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Project SD: Optimizing IT Staff Deployment
Right People, Right Places, Right Time, Right Work
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Business expects the same from IT as any other department or business unit: value, innovation, and leadership. To be a business partner, IT must also aim for - and achieve - "Level 3" maturity, characterized by continuous planning with and for the business, an innovative culture, full integration with the business, an expanded infrastructure, and flexibility and agility to respond to ever-changing economic and industry conditions and customer demands. To simplify the process of IT staff deployment, we have identified four components that shape IT staffing:
- Human Capital Management. This encompasses not only the requisite up-to-date technical skills, but also architecture management, relationship management, and vendor management skills.
- Sourcing. Sourcing technology services requires deep understanding of the core competencies of the IT organization, the business strategy, and the customer needs, as well as relationship development and management skills. Fundamental in any external sourcing capability are contract specification, development, and negotiation skills to ensure IT gets what it needs, and sophisticated communications skills and processes to ensure that the sourcing relationship remains vital and viable.
- Work and Workplace. The most value-added IT work is what we call "development work" - not meaning just traditional systems development work, but creative problem solving and innovative work in general. While IT has most often evaluated itself on the cost-effectiveness of its problem-solving work (such as application maintenance) or the efficiency of its production work (such as data center operations), development work delivers the most business value.
- Organizational Structure and Governance. The IT organization's "shape," including its governance, must be modeled on the shape and structure of the business, with the ultimate goal of providing the flexibility and agility to quickly respond to changing customer needs, technological advances, and market and industry trends.
The new superstars in IT are not the technical people - their skills are commoditized - but people who can get things done for the business (establish and manage relationships, develop staff, and foster creativity). This requires having IT people embedded with the business, working with their business counterparts, participating in their decisions, helping them identify the cause of and solutions to problems in the marketplace. These IT people must have the technical skills, the social skills, and the emotional skills to work with the business on its terms. They must be prepared for the next evolution in IT-business relations, as IT-business alignment becomes convergence.
This Re.sults® report examines what it takes to enable Level 3 maturity, which is where each IT organization needs to be to maximize both value and innovation to the business, and to fulfill its partnership role. It includes with a checklist for evaluating all four components of our staff deployment model.
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