Welcome to our blog, the digital brainyard to fine tune "Digital Master," innovate leadership, and reimagine the future of IT.

The magic “I” of CIO sparks many imaginations: Chief information officer, chief infrastructure officer , Chief Integration Officer, chief International officer, Chief Inspiration Officer, Chief Innovation Officer, Chief Influence Office etc. The future of CIO is entrepreneur driven, situation oriented, value-added,she or he will take many paradoxical roles: both as business strategist and technology visionary,talent master and effective communicator,savvy business enabler and relentless cost cutter, and transform the business into "Digital Master"!

The future of CIO is digital strategist, global thought leader, and talent master: leading IT to enlighten the customers; enable business success via influence.

Friday, October 28, 2016

"Digitizing Boardroom" Book Tuning: The Digital Savvy Board with High “Tech IQ”

11:22 PM  Pearl Zhu  No comments

A board with high “tech IQ” will have the advantage of pulling enough resources and pushing the business model of technology, to improve directorship agility and effectiveness.
Although Information Technology nowadays makes significant impacts on almost every aspect of the business, there is still a propensity to try to make the technology changes "go away" or to ignore them. The matter of fact is that the changes sweeping the world are hugely disruptive and there is nowhere to hide. While directors bring many competencies to the table, most do not have access to information about technology driven innovation and its potential related to the businesses they oversee. So how to build the board with high “tech IQ,” to produce a wave of response at board level, improve directorship effectiveness and innovate digital leadership?

Ask tough questions about IT strategy which is an integral component of the business strategy: One of the major responsibilities of the board is to oversee business strategies, which include sub-components such as IT strategy, innovation strategy, talent management strategy, etc. The main issue is the knowledge gap of BoDs and business executives to the trends of new technology and its impact on the business. The main role of the CIO is to demonstrate to the BoDs and other executives the added value provided by technology using the business language as businesses cases. To build the digital board with high “Tech IQ,” it is important for BoDs understanding how IT can make or break the business easily these days. Create an innovative boardroom with “ free atmosphere,” so directors are inquisitive to ask great, tough questions for understanding better as well as providing invaluable input for integrating IT strategy into corporate business strategy. It is also crucial to invite IT savvy BoDs to the table with business communication skills to convey concepts and ideas without lapsing into technology acronyms and encourage brainstorming and knowledge sharing.

The boards with high “tech IQ” can have interdisciplinary understanding about the “triple bottom line” of digital business dynamic: In the digital world with enormous transformations, more often, technology is the disruptive force or game changer, companies with a digital strategy driven by the CIOs at a board level can better weave digital into every fabric of business and bring different perspectives on governance and risk intelligence. As a Board member, one of the fundamental accountability is ensuring the organization acts in accordance with the relevant regulations. So the boardroom with high “Tech IQ,” can phrase your contribution, or potential contribution, in the "triple bottom line" of economic, social and technological environmental ramifications of the organization's activities. These points can help confirm that the "IT" contribution is not constrained or limited to technology only, it needs to optimize business processes and build business capabilities for improving overall organizational maturity.  

Leverage critical thinking to enhancing decision effectiveness: Digital BoDs today need to have both critical thinking skill as well as the multitude subject domain knowledge for improving decision effectiveness. IT plays a crucial role in the full strategy management cycle. For this, you need background knowledge on the subject matter (such as IT) under discussion. And often this background knowledge spills over into the knowledge of the intellectual history of the debate regarding the topic at issue, which can include debate over the meaning of important concepts, methodological standards, pragmatic and institutional context, and so on. Hence, the digital board with high “tech IQ” will know by listening to or looking at; understanding through critical thinking and reasoning, and responding with what needs to be said or done, and walk through the full learning cycle which includes (1) The ability to organize knowledge into understanding. (2) Gain the right knowledge with understanding to abstract wisdom. (3) Learning, sharing and coaching. Critical thinking with interdisciplinary understanding makes the board more effective in evaluating the plausibility of a premise or whether all the relevant considerations about strategic issues are on the table for improving decision maturity and governance effectiveness.

Foresightful companies should establish on-going avenues to information which will regularly feed BoDs understanding about trends and potential innovation for their businesses. A board with high “tech IQ” will have the advantage of pulling enough resources and pushing the business model of technology, trustworthiness, prepare, and launch change, innovation, and ensure what happens next, for improving directorship agility and leadership effectiveness.




