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Aligning Business
and IT in theEnterprise
®
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2 It is Time to Think Beyond IT
4 CIOs More Focused on Business than Ever
6 Mastering the Art o IT/Business Alignment
8 Leveraging the Right Resources or Alignment
Contents…
This content was adapted from Internet.com’s CIO Update Web site. Contributors: Dennis DrogsethPatty Azzarello, Jerome Oberlton, and Allen Bernard
4 6
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Aligning Business and IT in the Enterprise
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Aligning Business and IT in the Enterprise
More than 10 years ago, Enterprise Man-
agement Associates (EMA) consultants
assessed processes and technologies in-
volved with monitoring and managing
manuacturing oors, utilities, transportation eets, and
other “business inrastructures.” They came to the con-
clusion that great economies o scale could be achievedby consolidating these requirements. In other words, by
leveraging IT capabilities or
monitoring, instrumentation, as-
set planning, security, service
management, automation, and
analytics, businesses could gain
new levels o operational ef-
ciencies, minimize risk and more
proactively optimize to changing
market requirements. Back then,
EMA called this the “Global Cor-porate Control Center.”
At that time, in the late ‘90s,
monitoring was pretty basic
(well, even more basic than it is
today, at least), and process au-
tomation existed (when it existed
at all) in very narrow silos within
IT. Analytic capabilities were mostly rule-based event man-
agement with very little in the way o sel-learning, sel-
adaptive heuristics. And when these later appeared, these“advanced analytic” capabilities mostly didn’t work.
Attention to process and the disciplines that best practices
such as ITIL could provide were barely emerging. IT was
very much a kingdom set apart rom the business — or no,
not even that, but rather a series o eudal kingdoms each
with its own walls and each with its own opinions about
priorities and governance — when defned priorities and
governance existed at all. The Web was certainly not Web
2.0 let alone SOA, and the notion o broad integration
technologies such as CMDB, confguration management
systems (CMS), IT process automation, and advanced dis-
covery undamentally didn’t exist.
Then IT had the shock o its lie. From 2000 to 2002 thetechnology bubble imploded, leaving many technol
ogy companies adrit in a sea o
doubt and IT organizations fght
ing hard not to be outsourced
And while that fght has been
renewed in the latest economic
crisis, most IT organizations have
learned a lot since then about
governance, visibility, compli
ance, accountability, and how to
optimize better with many o theabove-mentioned technologies
Even more importantly, there is
something o a slow-burning po-
litical revolution within many IT
organizations leading to dialog
across organizational groups in a
creative, responsible, and game-
changing way that simply neve
existed beore. O course there’s still a long way to go, but
the IT landscape is undamentally shiting.
Let’s revisit the premise o EMA’s old idea o the “Globa
Corporate Control Center,” which suggests collapsing a
whole new set o “eudal kingdoms” into a more efcient
more risk-ree, more automated, and more accountable
abric o people and technologies. One thing that should
become apparent just rom reading the press is that com
panies in many industries are accelerating their quest to
fnd new and more eective ways o working.
It is Time to Think Beyond ITBy Dennis Drogseth
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Aligning Business and IT in the Enterprise
Some o these industries, such as healthcare, reect a
more proactive eort as electronic inormation or stor-
ing and sharing patient records, enabling collaborative
diagnostics, and automating the business side o hospi-
tals and other healthcare institutions is beginning to take
hold. Other verticals, such as manuacturing and retail, are
increasingly dependent on better systems o automation,
outreach, visibility, and control just to ensure competitive
survival. In some industries, such as utilities, the linkage
between the “business inrastructure” and the “IT inra-
structure” becomes intuitively obvious as the power grid
is essentially a “network o resources” that needs to be
better monitored and optimized.
Transportation systems can be run much better when IT
provides better capabilities or monitoring, tracking, “ser-
vice management” and “liecycle eet management.” And
even fnancial services, which have spearheaded a lot o in-
vestments in IT innovation (and may have gotten in trouble
rom too much ill-ocused automation), are acing a drastic
need to consolidate, integrate, inorm, make visible, and
support a whole host o existing and coming compliance
requirements.
Several vendor initiatives, most notably rom IBM, are tar-geting individual vertical business inrastructures in much
this same way. But this idea is much bigger than IBM. Tech-
nologies and services rom a whole host o companies and
services can and should apply. And while the equivalent o
an ITIL guidebook or doing this doesn’t yet exist, the pro-
cesses and skill sets or dialog, consensus building, defn-
ing priorities, and documenting processes across multiple
groups all still apply.
