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Business Requirements

Run IT Like a Business, Not As a Business

January 25, 2010

A recent InfoWorld article by Bob Lewis questions the IT organization concept of “running IT as a business.”  Paraphrasing, he poses several problems with it: No one inside your company is your customer IT’s costs are always higher than external options Building software that “meets customer requirements” is short-sighted and reactive Software product focus limits enterprise wide thinking and shared investment It creates more organizational and relationship barriers and is seen as a vendor not ...

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Software as Soulcraft?

September 7, 2009

In his book Shop Class as Soulcraft, Matthew Crawford contrasts the fulfillment from working with your hands with the abstract world of the knowledge worker.  For an abbreviated version, check out his NY Times essay.  Being a closet Maker myself (more here), I was drawn into this topic as I often struggle with the creative limitations of the tools of our trade – laptop and phone. In the essay, Crawford says: High-school shop-class programs were ...

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IT’s Keystone Skills

April 16, 2009

Process issues are not alone in contributing to IT’s success or failure. People (and their skills) are also part of the “holy trinity” of People – Process – Technology, the three interrelated building blocks of any business capability, IT included. With the dramatic uptake in outsourcing over the last several years, CIOs have been faced with a new set of organization design challenges and skill needs. In fact, many IT shops have remade themselves to ...

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