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Justifications For Creating an IT Department?
jjoelc writes "This may sound like an odd request, so first some background. I work at a broadcast television station, and I have found it to be very common for IT to be lumped in with the engineering department at many stations. I believe this is mainly because the engineers were the first people in the business to have and use computers in any real capacity, and as the industry moved to file-based workflows it has simply stayed that way. I believe there is a need for IT to be its own department with its own goals, budgets, etc. But I am having a bit of a rough time putting together the official proposal to justify this change, likely because it seems so obviously the way it should be and is done everywhere else. So I am asking for some pointers on the best ways to present this idea to a general manager. What are the business justifications for having a standalone IT department in a small business? How would you go about convincing upper management of those needs? There are approximately 100 employees at the station I am currently at, but we do own another 4 stations in two states (each of these other stations are in the 75-100 employee range). The long term goal would be to have a unified IT department across all 5 stations."
i also worked in the engineering dept of a tv station and i agree with parent. think about the equipment load. sure, there's a dc, a mail server, etc but there's also a ton of satellite, microwave, playout equipment etc that has every bit as much to do with engineering as IT. the important thing to have is a department where IT and engineering can work well together, and in a lot of cases it's totally counterproductive to have a separate department when a large part of your budget is for the acquisition and maintenance of equipment that serves a purpose in both environments.
(I am using standard staff prices for my area, Labor costs can very)
You have 10 engineers who are paid 90k a year. 1/2 of the time they are focusing on IT related issues which isn't their field. (450k spent on IT)
If you hire 4 people in IT that are paid 60k (240k spent on IT) who can focus on their jobs and get more work done as it is in their field.
So in this case the company is currently spending more per IT hour and the effectiveness per it Hour is less.
If you replace it with numbers in your area who knows... You may not be justified for an IT department or you may have a bigger need.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
He isn't saying to outsource IT, he is saying to break it off into its own business unit at the company.
Give IT a bit more control, and make it a separate entity that is accountable on its own (instead of taking the engineers down maybe?)
After reading some comments I have a few ideas. First you don't want an IT department, as the engineering section you want a sub group that focuses on IT. You are already technology management.
The biggest selling point for an IT group IMHO is technology management. In theory you can run without an IT group and the CEO could take on the CFO tasks but it works better when you have an IT group working on utilizing what you are purchasing in the best possible way much like a CFO handles finances. A group that is focused on planning, supporting and implementing an IT strategy rather than letting everyone spend top dollar on whatever they want. Are you publicly traded? If so to my memory there are requirements for IT by the SEC.
To extend the CEO/CFO analogy no one is allowed to justify their expenditures anyway they like, and no one group or individual should be able to use whatever technology they like at the station's expense. Even if someone buys it on their own dollar if it impacts the running of the station or the day to day they will want support. It's best to manage it.
What a good IT dept/group can give you is:
A) Fall back or options : If a server breaks or a hardware goes down they can have contingencies and replacements waiting to minimize downtime.
B) Planning: They can either reduce cost or make better use of what you are spending rather than having HP or Dell be your defacto IT Support.
C) Data management: Do you have backups? Do you have remote access? Do you allow work from home? Information is the new life blood of the contemporary business. Who is handling this precious resource?
D) Security - The Fear Card - do you really want internal memo's leaked because you never had a supportable security policy and someone to implement it?
If you really want to be a bastard recommend ITIL. That will tie up their resources for years but you'll have an IT group. ITIL is crack cocaine for management types.
You are already handling these functions it's just time to take it on and manage it.
You could always make the case for a promotion and be their interim CIO.
"Don't fear death... fear not living..." -me
Agreed, I think that's the only functional model for IT - make it a separate unit funded through charge-backs to other units, as opposed to company budget allocation. Every budgeted IT team I've worked for was overlooked and perpetually underfunded. Chargebacks help distribute the costs across userbase and increase visibility into actual IT costs. Otherwise - IT is an unnecessary, non-money-generating department that hemorrhages money and creates downtimes for maintenance of stuff that works anyways.
Bow before me, for I am root.
Otherwise - IT is an unnecessary, non-money-generating department that hemorrhages money and creates downtimes for maintenance of stuff that works anyways.
In a small shop, having a separate IT department can be downright detrimental. IT don't understand unique needs when they sit across a wall, and often become a bottleneck, stumbling block, and someone to avoided to get work done. Without seeing the actual needs, "one size fits all" approaches are taken, which either burns money or doesn't get the job done.
The big difference between system administrators and IT departments is that the former work with the users, anticipating needs and finding special solutions. IT departments are good for generic work, but in a small shop, I believe they have no place.