Just think: with a modest but creative investment in instru-
menting business inrastructures your chosen IT technolo
gies, and more importantly, you and your organization
may begin to show value in a whole host o new and un-
expected ways. And while new opportunities oten come
with associated headaches, the upside or you and the IT
industry as a whole is high.
The notion I’d like to put orward to CIOs and enterprise
IT executives is that just as you need to lead the charge
in supporting organizational transormation and its associ
ated technologies within IT (CMS, IT process automation
etc.), you have an opportunity to promote IT services and
technologies in a broader business context. And when, you
may ask, is it time to start to think more creatively about
extending IT resources in support o business needs?
While it may seem counter-intuitive, this may just be the
perect moment to get credibility and support or a more
innovative use o IT. The fre in the belly exists in many
businesses and organizations across many verticals to act
now. This time around, vs. 2001, you are squarely part o
the cure and not the disease.
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Aligning Business and IT in the Enterprise
I
n case you missed these past ew years, the job o the
CIO has been morphing rom top technical propeller
head to that o true corporate leader. Beginning with
the dot-com era and continuing through today, the job has arguably changed more rapidly than any other in
corporate America. Once just an order taker, CIOs are now
spending most o their time fg-
uring out how to leverage tech-
nology or business advantage
as opposed to just keeping the
lights on.
IBM’s latest global study o
more than 2,500 CIOs supports
this conclusion.
“Clearly the role o the CIO is
changing dramatically,” said
Pat Toole, IBM’s CIO, in a state-
ment released with the fndings.
“On the one hand they are try-
ing to standardize routine pro-
cesses and simpliy their exist-
ing IT inrastructure to reduce
costs, hence their growing interest in technologies such
as cloud computing. On the other hand, given the centralrole that today’s CIO perorms in driving new business
models, whether it’s a Smart Grid system, an Intelligent
Transport system, or a transparent ood supply chain,
it’s not surprising that the amount o time they are now
spending on driving new kinds o growth or their compa-
nies is growing considerably.”
To do this CIOs are leveraging analytics to gain a competi-
tive advantage and improve business decision-making. In
act, this is now the top priority or CIOs. More than our ou
o fve (83 percent) survey respondents identifed businessintelligence (BI) and analytics — the ability to see patterns
in vast amounts o data and extract actionable insights —
as the way they will enhance their
organizations’ competitiveness.
The study, titled The New Voice
of the CIO , represents the insights
and vision o CIOs rom 78 coun-
tries, 19 industries, and organiza
tions o every size. It reinorces
the increasingly strategic role thatCIOs are playing as visionary lead-
ers and as drivers o innovation
and fnancial growth.
Along with the increased ocus
on data analytics, the survey also
revealed that data reliability and
security have emerged as increas
ingly urgent concerns, with 71
percent o CIOs planning to make additional investments
in risk management and compliance.
Other key fndings o the survey include:
CIOs are continuing on the path to dramatically lower energy•
costs, with 76 percent undergoing or planning virtualization
projects.
Seventy-six percent o CIOs anticipate building a strongly cen•
tralized inrastructure in the next fve years.
CIOs More Focusedon Business than Ever
By Allen Bernard
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Aligning Business and IT in the Enterprise
Top ProjectsIn the study, CIOs also identifed the top visionary projects
that they are working on now or oresee implementingin the uture, ranging rom process improvement to tak-
ing advantage o technologies that can provide immedi-
ate and long-term fnancial impact. These include: BI and
analytics, virtualization, green IT, service oriented architec-
tures (SOA), service management, and cloud computing.
CIOs are also ocusing on mobility solutions and unifed
communications, collaboration and social networking
tools, and Web 2.0 projects to enable more eective com-
munications or employees, customers, and partners.
“You can see that they are really a combination o busi-
ness and technology so at any given point in time in the
morning they may be ocused on (technology) and in the
aternoon they may be working on a fve-year plan or the
business,” said Ban. “So, they wear many hats during the
day, they change roles on a regular basis, and whateve
comes up will be what they have to ocus on.”
More than hal o CIOs are expecting to implement completely•
standardized, low-cost business processes.
Even as they build these standardized low-cost inrastructures,•
CIOs are able to ocus 55 percent o their time on activities that
drive innovation and growth, whereas traditional IT tasks like
inrastructure and operations management now consume only
45 percent o their time.
“There really is a ground swell on how their role is evolv-
ing,” said Linda Ban, director o the CIO study program.
“It’s no longer enough or them to be considered the con-
summate IT proessional in the company. They’ve got to
understand the company, they’ve got to understand where
the company is moving and what the issues are and how
they help make that happen.”