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Three Disconnects Decelerate IT Transformation

11:18 PM  Pearl Zhu  No comments

The business speed can only be accelerated with a clear vision, strong focus, mutual trust between business and IT, hyperconnected information flow, decision maturity, and distinctive capabilities.

 Digital means the increasing speed of changes, hyperconnectivity, and always-on business dynamic. The digital hyperconnectivity is breaking down the functional borders, business borders, and even industrial or national borders. Nowadays IT impact is significant, IT is impacting every business unit and is becoming the driver of business change. However, many IT organizations still run in a reactive mode or act as a controller only, slow to change. What are the disconnects decelerate IT digital transformation, and how to build IT as the change organization of the business?

Communication disconnect: IT drives products, services, customers, line functions, staff functions, IT leaders should be aiming to shape the thing of information within the executive team to allow including an information strategy as the core element of the business strategy and tactical plan. However, the disconnect does exist, and it is caused by miscommunication, or “lost in translation” syndrome, because each functional executive or manager speaks in their own dialect without the common understanding. It is important to speak the common business language, and more critically, the strategic conversation between CIO and other C levels focuses on both top-line business growth and innovation, as well as bottom line business efficiency.  Business transformation needs to start at and be led by the top of the organization. What needs to change and why? Leaders must clearly articulate that message to their organization so managers and employees can actually execute it. If you want employees to implement changes, there must be something in it for them - more time to spend with customers, more training, increased productivity, bonuses, etc. Smart CIOs are talking about the strategic use of technology to meet these concerns and if they are really smart, they are working with other C-Levels in the power base to ensure that technology delivering is aligned and they can show an ROI.

Decision disconnect: The digital shift has come to a change in organizational forms away from the traditional rigid hierarchies managed through command and control to more fluid and responsive network forms. However,  many business managers still apply old silo management mindsets, take overly rigid management practices, and cause decision disconnects, as well as business bureaucracy. It is a good reminder for IT to review and optimize its decision-making scenario and improve processes for the strategy management business cycle. Bridging the gap between IT and the business are really issues of all about change: The steps, processes, tools, and products that organizations use to make decisions and affect the transformation from strategy to deployment. The challenge of IT is getting out of the overly rigid procedures and policies mindset, and shift to “doing more with innovation,” and “designed to change” mentality. It hobbles their ability to think and move as fast as their co "C" level colleagues. The process and policy are still very important to run today’s overly complex IT, however, IT has to be run in a more agile, speedy and flexible way. If information based business insight built is poor or not managed in a proper way, it may lead to wrong decisions and hence impact on the business survival. More critical than ever, business needs IT to provide better information to achieve improved profitability.

Knowledge disconnect: To bridge the disconnect, highly influential IT leaders have to understand the “ three side of the coin”: IT, business, as well as the interaction between IT and business. Modern IT leaders need to be specialized generalists with interdisciplinary knowledge about business and technology. Knowledge is no doubt important but more than that is complete awareness of what is happening in the business context. Once you do that, you use your ability to classify the elements and know their linkage. Then you use your specialized knowledge. Over and above that one has to be practical in relation to the context and not let your absolute knowledge overpower practicality. On the other side, most of the executive peers do not have a deep understanding of technology/process while effective CIOs have to know both the business and the technology side of things and take an advisory role in communication and coaching. You cannot know only one piece of the equation. IT provides a nervous system to the business. Business leaders should also have the desire to understand IT better in order to bridge the knowledge gap and capture business insight for managing a holistic and seamless digital transformation.

Successful business transformation must be partnered with solid communication plans, with comprehensive change /knowledge management discipline. The business speed can only be accelerated with a clear vision, strong focus, mutual trust between business and IT, hyperconnected information flow, decision maturity, and distinctive capabilities, with the business goals to improve customer retention, recurring revenues, new customer acquisition, talent development, and profitable business growth.







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Thursday, October 27, 2016

The Weekly Insight of the “Future of CIO” 10/28/ 2016

9:54 PM  Pearl Zhu  No comments

Blogging is not about writing, but about thinking, brainstorming, and innovating.

 The “Future of CIO” Blog has reached 1.5 million page views with 3200+ blog posting in 59+ different categories of leadership, management, strategy, digitalization, change/talent, etc. The content richness is not for its own sake, but to convey the vision and share the wisdom. Here is the weekly insight about digital leadership, IT Management, and Talent Management.

