Huge market and technical forces are driving radical change in the organization of internal IT shops. The advent of cloud services and converged infrastructure from the major enterprise IT hardware providers (HP, IBM, EMC/Cisco Systems) both militate for the breakdown of the traditional server, storage, network, and application silos in IT. The real impact of cloud services is not that some IT infrastructure will be outsourced to the cloud – outsourcing is not new to IT, and this is just a new alternative in the outsourcing market. The huge impact is that in order to work and compete with those outsourced services, internal IT has to change its entire approach from that of a cost center to an internal service provider. To do that it needs to redefine the functionality it delivers in terms of business services and reorganize around those services. This is reinforced by the advent of converged infrastructure. Obviously these converged boxes require converged management that cuts across the traditional silos.

Accomplishing this major organizational change requires a complete redesign of many business/technical processes in IT and reorganization of the IT organization (ITO) itself into cross-functional teams. In his latest Alert, “CIOs can lead the way in changing the mindset around business process improvement”,  Wikibon Analyst and former CIO Scott Lowe provides a practical discussion of the main challenges of business process review. His main point is that IT and business staff should not take it personally.

The biggest problem that CIOs run into in business process change, he writes, is that many staff members view themselves as the “owners” of the processes they run. This is natural given the level of commitment and effort required. But, in fact individuals do not own any business processes; the business does. The individuals responsible for them should see themselves as stewards of those processes, not as owners. This implies that they are granted responsibility by the organization, and those assignments are by their nature temporary. Change is reality; every business process has a lifespan and eventually is transformed or ended. When one assignment ends, a new one begins.

Simultaneously the people charged with reviewing business practices should take a detached view. They are considering how the process can be improved, not the personality or effectiveness of the individual running the process. Individual assignments, promotions, and demotions are not the responsibility of the process review team.

Detaching the personal from the business practice equation often requires a major change in attitude, particularly on the part of hard-working staff members who take their responsibilities seriously and work long hours to carry them out. However, it is necessary to survive and prosper in today’s highly volatile business and technical environment in which the very IT organization is being turned upside down.

Like all Wikibon community research, this Professional Alert is available in its entirety without charge on the Wikibon.org Web site. Interested parties are invited to register on the Wikibon site, which allows them to read, correct, and comment on this and other Wikibon research as well as receive Wikibon’s Peer Incite announcements and newsletters.