Organizational Practices of an IT Department?

fbg111 asks: "I've recently joined a company, a regional airline, with an IT department that has grown organically (ie in response to immediate, rapid-growth-driven need, rather than according to any organizational plan). In the past five years the company has come to rely on IT, specifically the web team, for about 3/4's of its revenue. However, this unstructured growth has caused some problems, like this one: the lack of defined career paths and clear promotion 'triggers' makes techs feel 'stuck' in dead-end situations, and we tend to lose good people who find more transparent advancement opportunities elsewhere. I've recently joined the new CIO's task force for putting together a plan that addresses the immediate problem of defining career advancement paths and payscales. Does Slashdot have any ideas on this subject?" "I'm particularly interested in industry best practices that cover providing breadth and depth of experience and training, dual (or more) career tracks that allow techs to go the management route or the technical guru route, and aligning promotion triggers and career paths with IT department & corporate goals, and anything else relevant to the matter. Do any of you have anything in particular to recommend?"

Comments

Is there anywhere for them to actually advance to?

[CyricZ]

Indeed, it sounds like the problem may be more a case of there just not being anywhere for the staff to advance to. It would be pointless, and probably more problematic than beneficial, to artificially create managerial positions just to make the staff feel better.

Rather than waste money on useless managerial positions, give each staff member a raise. They'll get the financial benefits of having a higher position within the firm, while at the same time keeping a structure that is currently fairly functional, and without the overhead of excessive management.

Joel On Software

[camt]

Joel Spolsky has a few things to say about that. I think the following is prerequisite reading for those on your committee.

• How do You Compensate Programmers?
• Feedback on Programmer Compensation
• Fog Creek Compensation
• Getting Things Done When You're Only a Grunt

Take it with whatever size grain of salt you want, but it is interesting food for thought for those in your position.

Re:Sure fire solution

[CastrTroy]

I think that in many senses, unions have outgrown their usefullness. In times (or places) where there are no laws governing hours of work, minimum rates of pay, or safety of working conditions, unions can serve a good purpose. However, once they achieve those goals, they usually continue fighting for more and more. Eventually, they start asking for too much, or taking measures that affect the business in a very negative way, such as multi-week, or multi-month strikes. The NHL lost an entire hockey season due to a strike. And almost all the players are millionaires. Many times, employees don't even want to go on strike, but have to because the majority rules. Even if they are strongly against it, then end up getting pushed into it.