The Weekly Insight of the “Future of CIO”  10/28/2016
  • Three Pitfalls in IT Digital Transformation:The majority of organizations are designed to improve functional efficiency in the industrial era; there is nature friction between different functions of the organization, because often they compete for the limited resources, or speak different business dialect. Different IT organizations are also at the different stage of business maturity, IT can be used as a tool, help desk, enabler, catalyzer, or a digital game changer to meet the ultimate goal of an organization's short-term quick win and long-term strategic advantage. There is no one size fits all formula to run a highly effective IT organization. Regardless which flavor of IT you are running, here are three pitfalls in IT digital transformation you should avoid in order to improve organizational effectiveness, agility, and maturity.

  • Harnessing Digital Thinking to Build a “Mindful Board”: Modern corporate boards play a significant role in strategy oversight and business advising and monitoring. Business understanding is a prerequisite for being a board member in the first place, and to add to that you need different members to have important cognitive difference/experience/ competence in many other areas. Most directors are seasoned executives with a variety of experience. While mindset is critical to being an effective director is sometimes often overlooked. BoDs with cognitive differences can make better decisions and heterogeneous boards are more open-minded and set the right tone for the culture of innovation.

  • Digital Master Book Series Thoughts & Quotes, Author Profile, Introduction: “Digital Master” is the series of guidebooks (9+ books) to perceive the multi-faceted impact digital is making to the businesses and society, help forward-thinking organizations navigate through the journey in a systematic way, and avoid “rogue digital.” It perceives the emergent trends of digital leadership, advises on how to run a digital IT organization to unleash its full potential and improve agility, maturity, and provide the insight about Change Management. It also instructs digital workforce on how to shape game-changing digital mindsets and build the right set of digital capabilities to compete for the future.

  • Innovation Management Assessment and Measurement: For many businesses, creativity is the mystery and innovation is serendipity. In fact, innovation is how to transform novel ideas and achieve its business value. Due to the hyper-complexity of modern businesses, innovation is also about reducing the unnecessary business complexity to tackle the complexities of business dynamic. It can be managed in a structural way. If you can only manage what you measure, how to measure innovation effectively?

  • Is Critical Thinking Domain Specific? Critical thinking is one of the most important skills to learn for career and life. There is evidence that organizations and managers/leaders who utilize critical thinking with an evidence-based approach to decision making do better than those that don't. The good thing for those that do is that they are in the minority, giving them a competitive advantage. Still, there are many puzzles about critical thinking, is critical thinking domain specific, or subject independent? Does one always need background knowledge about a given context to refer to? Is critical thinking in management different from thinking critically in psychology? Does domain-general critical thinking mean anything more specific than asking "Who"? "What"? "When"? "Where"? and "Why" in new contexts?  
Blogging is not about writing, but about thinking and innovating the new ideas; it’s not just about WHAT to say, but about WHY to say, and HOW to say it. It reflects the color and shade of your thought patterns, and it indicates the peaks and curves of your thinking waves. Unlike pure entertainment, quality and professional content takes time for digesting, contemplation and engaging, and therefore, it takes the time to attract the "hungry minds" and the "deep souls." It’s the journey to amplify diverse voices and deepen digital footprints, and it's the way to harness your innovative spirit.


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Assessing IT Performance vis Multidimensional Lenses

9:50 PM  Pearl Zhu  No comments

Keep in mind, measurement is not just numbers, but stories.

 IT metrics need to evolve to something that matters to the business audience, at the same time that "business sentiment" needs to get put into something more tangible, such as optimize processes, or improve productivity. The various activities needed to manage performance— STRATEGIC and OPERATIONAL plans, innovation METRICS, day-to-day decisions. Selecting the right key performance indicator is one of the most important steps in measurement because this process includes to answering why you are choosing that, how you will use them and whether you have enough resources to manage data. Always attempt to identify areas in which measurable improvements can be realized, providing demonstrable value is essential, in some instances, these areas have been low-hanging fruit. Your measures should cover all areas that contribute to value creation including service quality, employee engagement, customer satisfaction, innovation benefit, and financial outcomes.

Effectiveness: In order to demonstrate IT value, organizations need to first know wherein lies the IT value: If you understand that upfront by doing the right strategic questioning, you can later go back and ask if you achieved the value that had been set out to attain. The best way to demonstrate the value of IT is to know who you are showing the value to. Obviously, you are demonstrating the value of IT to business. Looking at it from the point of view of "What's in it for me?"  The business would like to know what's in it for them. So the IT needs to first understand what the business is, what their pain points are, identify areas for improvement and then those that can be improved with IT.

