Let's face it: Though there's been some progress toward changing business users' perception of IT, IT still has a lousy image. There's an impression that IT is off in its own little world, doing its work in veiled secrecy. Customers complain that they're getting little attention, when folks in IT know all too well that's untrue.
In a day when any IT organisation is in competition with outsourced providers, promoting IT's mission and services should be priority one for CIOs. I asked four CIOs what methods they used to communicate the value of IT to the rest of the company. Here's what they said.
Stick to a regular schedule
Bill Hicks, CIO for Precision Response Corporation (PRC), is quick to point out that it is the IT department's responsibility to keep all the other departments informed, and he takes the responsibility very seriously. His approach to IT interdepartmental communications is three-tiered:
- Keep the CEO (Tom Cardella) informed.
- Maintain lateral communications (C-level and department heads).
- Make sure the entire IT team knows what's going on.
Hicks said he schedules a meeting with the CEO anytime an issue or anything new comes up that involves the IT department. For example, Hicks recently met with Cardella to explain the company's ongoing migration to a Linux platform. -I don't think e-mail or memos are good for getting that kind of information across," Hicks said.
Hicks said his meetings with Cardella are very important because, otherwise, -we may not interact on a regular basis....It is mission-critical that he is kept informed".
At the second tier of Hicks' approach is communication with other C-level personnel and department heads throughout the company. For them, Hicks develops monthly update reports. These are usually about four informative pages that include topics such as goals that were set and the outcome of those goals, and updates on key projects.
The first two tiers of communication are important, but Hicks said the greatest effort goes into making sure the entire 220-person IT department knows what's going on. Each month, a two-hour meeting is scheduled between leadership and management-level IT personnel. Topics for these meetings include new technology. In addition to keeping IT management level informed and talking about their own strategies and goals, this also gives this level of management a chance to develop and improve communication skills, Hicks said. Most importantly, it gives teams within IT a chance to discuss ongoing projects that may affect other groups. -This is a challenge I noticed early on," Hicks recalled.
-Maybe I'm working on a project in the UNIX group that might impact the quality assurance group, but the quality assurance group won't know about it until it hits them in the face." Good communications within the department will prevent that, Hicks said. Hicks also holds roundtable discussions that are open to anyone in IT.
Keeping the entire company informed when the network, or something else for which IT is responsible, does not perform as expected is another task Hicks takes seriously. Hicks said he quickly informs others in the company what went wrong, what was done to fix it, and what effect it had on the company. His team is careful to issue these reports in a way that less computer-literate members in other departments will understand. -We want to make sure people realise IT is not all that complex," he said. -The more you strip off that complexity, the better it is overall. We take the mystery out of it."
Hicks has good reason to know this. He's been CIO for three years, and his first year in the position was very sobering. There was not enough communication between the IT department and other departments, and there was a lot of misunderstanding about the IT department's role in the company. Meeting regularly and sending out regular reports has helped to demystify the IT department.
But Hicks cautioned against too much communication. If there are too many meetings, too many reports, too many details shared with other departments, the communication gets lost. -I think that you lose your voice when that happens."
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