Customer Reviews

Making the Invisible Visible: How Companies Win with the Right Information, People and IT

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This is a book that I consider to be one of the most refreshing business texts that I've had the pleasure to read in a long time. It was something of an epiphany for me as concepts I had always instinctively known to exist and to be right were suddenly being detailed and consolidated in a way I have never had the vision to do, and in a way I have never read before.

Time will tell, but the methodology presented here may just provide the hitherto missing link between what we pay for information and what we get from it. Remember that by the end of 2001, the US alone will have spent the lion's share of a trillion dollars on Information Technology, and though we may not like to admit it, much of that money will disappear down a black hole of failed projects and mis-used systems.

If the case studies are anything to go by, the company that has the foresight to apply the principles of "Information Orientation" will not only offer itself the best chance of avoiding the IT gravity well, but will also be putting itself on track to derive the maximum possible value from its expenditure on information systems, in a way that will be measurable in the real business terms of growth, margin and bottom line.

That's a claim I find pretty exciting and I'm looking forward to applying it in my own environment. The authors say it's no fad, and my gut feeling is to agree. I recommend you get a copy of this book before your competitors do!

Donald A. Marchand, William J. Kettinger and John D. Rollins, professors and consultants on information technology and management, explain how your company can improve its business performance using information orientation (IO). The authors present ways to improve corporate capabilities in information management, information technology and employee use of information. The authors draw from interviews with about 1,000 senior managers from more than 100 companies, representing two dozen countries and two dozen industries. The book uses case histories and examples from these interviews to support its central model, which is based on building, using and measuring these three information capabilities. The authors present innovative answers to the perpetual question of how to quantify subjective measures. The one shortcoming, beyond explanatory repetition, is the problem of sorting out programs with initials instead of names. Yet, we [...] found this book quite solid, albeit academically written, and suggest it to all managers and executives involved with IT initiatives at large companies.

An important work that takes the technology areas so necessary to information management, and places them exactly where industry needs to view them right now! Based on solid examples of solutions pioneeers, this book offers a view toward integration and application in an area that now generates real winners.