The Disconnect Between Management and the Value of IT

DavidHumus writes "According to a Wall St. Journal article top executives at most companies fail to recognize the value of IT, having a tendency to think of information technology as a basic utility, like plumbing or telephone service. The article lists five primary reasons for 'the wall' between IT and business: 'mind-set differences between management staff and IT staff, language differences, social influences, flaws in IT governance (defined as the specification and control of IT decision rights), and the difficulty of managing rapidly changing technology.' Does this fully explain the extreme lack of understanding of IT at high executive levels? The article is even-handed in apportioning blame but touches on a few good points. In particular, how '[m]ost top executives ... think of IT as an expensive headache that they'd rather not deal with.'"

Comments

If only we were treated as well as utilities

[Cerberus7]

Where I work, our Facilities department gets whatever it wants. They take care of the generators, the lights, the A/C, etc. All things this place needs to keep running. We IT people get shafted at every opportunity because we "cost money," yet we take care of the servers and applications that keep this place running. Turn our stuff off, and it's as detrimental to the business as turning off all the lights. I can only dream of what being treated like a utility would be like. It must be nice.

Re:If only we were treated as well as utilities

[Cerberus7]

You maybe are being sarcastic, but the average salary of our maintenance staff is the same as the average salary of our IT staff.

I guess I'm Lucky

[techpawn]

The CEO was once an IT grunt back in the old days. So, yes the tech has changed but he still sees the world through the IT "filter" as it where. Many decisions he has to defend to the board and rest of management because they make sense from the business side for IT (such as hot swap backup equipment). The other managers see it as expense, luckily the CEO sees it our way (yes, it's a cost now, but downtime mean more cost later)