Strategic sourcing, pathetic delivery

The poor fellow was looking harrowed after week long meetings sans his CIO with the big global IT services company with whom the company had entered into a long-term strategic services contract. Six months having passed since the signing of the contract, he was wondering whether the decision can be changed or penalties levied for not meeting commitments, the contract protected the vendor in the transition phase. The presales team which was a permanent fixture in the office earlier was now trying to avoid coming to the meeting very well knowing the situation not being favourable.

Over a year of courting, discussions, negotiations and going over a long legal contract, it was a sigh of relief for the vendor and the enterprise when they did sign off the deal. As all strategic sourcing deals go, there was an expectation of maintaining business as usual with improved efficiency and lower cost; then move on to transformation driven by tools and technology which was the investment promised by the vendor. Over the decade of relationship, it was expected that there would be efficiency of scale, savings on the table, and investments in innovation with global benchmarking.

The big team arrived soon enough to transition services and fit or change existing processes into their framework, which they managed with some difficulty. Within a few months unable to scale up to diverse needs across locations, changes in the management team were enforced and that brought welcome improvements though not commensurate to expectations. The first big review meeting was a shocker for everyone. Some milestones achieved, lot of work in progress way past due dates, a few endpoints seemed a long way off; the CIO who was well known for his patient handling of crisis lost his cool.

To begin with interpretations of clauses done by the execution team were in conflict to understanding while drafting them into the contract. Stretched timelines became super-stretched timelines; senior consultants attempted to provide solace with no Plan B in case success eluded the team. The High tension meeting resulted in change of pace and “compromise” in favour of the customer. With new timelines cast, the pressure was on everyone; avoidable pressure as agreed by everyone present.

Why does delivery rarely match presales promises or timelines ? Are sales teams preconditioned to sell unreasonable timelines or commitments to bag orders from unsuspecting and gullible customers ? No, I am not calling the CIO names, but admiring the ability of the sales teams to sometimes get away with untenable contracts. I am also bewildered at the ability of delivery teams to squarely make a hash of even normal service delivery expectations. What causes history to repeat itself in almost every engagement ?

In this case, the CIO summed the case up with one phrase “lack of consistent communication across the ecosystem”. The presales team did not spend adequate time taking the transition team through each and every clause and expectation. The delivery team found significant differences on the ground to their assumptions which required change. The project lead busy fighting fire every day forgot that consistent communication is essential to setting expectation, managing perception and finally success.

I believe that it does not always matter what you do; what matters is how you communicate what you have done or planning to do. No news is not good news when everyone is expecting some change. Otherwise strategic sourcing will become a big tactical pain where real life experience defines success.

Hyper or Mediocre IT ?

The number of IT professionals taking on to consulting after multiple changes are increasing. A lot of them were considered high potential when they worked within corporate IT functions. Some of them were also CIOs who chucked their cushy jobs to explore entrepreneurship. I started tracking down some of them to find what made them take such a step. The answers were surprising and not so surprising when analysed rigorously.

Now consider that in recent times the lament gaining popularity is the inability to find good talent; with global competition and willingness to relocate, good professionals are always in demand. And the good ones always find it easy to bag the next opportunity. That being the case, why is it that CIOs are struggling to hire and retain good talent ?

Every manager or leader has one key benchmark when interviewing people; it is they themselves. We hire people based on our own competencies. Most (fortunately not all) managers want to hire staff with equal to or lower skills than themselves especially for senior positions. Maybe it is their perception of threat to their own positions; maybe it is a low risk model when you know that the person will not be disruptive by challenging the managers’ decisions. This manager wants to know everything and be part of every meeting thereby becoming the bottleneck to progress. S/he feels insecure when new solutions are presented by others which impact his domain.

A great way to maintain status quo or keeping the lights on; in this case the CIO will perennially be challenged and discuss BITA (Business IT Alignment). The team at best delivers mediocrity and is relegated as a support function with limited participation in activities outside of their function. Organization culture too contributes to this state compounded by the CIO not reporting to the CEO. I have seen good CIOs get out of such companies as soon as they could.

Now, when you look at high performance teams, the leader acknowledges the need for diversity and challenging status quo. S/he has always hired different skillsets and encouraged open innovation. One of my observations was that these leaders define the direction and then get out of the way leaving the teams to soar to new heights. They do not micro-manage, they facilitate and encourage the team. Making mistakes is acceptable, repeating them is not. Attrition is normally low.

I believe that to create a winning team and not an also ran, the CIO needs to balance command and control with empowerment. Everyone does not need close supervision; neither can everyone be left to do their own thing. Delegation is good; however delegation does not imply abdication of responsibility. Incorrectly delegated work can lead to challenges and success denied; the CIO should own up to equal share of success and failure. After all you cannot be the father of success and know no failures.

An old adage, “People join organizations, people leave their bosses” holds true today more than ever. It is not an Oscar award speech but many leaders acknowledge their teams as the reason for their success when felicitations come the way of winning teams. The team too holds no grudges against the leader who is held high in trust and respect. The new age CIO is making these choices, are you one of them ?