Past Tips - 2001
IT
isn't a relay race.
12/10/2001
Do
your processes involve lots of hand-offs between employees with
narrowly-defined responsibilities? If so, you’ve built more than
excessive overhead into them: You’ve also built in poor-quality
results. Why?
When
lots of individuals each work on just a tiny bit of the problem, the
chance of their bits assembling into a coherent whole is much lower
than if each one builds a meaningful subassembly while understanding
the entire problem.
Fix
this by involving as small a number of people as possible in each
process, and giving each one both a broad role, and responsibility for
the business outcome.
Avoid brainstorming.
11/26/2001
At
least as taught by group-process weenies it’s self-defeating: Insisting
on a rigid rotation within the group with no interruptions and no
evaluation prevents great ideas from happening.
Instead,
ask everyone to e-mail you their best ideas before the “brainstorming”
meeting begins. Then, consolidate the list and distribute it by e-mail
prior to your “brainstorming” meeting.
The
result: You’ll avoid wasting a meeting and will spend meeting time
doing what meetings are for: Sharing information and opinions so you
can make the best decision.
Think beyond ROI.
11/19/2001
IT is part
of every improvement in the business, and can’t deliver any business
improvements on its own. It shares in the credit for every gain and
claims full credit for none of them.
Rather
than waste time trying to calculate the return on investment (ROI) for
your company’s IT investments, promote the idea that there is no such
thing as IT spending, only business spending, some of which happens to
be on IT.
It’s
tough getting executives to think like this, but the ROI for it is
enormous.
Your internal customers aren't who you think they are.
11/12/2001
Customers
are individuals who make buying decisions. Consumers are individuals
who use products and services.
End-users
are your consumers, not your customers. Your customers are the
individuals who approve your department’s budget, and your raises,
promotions and bonuses. They’re your customers – treat them that way.
If
you’re lucky, your internal customers want you to focus on the
company’s customers. If so, you have a great job.
Get your programmers away from their desks.
11/5/2001
The
only systems that get used are the ones that help end-users do their
jobs better. If every member of every project team watches how people
actually work – and even better, do the work themselves for awhile – they’ll
be in a position to create systems that do exactly that.
We
already know that body language conveys half the information in a
typical conversation, so why do we expect printed specifications to be
sufficient information for developers?
Have a positive ROI.
10/29/2001
Not your projects. Not your department. You.
You
cost your company your salary plus benefits and the facilities it
provides. Add the margins it expects to make on every investment it
makes and you need to return 70% more than your salary for the company
to break even.
If
you can’t explain how you do this, your job is seriously at risk,
because putting the same money in mutual funds would be a much better
investment.
Apply the theory of evolution.
10/15/2001
Darwin didn’t theorize that the fittest organisms survive. His theory
states that those best adapted … that fit best into their environment …
are the ones that shape succeeding generations. Evolution is
contextual. You should be too.
So
whether you’re planning business strategy or selecting information
technology, remember the difference between “best” and “best fit.” Your
goal is always the latter.
Fine-tune your bunk detector.
10/8/2001
Of all the CIO survival skills, none is more important than the ability
to recognize bunk.
A
bunk detector is built out of four basic questions:
-
“How would my business use this?”
-
“What would it take to deploy it here?”
-
“Who is using it successfully right now?
-
Are you making money at this right now?
Remember,
if bunk were money we’d all be rich, but it’s the exact opposite – an
opportunity to waste the money you have.
It
isn't communication unless it affects the audience.
10/1/2001
We live
in a world of information overload. Inundated with messages and starved
for time, people have finely honed mechanisms that help them ignore
what they can’t use.
Be
different. When you present information, tailor it to what your
audience cares about. Make it useful and you’ll communicate instead of
simply transmitting.
Be
visible in a crisis.
9/24/2001
While
good planning and smart decision-making are important to getting through
a difficult situation, it’s even more important for employees to be
able to interact with you. If they can’t, they’ll quickly lose
confidence in you, and your ability to lead will be diminished.
When
they do, even the best plans and decisions will be worthless.
Don't compete on a level playing field.
9/10/2001
Smart businesses avoid direct competition. So should you. So don’t try
to make your IT organization look like an insourced outsourcing deal.
If you do, you’ll lose because you’ll be playing the outsourcers’ game
and they’re better at it than you are.
Instead,
play a game you can win – become an integral part of the business
instead of an internal supplier.
Pay your own salary.
9/3/2001
No, not
literally, of course, but it’s vital to understand how your company
increases its profits by employing you. Typically, that means you
return at least 70% more in value of some kind than your direct salary,
once you take into account all costs of having you around.
Otherwise,
your employer is better off investing its money in mutual funds than in
you.
Technology isn't the easy part.
8/27/2001
It’s become popular in consulting circles to assert that it’s the
business planning, not the technology, that’s hard. Technology is the
easy part for these consultants, but only because they don’t have to do
it.
What’s
the tip? Don’t disrespect those with skills different from yours.
"I" is the least persuasive word in the dictionary.
8/20/2001
When you want to sway people to your point of view, what they’re
interested in hearing is more important than what you’re interested in
saying. It’s okay to give different audiences different messages, so
long as they’re consistent. In fact, if you don’t, you aren’t showing
integrity, merely lack of interest.
It's your job to have headaches.
8/13/2001
It’s
easy for those of us responsible for information technology to make
“Avoid headaches” our covert mission statement. Stay alert for this
syndrome – in yourself, and among your staff – and constantly remind
everyone of the difference between personal convenience and business
value.
Think globally, act locally.
8/6/2001
You don’t have to be an environmentalist for this to be good advice. Every
project you undertake should yield immediate, short-term practical
results while also advancing your company’s business strategy.
Remember,
any project with a schedule longer than nine months may as well be
eternal.
Never say no.
7/30/2001
No invites argument, and makes you appear authoritarian and
uncooperative. When ever you're tempted to say no, ask a question
instead, to start a conversation that steers the other party to your
answer.