Efficiency: The cost breakdown provides insight into where the most money is being spent, which in turn identifies opportunities for bottom line improvements. Chargeback can be done on a more equitable, actual usage basis, rather than assuming everyone is using the same amount. The detailed data becomes a base from which statistical analysis can be performed to do far more accurate financial budgeting projections, based on natural growth rates at a fine-grained level, and capacity planning is more accurately predicted too. Dysfunction and inefficiencies do not develop overnight, they creep in slowly. Hence, collecting and acting on business feedback is the most important project each year for every IT department. The goal of cost breakdown is to provide a clear, measurable view of the business’s top IT priorities, and continue optimizing cost and improving business efficiency.

Quality: Quality is defined by a number of factors, and to effectively lead an organization into good practices to focus on quality attributes takes work and a level of credibility within the organization. IT products/service quality begins with the quality of the requirements. It is impossible to deliver an acceptable application to a business without a clear understanding of what is to be delivered. A better user interface can make high-quality software even more qualified. And what you measure gets cared about and only focus on defects is too limiting, perhaps the good approach is to measure the 'health' of software projects, trending the well-defined metrics to see how you're managing rework, defects, automation, documentation and customer satisfaction, to name a few. So the measure is not about counting defects. Knowing what the quality of the product to be delivered will be, and take action if that quality will be insufficient early at lower costs.

Optimization: IT plays a crucial role in optimizing business and improving organizational agility. The metrics of the process should reflect the business outcome executives care about: Like most other aspects of business, business processes must integrate with and support the final outcome to produce a product or service and generate revenue. To fully optimize these processes, a business must establish KPIs and use business intelligence tools like balanced scorecards and forecasting, predictive analysis, 'what if' analysis and sensitivity analysis to determine how changes to a process might negatively or positively affect the business, with the lenses of business management.

Outcome: Outcome-based measurement practices are important to focus on the performance of the entire organization. One of the biggest pitfalls for performance measurement is measuring the “part” with ignorance of the “whole.” In other words, what are the organization's rewards and recognition structure perpetuating? The problem stems from the way outcomes are being measured. When the collective outcome is the focus, the silo walls collapse. When individual and departmental outcomes are measured, the walls go up. Differentiated performance metrics and rewards systems tend to bring this shift in perspective about, but they too are a necessary aspect of how an organization operates until they become counter-productive and have to be changed.

Keep in mind, measurement is not just numbers, but stories. The problem with measurement is that more often, the metric is very subjective. That is, from a scientific methods perspective, there is no way to run a real experiment to try one process against another. Historically, performance measurement systems for most businesses have been financing driven. However, in many business situations, financial indicators only cover part of the story. Your measures should cover all areas that contribute to value creation including service quality, employee engagement, business competency, customer satisfaction, and financial outcomes If you think through these concerns properly, the rest will just fall in their rightful places.




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Wednesday, October 26, 2016

The Monthly “Digital Compass Oversight: Strategy Execution Effectiveness Oct. 2016

11:16 PM  Pearl Zhu  No comments

Digital is the age of creativity and innovation, and creativity is all about connecting the dots.


A digital strategy is cross-functional effort, multidisciplinary, multidimensional planning; it brings up new functions, roles, collaboration, demand for intuition and emergence, complementarities, philosophy, neutron sciences, and trans-disciplinary businesses. And digital strategy execution is not linear steps, but an iterative continuum.