As the role o the CIO itsel transorms so do the types o
projects they lead across their enterprises, which will allow
CIOs to ocus less time and resources on running inter-
nal inrastructure and more time helping their companies
grow revenue. CIOs are transorming their inrastructure to
ocus more on innovation and business value rather than
simply running IT.
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Aligning Business and IT in the Enterprise
A
s I’ve been writing about IT/business align-
ment and working with IT organizations, I see
that CIOs and enterprise IT executives all into
two camps regarding taking ownership o IT/business alignment.
“Not my job.” Some CIOs have given me pretty direct
eedback that people like me should get out o the way
and stop giving IT a bad rap.
They think that i you need to
ocus on building credibility, it
means you are, by defnition, un-
deserving o credibility. The only
thing that should matter is doing
a good job. Good work speaksor itsel.
“I need to own this.” These are
CIOs and executives who believe
that making personal, relevant
connections to their business
peers, CEO, and board is one o
the key actors in being success-
ul in the frst place.
As you consider your appetiteor reaching out to your business
counterparts here are some points to consider:
Executives with high credibility get more done. This is
not a shallow, political phenomenon independent o deliv-
ering results. It’s because people with high credibility are
more respected and trusted, which means they get more
budget, more support, and waste less time on deense
endless justifcations, and stupid questions. They can de
liver more, because they have ewer things blocking themand they attract the best people to work or them.
Good work doesn’t stand on its own – at any level, in
any unction. This is not just an IT issue. People who work
really hard and deliver great re
sults don’t always get recog
nized, discovered, or protected
It’s sad but true. In IT it’s even
more perilous because no one
else even understands what a do-
ing a good job looks like. It’s upto you to fnd a way to share what
excellent work in IT looks like in
a way that can be understood by
non-IT people.
Technology doesn’t help. Build
ing good business relationships
requires personal interaction
listening, and having a meal or a
coee with someone. Because it
is outside the realm o technol-ogy, many IT executives eel like
it is low-value activity, or they are just not comortable with
it. You don’t need to be comortable; you just need to do
it. I it’s unpleasant or you and unlikely to happen sponta
neously, schedule it.
Mastering the Art of IT/Business Alignment
By Patty Azzarello
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Aligning Business and IT in the Enterprise
Business frst. This is not just an IT challenge. All business
unctions have the responsibility to manage their unction
while putting the overall business frst and at the center o
the discussion. Any executive leader needs to be able to
ocus frst on what the business needs and then prioritize
what happens inside their unction to serve the business
agenda. The more you connect with your peers on a busi-
ness-frst basis (where all o you are putting the business
at the center vs. your own unction), the clearer it will be
what is important to the business, and how you should
ocus and communicate your IT plan in your interactions
with the business.
How do we make money? One thing that really helps
is i you make sure every person in your IT organization
knows how the company makes money. Explain where the
revenue comes rom, what the fxed and variable costs
are, and what the biggest levers that drive proft are. Make
sure they understand how IT spending impacts the P&L
and how choices are made about general business and IT
investments.
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Aligning Business and IT in the Enterprise
I
T’s alignment with the business is critical to the suc-
cess o an organization. My experience as CIO o
Mannatech, Inc., working with business executives
to achieve results or our supply chain managementproject, confrmed this to me.
Such alignment oten entails the
willingness o key leaders to col-
laborate and ocus on the ex-
ecution and delivery o key pro-
grams. In many cases, successul
collaboration means leaders
need to have extensive conver-
sations concerning what’s vital to
the business. Ideally, executivesshould give up personal agen-
das, work across departments,
and enable IT to provide the
resources that are necessary to
make those programs a success.
In addition to these actors, CIOs
and enterprise IT executives must
also hire the IT proessionals
most likely to create an atmosphere o alignment between
technology and business.
Hiring the Right IT Professional toBridge the BusinessAs I continued to use alignment as a means o driving the
success o all business programs, including supply chain
management, I recognized the importance o hiring a sea-
soned supply chain management proessional who could
work side by side with the business to develop an overal
strategy or supply chain optimization.
To meet this requirement, I selected an individual romthe talent pool o consultants who had previously worked
on supply chain eorts at Man-
natech. I was looking or an indi-
vidual who was well versed in the
supply chain discipline and could
help guide the business along
the appropriate path. In that
same proessional, I also sought
someone who understood the
specifc supply chain modules o
Mannatech’s resident EnterpriseResource Planning (ERP) system
so he or she could align the un
damental needs o the business
with the technology.
This combination o talents, in
turn, enabled the creation o a
sound strategy that IT, in connec-
tion with the business, could use
to introduce a program that would deliver huge value to
the organization.
