IN THIS ISSUE

Welcome from Jason

Getting Your Needs Heard

Welcome from Jason

I am pleased to announce the website launch of Jasonwisdom.com, and the premiere issue of this newsletter, Words from Wisdom.

In the past, Jasonwisdom.com was a blog about my world travels and personal achievements such as running my first marathon. I may do that again in the future, but at present I have no passion for it.

This new site is dedicated to my professional consulting practice, which I first launched in 2001.

During the past 9-10 years, I have helped companies in many industries, with many situations, achieve many different desired results. There are certain best practices and approaches that make life easier in just about any situation. These best practices and approaches will be the focus of this monthly newsletter.

Much of Words from Wisdom will focus on Technology-related matters: how to deal with a technology department, how to create a better technology team, how to make existing processes and systems better, etc.

However, so many of these concepts cross-apply to other modalities, and much of my experience involves more than Tech. For example, I have done business consulting, having nothing to do with IT, for several clients. My first job out of college was in Operations, not (directly) Technology.*

In any area of expertise, the successes I have seen, and the lessons I have learned, apply to a wide variety of situations, and so I will point to the core of a concept, not just the one-time resolution. For example, any success in business boils down to three things: relationships, innovation, and common sense.

Again, Words from Wisdom will be sent out monthly. As things develop, I may add sections such as Upcoming Events. The newsletter will always remain simple, to honor your time.

Thank you for your attention! I will do my best to make Words from Wisdom of benefit to you.

Jason

Getting Your Needs Heard

From "What do they want now?" to "Agreed, let's do it."

The Situation

Working in IT is challenging enough, with its (almost) daily unique and complex situations that would give Albert Einstein a headache.

Explaining IT issues to non-technical people is even more challenging. And yet, that is exactly what IT must do to secure funding, and sometimes just to keep their jobs.

It is worth looking at how anyone in IT can more effectively communicate their situations and needs to business decision-makers, and develop enough of a voice to get the resources and high-level approval they need to do their jobs well.

The Challenge

IT is more times than not a thankless responsibility. If things go well, there is generally no credit, but when things go wrong, heads will roll. If you cannot find a scapegoat, it will probably be your head that rolls first.

The fact is that most executives outside of IT do not understand what goes on within IT boundaries, and to be honest they don't want to know. They just want it to work. They don't want to take on your headaches. They don't want to hear your problems.

They also don't want to have to spend more money to fix things, which makes expenses look out of control. Any request for purchase above and beyond the annual budget will make them cringe. They won't want to go golfing with you when your emergency request sent their quarterly YOY numbers down -10%. With all new trends including enterprise solutions, cloud computing, outsourcing, and other recent developments in the world of technology, shouldn't things overall cost less? Can't we automate things rather than hire a new hand?

Your biggest challenge is communicating your needs in such a way that they are not only listened to, they acted upon. And, you want your reputation to increase in the end, so the next time you have a request, it is given priority attention.

Obstacles

There are three main obstacles in establishing "your voice" within a large organization:

1. Lack of trust. There is a decades-long turf battle, between IT and other forces in business, that is still not resolved.
2. Lack of knowledge. Most business decision-makers just do not understand technology or IT needs. Why spend money on redundant data storage when what exists works fine? Best IT practices do not make The Wall Street Journal best-selling books, or for that matter the Wall Street Journal front page. So a big part of establishing communication has to do with educating the influencers.
3. Lack of common culture. Most IT workers would rather download the latest Android upgrade than secure a round on the newest golf course. It is sometimes easier for, example, sales to convince upper management to agree on a critical issue, because their cultures have more in common with each other — the analogies and references used to explain an idea are already understood, etc. Despite "CIO" titles and other practices intended to bridge the two worlds together, this fundamental difference of culture between techies and non-techies is not going away anytime soon. All too often, the CIO still sits alone at the end of the executive lunch table.

Solutions: Building Trust

So what can you do? As it turns out, there are effective ways to get your needs met. I will share four that in my clients' experience, works very well:

1. Understand their needs —"they" of course being not the enemy, but who you are looking to influence. What is important to them? Understand their business objectives. Look for ways you can create value. Put the business's needs first — and how can IT help the company accomplish its goals. Make it your primary goal to improve the state of the company. Everything else is secondary.
2. Think like a business executive. How do business cultures phrase things, and what do they talk about with the most passion? Come from that angle. Read, learn, and immerse yourself in the business culture. How you say things is usually more important than what you say.
3. Three, understand that you are building relationships. Several relationships! You need to establish trust — this takes time. A relationship does not get built between IT and Finance. A relationship does get built between the database administrator and controller. A relationship does get built between the CTO and CFO. After many strong relationships are established, and strengthened through time & repeated acts of good will, somebody will remark, "IT and Finance have a great relationship!" But that is a result not a cause. You don't create a strong relationship with your family. You create strong relationships with each family member. It's a subtle and important distinction.
4. Start small. Find low-hanging fruit that will build rapport. Then move on to moderate initiatives and lastly introduce your big plans. Yes some situations call for drastic action up front, and the environment may just support it. But don't go into a shaky situation and say you need to take down the website for a month to make important changes. You get the idea.

When you create a strong track record, your efforts will be noticed even if it takes time. Great IT leadership is rare to find, and any good business leader knows that. I have heard this time and again, from CEOs both clients and those I've met socially, whom have not only successful businesses but good relations with their technical unit.

The following is a direct quote from a CEO I interviewed, and it matches the sentiment that exists in my clients who have the healthiest Business-IT relationships: "I don't even ask how much it costs. Anything they want, no problem. Tim and his group take care of things, and I don't even know what they do. But we wouldn't be here without them, I know that."

Now that's trust.

Avoid Self-Sabotage

Beware of what may sabotage your efforts.

The first place to look here is internal beliefs. I am not a therapist, but if you have a vendetta against a business decision-maker, it may make your ability to create value for that person more difficult! This belief can be caused by the individual person ("That idiot slashed our funding"), or by a past history trend ("Those idiots always slash our funding, every company I've been in!").

Second, you want to make sure your requests are legitimate, that you aren't asking for an extra $1 million to throw a huge party where people crash jets.

Third, don't make it about you. Make sure you have enough comprehensive support throughout the organization that you don't island yourself. This support is necessary above, laterally and below. Many a leader has furiously fought for resources that even their own team didn't think were necessary.

Summary

Whether a 1-person IT department, the leader of a 10,000-person IT department, or a senior technical resource in any size organization, a big part of success is developing relationships. You don't have to be naturally sociable, or even enjoy dealing with people. But you do need to be able to improve another person's condition, think in terms of improving the business's condition, and build trust in both key and supporting relationships, so when you say, "This needs to be done," the response you hear is, "Agreed, let's do it."