Strategy Execution Effectiveness
How to Improve the Success Rate of Strategy Execution: If strategy making is more important, perhaps strategy execution is more difficult. If the strategy is deciding what to do, then execution is all about making it happen via engaged, competent and committed managers and employees. A recent executive survey indicated that execution excellence was the number one challenge facing corporate leaders globally, but more than two third of organizations struggle to implement their strategy smoothly. Hence, organizations need to address this aggressively to really start cranking up their execution abilities. And what are important factors in executing strategy more successfully??
Five Key Factors in Strategy Execution? Strategy execution is difficult. A recent executive survey indicated that execution excellence was the number one challenge facing corporate leaders globally. Statistically, about two-thirds to three-quarters of large organizations struggle to implement their strategies. Why does strategy execution unravel, and what are the key factors to lead the effectiveness of strategy execution.
Business Strategy Execution Challenges  Many companies spend a significant portion of time for formulating rock solid strategies, focuses on business strategy development and puts a lot of efforts to develop a great strategy with strategic initiatives. On the other hand, strategy execution does not get the same attention which leads to misalignment with business objectives and not achieving the expected results. But more specifically, what are the business strategy execution challenges.
Why Achieving Execution Excellence is so Hard? Compare to ‘Strategy Hype’-the variety of theories or best practices, books or white papers brainstorming about strategy, execution seems to be the much ‘cooler’ space, do you know why Strategy Execution is a discipline which has not been extensively developed, despite being so crucial?.
Strategy Execution: How Difficult Could it Be : Nowadays, with increasing speed of change and fierce competition, business strategy execution is no longer linear steps, but a dynamic continuum. If strategy formulation is more important for leading business toward the right direction, then strategy execution is perhaps more difficult due to the business complexity, uncertainty, time/resource consuming, etc. The strategic themes are essentially the pillars of the organization. They include business growth, operational excellence, customer experience excellence, product development, innovation, and sustainability. Strategic perspectives include financial aspect, customers and stakeholders' aspect, internal processes, organizational capability and engaged leadership. Strategy execution: How difficult could it be?
The “Future of CIO” Blog has reached 1.5 million page views with about #3200th blog posting in 59+ different categories of leadership, management, strategy, digitalization, change/talent, etc. The content richness is not for its own sake, but to convey the vision and share the wisdom. Blogging is not about writing, but about thinking and innovating the new ideas; it’s not just about WHAT to say, but about WHY to say, and HOW to say it. It reflects the color and shade of your thought patterns, and it indicates the peaks and curves of your thinking waves. Unlike pure entertainment, quality and professional content takes time for digesting, contemplation and engaging, and therefore, it takes time to attract the "hungry minds" and the "deep souls." It’s the journey to amplify diverse voices and deepen digital footprints, and it's the way to harness your innovative spirit.


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"Leadership Master" Book Tuning: Three Differentiators in Digital Leadership

11:14 PM  Pearl Zhu  No comments

Digital leaders understand that ultimate mastery of leadership does not exist. The path to mastery is something that unfolds day by day.

Leadership is about future and change, innovation and influence. The intention of becoming a leader is to inspire and innovate, to improve and advance, to facilitate and encourage, as change is often uncomfortable, yet necessary part of reaching the future and maintaining success. Digital makes everything so transparent, and dynamic, it raises the leadership bar as well. The digital leadership effectiveness is not based on how loud you can speak, or how skillful you can control, but how profound you can influence, and how insightful you can perceive, to touch both hearts and connect minds. Here are three differentiators in digital leadership.

Eager: Leaders inspire people to think about and reach for what can be. Becoming a leader is a process of becoming your true authentic self in all that you are today and "to be" in the future. Being a leader can on occasion feel isolating, however, by following your instinct you will more often than not turn the situation around and produce a positive outcome. So rather than looking for examples of leaders out there, look within yourself and ask: Why do you want to lead? Which gaps can you fill? Why should others follow you? Being a leader takes one to have the eager to drive changes and a desire to do better than others in certain domains while creating themselves a platform of influence in wherever they are. A great leader is a confident person who will welcome debates and do their utmost to understand and embrace another viewpoint. A leader with eager has the courage to take risks and has the vision to see further. Digital leaders are great visionaries. They possess an innate potential to transform vision into reality and become the true source of inspiration and motivation for success. Effective leaders have eager to change, facilitate progress and encourage innovation.

Exploring: There is no one size fits all leadership formula. Leadership is the adventure to explore unknown, test the uncharted water and take the different path. It’s the journey to help unleash the unlimited human potential. Either being a digital leader or digital professional today, it is not sufficient to do transactional tasks only, you have to continue learning, growing, exploring, innovating and achieve more. There is a clear vision, but there are alternative ways to get there via exploring the art of possible. A highly innovative organization is surrounded by high-potential people who take on new challenges at work, rapidly learn and grow into next-level roles, keep exploring for expanding the horizon with growth minds, and they either demonstrate the positive attitude, abundant curiosity, or constructive criticism to build a healthy or even creative workplace.

Expertise: Nowadays commodity knowledge is only a click away, and the mix of signals and noises make the business world over complex and hyper-risky. Digital leaders today needs to be highly intelligent and highly influential. The qualitative leaders must be very open to knowledge, desire for insight, and hunt for wisdom. It's important to keep the ingredients fresh by investing in professional development regularly. At the hyper-connected digital era, to break down stereotypical biases or any types of career ceilings, continuous delivery, expert power, and dynamic digital footprint become the very significant part of being “who you are,” And the digital platforms can condense your strength to amplify your leadership influence effortlessly.