With this proessional in place, Mannatech hired a supply
chain management executive who had a very solid back-
ground in sourcing, contract management, demand plan
ning and orecasting, warehouse management, and lo-
gistics management. This individual was a well-respected
leader who already understood the cultural dynamics o
the business.
Leveraging the Right Resourcesfor Alignment
By Jerome Oberlton
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Aligning Business and IT in the Enterprise
Achieving Strategic ValueHer ocus on supply chain optimization, coupled with her
desire to utilize technology to drive improvements andoverall productivity or the business, was an ideal match or
the company. She not only set her sights on collaborating
with IT but also understood the need or cross-unctional
business alignment as a means to achieve strategic value
or the business.
Our new VP o supply chain management began work im-
mediately ater accepting her new role to ensure that both
a disciplined and structured approach or execution was in
place. During this process, we developed a cohesive strat-
egy and execution plan or the supply chain optimizationproject. Both the plan and strategy were shared with key
business executives and then subsequently shared with
the CFO.
Her relationship with the CFO was important because we
wanted him to understand the impact and importance o
the supply chain optimization initiative. The VP o supply
chain management careully nurtured that relationship
and was key in advising the CFO o specifc efciency and
cost-saving opportunities that were available as a result
o this project. She outlined the business case associatedwith the need or supply chain optimization and helped
ensure the program had the appropriate level o visibility
at the senior executive level. The vice president o supply
chain management met with the CFO to discuss the pros
and cons o the eort. Not only was she able to elevate
the importance o the program with the CFO, but she also
specifcally worked with IT to champion the success o the
program.
Partnering with an individual who is well-respected among
senior leadership and is committed to a strategy o col-laboration can be very valuable to an organization. When
hiring a new team member, look or these traits to help
ensure a successul team:
Business-savvy and technical-savvy: I a candidate dem-
onstrates strength in both areas, the business will readily
accept this person as a member o the team, and credibil-
ity will be more easily achieved.
Relationship-oriented:Ideally, a candidate will understand
the importance o building a relationship with the business
as well as orming internal alliances. One must make a me-
thodical, planned eort to build lasting relationships.
Cultural awareness: Knowing the nature o the business
and demonstrating an ability to adapt to the cultural dy-
namics o an organization are extremely important.
Using Alignment to TransformWeb ResourcesJust as with the supply chain optimization eort, I re-
searched other programs that would contribute to the e-
fciency and eectiveness o the Mannatech organizationAter a number o conversations with key members o the
leadership team and much deliberation, we agreed that
the corporate Web site had become obsolete and was in
need o a redesign.
The old Web site was dated and used mostly to process or-
ders and handle the registration o new independent sales
associates. The site desperately needed an upgrade, as it
was difcult to navigate and had little consumer appeal
An upgraded site, i appropriately designed, could bette
position the Mannatech image and brand. Additionally, itcould be used to up-sell and cross-sell products while also
reducing the amount o time needed to order products
and register new independent sales associates.
Taking on this eort was no small eat. As CIO, I real
ized the need to collaborate with other key executives as
a means to help propel the eort orward. Keeping this
need in mind, I reached out to the head o marketing to
discuss the challenges with the existing Web site. The chie
marketing ofcer (CMO) agreed with the need to upgrade
the site, and we collectively began working on a strategyand plan to present to the CEO and, subsequently, the
board o directors.
In preparation or our presentation, the CMO and I spent
a great deal o time learning the challenges and rustra-
tions that associates were experiencing on the Web site
We knew i the associates’ ability to do business was ham
pered, it would ultimately aect Mannatech’s top and
bottom lines.
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Aligning Business and IT in the Enterprise
The Web site redesign program underwent extensive test
ing by a subset o Mannatech associates. Based on severa
eedback sessions, the feld organization was pleased with
the new Web site redesign.
Alignment and collaboration are important or any organi
zation but can be especially valuable in bridging the gap
between the business and IT. Organizational goals and
initiatives can be successully achieved by partnering with
individuals who are well-respected and who have a proven
track record. Such a partnership will help IT better under
stand how to connect any issues with viable solutions and
ultimately achieve success.
We extensively researched the impact on productivity and
customer experiences; we conducted surveys and ana-
lyzed various Web tools in order to generate a viable solu-
tion. This collaboration gave us true insight into what was
working and what needed to be improved so that by the
time we met with the board, we were well-prepared.
During the presentation, the CMO laid out the impact that
executing this program would have on the broader market
and detailed how this program would help our company
reposition itsel. At the conclusion o the presentations,
both the CEO and the board elected to have the CMO
and I spearhead this program or the business.