Mastering the Three Worlds of IT

Andrew McAfee has just published an interesting paper entitled Mastering the Three Worlds of Information Technology in the online version of the Harvard Business Review which is providing free access (at least for now).  There are 2 major themes in this paper:

1. Non-IT management is critical to the successful implementation of projects
2. He presents 3 models of IT and discusses the implications for management in terms of which they should invest in and what they should to maximize returns.

For the sake of brevity, I will only discuss the first theme in this post and will defer discussion on the second theme to a later post.  Nicholas Carr has also reviewed this article in blog posting entitled "Too Many ITs".

Carr states that McAfee’s argument "that IT success in business today is less about technology than about good old-fashioned management is not new."  While this point may be important in terms of an academic review I think the concept is one that bears repeating.  The reason I say this is that many still do not understand this point.  At the risk being accused of repeating an overused cliché, success in implementing new technology really is about people, processes and technology.

McAfee states:

"I believe that executives have three roles to play in managing IT: They must help select technologies, nurture their adoption, and ensure their exploitation."

McAfee goes on to clarify:

"Everyone who has studied companies' frustrations with IT argues that technology projects are increasingly becoming managerial challenges rather than technical ones. What’s more, a well-run IT department isn’t enough; line managers have important responsibilities in implementing these projects. An insightful CIO once told me, “I can make a project fail, but I can’t make it succeed. For that, I need my [non-IT] business colleagues.” Managers I’ve worked with admit privately that success with IT requires their commitment, but they’re not clear where, when, and how they should get involved."

Amen Brother!

I believe that many people view new technologies as a silver bullet – If I install this software my salesmen will be more effective and sales will go through the roof!  Unfortunately, we in IT are often guilty of fostering this misperception in order to “sell” the project.  Under the silver bullet approach technology implementation solely equals IT installing software.  The truth is that technology implementation is really communication, process redesign, organizational development, training and employee and management involvement at all levels both inside and outside of IT plus IT installing the software.

I believe this is a concept well worth repeating as often as necessary.  What do you think?

To Be Continued . . .