People are complex, businesses are complex, the world is complex, and leadership is complex. The future of leaders has to deal with opposing views, paradox, diverse cultures, constraints, and competition. Digital leaders have to continually practicing, experiencing, learning, sharing, adapting, exploring, innovating and maturing, and they understand that ultimate mastery of leadership does not exist. The path to mastery is something that unfolds day by day.



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The Race for IT Relevance

11:10 PM  Pearl Zhu  No comments

The race for IT relevance is still on, be alert to identify blind spots, be flexible to adjust the planning, be open to listening to the different points of views and be determined when you have to make tough choices.

 Due to the changing nature of technology, the saying about the demise of the internal IT has been around for years. In reality, the majority of IT organizations get stuck in the lower level of maturity, slow to change. CIOs are in the hot seat to run the race for IT relevance, with the pressure to transform IT from a cost center and a commodity service provider to a value created business growth engine. But, how?

IT is neither an order taker nor a controller only, IT needs to become a business solutionary: IT needs to be influential enough to impact and provide customers with the right solution, in a right manner, and at a right cost. It doesn’t mean IT should say YES to all customers’ requests or say NO to maintain a status quo. It’s ultimately important for IT to discuss "what's possible" not just "what do you want." This requires a certain depth of understanding of the business. However, in many organizations, IT is a cost center, not a business unit. Often, business departments prefer a solution that meets their needs; even further, they don't want solutions that level the playing field and equalize them with their peers, they want something that elevates them. But IT often strives to provide a technology platform that serves all business units for the sake of reduced cost. It's difficult to reconcile these two needs without a great deal of trust and communication. As IT leaders, you have to ask yourself then whether you are offering something in your dialogue that really helps business partners see how they can differentiate themselves or their business practices. IT can provide valuable insights and tools, and should have the vision to do so. Especially the "what is possible" part, don't just deliver what the business asks for, but be able to provide the "best solution" for the business' requirement, and help the entire business build the long-term advantage.

IT has to work towards building better credibility and influence and gain respect from business peers: The CIO must be a partner in every aspect of the business. The supporting IT budgets must reflect business priorities and urgency. From both top-down to bottom up, in order to enable the constructive communication, there are leverage points, such as communication of the best tactical actions in support of the business strategy; the sacrifice of a few (products, services, tools, teams) for the advance of the whole; the balance of quick win and long-term benefit, in the face of sometimes wildly variable priorities. Every IT initiative is to help in solving business problems. IT should turn on the ‘debugging mindset’ to do a root cause analysis. Discover what is at the heart of the problem. In many cases, the customer does not really understand the real cause. Once they understand the core problem, then they are able to let go of what they thought would be the best and only answer. IT needs to help the customer focus on the root cause and get away from a preconceived solution if you believe that the proposed solution is not what is best for the company or the customer. Offer added value and feature insights based on system understanding, that the business might not even have thought of. And IT can earn a reputation and build better credibility, and gain respect from business peers via unique insight and solid problem-solving capability.

Avoid the pitfalls at the journey of digital transformation: It is no surprise that there are both visible barriers and hidden pitfalls on the way:
(1) IT is an afterthought: if the business does not invite the IT leaders to provide input or co-create strategy, IT is developing a different solution than the other department had in mind. Business and IT both should take responsibility if IT is delivering the wrong solution. They often need to shift from answer-driven approach (what is the answer, HOW to fix it -often the symptom), to problem-centric scenario (What is the real problem (root cause), why does it happen.) IT and business should always be on the same page: First, ask managers and leaders about the vision and business problems they are trying to solve, there needs to be a comprehensive audit of the business, to ferret out the problem areas. Once this is done, you can then begin to determine what modifications need to take place, whether it is adding new products or services, building the culture of innovation, or shaping the change capability.

(2) Communication is not clear between the participants: Typically, one starts with communication and a process that allows people to discover that both sides of the business want to achieve the best results. The cause of most of the conflict is a lack of trust, in both directions. Trust is earned by business and IT working as a whole, head to head and hand in hand.

 (3) Non-IT personnel doesn't understand technology thoroughly: Business needs to have empathy and complexity mindset to understand IT better. The issue is not whether IT matters as it clearly does. The issue is whether most business leaders understand how IT matters. Many organizations are not foresightful to empower their IT leaders or lack of in-depth understanding of IT responsibility, technology complexity, the innovative potential and the paradox of IT management.

The race for IT relevance is still on, be alert to identify blind spots, be flexible to adjust the planning, be open to listening to the different points of views and be determined when you have to make tough choices and take calculated risks. With the increasing speed of change in the Digital Era, IT matters more, not as a commodity service provider, but as a competitive advantage.



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