matter".