As technology continues to advance, the alignment of IT and business units is paramount to enterprise success. When IT and business units work together in a coordinated and collaborative manner, they can achieve better business outcomes, optimize operations, and increase the efficiency of the organization as a whole.
Instituting an IT-Business alignment within your organization is a cultural shift that can be cumbersome and slow to secure, but Enable Consulting can help. Working with a large energy company, we found that demonstrating the value and benefits of the alignment was essential to fostering an environment open to organizational change.
Steps Toward Alignment
Working with Enable, our client found that implementing the following steps were key to IT and Business alignment:
Evaluate: Initiate an objective assessment of your current corporate culture to identify potential areas of improvement. How do departments interact or communicate? How are technology projects prioritized? Do business functions share ideas, troubleshoot problems, A/B test solutions, explain limitations, or brainstorm solutions? How are technology projects approved for implementation?
Communicate: Effective IT-Business Unit alignment requires a high level of trust, collaboration, communication and project delivery. Re-examine the current chain of command and facilitate C-suite leadership support. Establish a governance council to guide decision making, and ensure departments are closely integrated in regular communications and decision-making meetings.
Moderate: Appoint a Business Unit relationship manager to act as the point person, establishing a roadmap of communication between IT and business leaders. Creating this role to recommend projects and participate on the council adds validity to the commitment of making collaboration a reality. Having the right people in the right seats is the key to success.
Validate: Hardwire a technology approval process based on the solutions’ ability to generate profitable income. Ensure all projects are evaluated and prioritized based on its key criteria. Departments will then recommend unique innovation solutions which drive revenue, as teams are better able to understand pain points across the organization and identify opportunities that can be addressed through the better use of technology.
Shared Benefits
While the shift in culture to an IT-Business alignment takes time, experiencing improved collaboration and shared accountability between departments, technology that is easier and more efficient to use, and enhanced project delivery times and improved customer satisfaction will speed the overall transformation – and lead to a competitive advantage in the marketplace.
A successful IT-Business alignment not only delivers technology that drives business strategy and goals, but it enhances trust and credibility across the organization with clear objectives, more accurate timelines and the efficient delivery of the solution to the business unit. The collaboration offers more visibility into pain points in both business processes and the technology that supports them, and business units are better able to understand how prioritized technology projects support overall business objectives.
At Enable Consulting, our approach to our clients’ complex technology challenges is to first evaluate and determine your specific business and technical requirements. We then apply our unique approach — all while providing strategic insights, expertise, and streamlined, smart solutions that drive success.
Whether you are ready to bring aboard a full-fledged partner to walk with you on the road to success, or just need some advice on how to get a project off the ground, you can rest easy with Enable Consulting.
Contact us today.
