Managing IT Infrastructure vs. Platforms

I was in an interesting discussion with one of my consulting clients recently.  I was with a group of IT managers responsible for their firm’s shared IT assets.  This is a large, global enterprise that has been on an aggressive journey over the last 5 years to transform business-IT maturity.  By any measure, they have been [...]

Improve or Innovate?

My last couple of posts have been on ITIL, where I presented my argument that approaches such as this (and CMMI) are necessary but not sufficient to take Business-IT Maturity to the next level.  They are necessary because they help build a solid foundation for IT operations and services.  They are insufficient because they typically [...]

Why ITIL is “Necessary but not sufficient”

My post yesterday claimed that ITIL is necessary, but not sufficient for reaching Level 3 Business-IT Maturity.  As anticipated, this has led to a fair amount of traffic, some showing up as commentary on the blog, others showing up as email messages from various vendors of Service Management and ITIL support services.  I therefore want [...]

ITIL: Necessary, but not sufficient!

 
I posted yesterday on the distinctions between IT Product Management and IT Service Management.  Rich Lemieux commented and pointed us to his helpful and informative DITY Newsletter and to his article on the 5 domains of ITIL V3 suggesting that IT organizations organize themselves around these domains as the “five new silos of IT.”
A couple of [...]

IT Service Management vs. IT Product Management

 
In an earlier post, I discussed the differences between and relationships among Project, Program and Portfolio management - this continues to be a popular post.  Today I’d like to explore the differences between IT Product Management and IT Service Management as they pertain to IT and to business-IT maturity.  This thread is inspired in part [...]

Six Sigma and Process Innovation

 
The Enterprise Leadership site posted a nice piece on ITIL and Six Sigma back in December, and more recently on Getting Six Sigma Right.  I want to reflect on this, and expand on my own post a while back which discussed IT Improvement versus Breakthrough.
Quality guru W. Edwards Deming said you can focus on product [...]

Business-IT Maturity and the Portfolio Lens

I was with a client recently as their CIO was leading one of their regular “town hall” meetings (live meeting for those in HQ, videoconference for those elsewhere).  He was talking (eloquently!) about Next Generation Enterprises, Web 2.0 technologies and the implications for their company and for their IT / shared services organization.
A question from the [...]

More on the Sticking Point

As I get ready for a week’s vacation in Aruba (lots of Scuba diving and time with my family!) I want to explore a couple of more aspects of the “sticking point” that I see IT shops bogging down in as they mature from Level 1 business-IT maturity towards Level 3.  The sticking point is [...]

The “Level 2″ Sticking Point

I believe that the major inflexion point comes at the middle of Level 2.  The things you have to do to get from Level 1 to Level 2 are quite different from the things you must do to get from Level 2 to Level 3.  The Business-IT Maturity model is a learning curve and the middle [...]