5 Whys

April 2, 2018May 27, 20183 Comments

“5 Whys” technique for Root Cause Analysis (RCA)

Do you have a recurring problem that keeps on coming back despite repeated actions to address it? This might be an indication that you are treating the symptoms of the problem and not the actual problem itself – you need to determine the root cause of the problem – you must conduct a root cause analysis.

Root cause analysis (RCA) is a systematic process for identifying “root causes” of problems and the appropriate response that effectively deals with it. RCA is based on the basic idea that effective management requires more than merely “putting out fires” through quick fixes for problems that develop, but finding a way to prevent them from occurring again or in the first place. A root cause analysis is a process used to identify the primary source of a problem.

An effective method to get to the bottom of a problem is to use the “5 Whys” that was initially developed as part of TPS (Toyota Production System) that gave birth to what we know today as Lean Six Sigma – discussed in more detail in the article on “Lean Six Sigma – Organisational Development and Change”.

5 Whys is an iterative interrogative (problem solving) technique used to explore the cause-and-effect relationships underlying a particular problem.

The primary goal of the technique is to determine the root cause (source) of a defect or problem by repeating the question “Why?”, five times. Each answer forms the basis of the next question.

Why five time? This derives from an anecdotal observation on the number of iterations needed to resolve the problem.

How to conduct the 5 Why technique:

Write down the specific problem. Writing the issue helps you formalize the problem and describe it completely. It also helps a team focus on the same problem.
Ask Why the problem happens and write the answer down below the problem.
If the answer you just provided doesn’t identify the root cause of the problem that you wrote down in Step 1, ask Why again and write that answer down.
Loop back to step 3 until the team is in agreement that the problem’s root cause is identified. Again, this may take fewer or more times than five Whys.

For example:

In business, only one cause for a problem is not the usual case. Using the 5 Whys in conjunction with the Fishbone Diagram (Ishikawa), that helps the exploration process to cover all potential inputs and hence potential causes of problems or defects.

The 5 Whys method can be used to uncover multiple root causes by repeating the process asking a different sequence of questions each time.

Building a Compelling Value Proposition

March 22, 2018May 17, 20182 Comments

What does a professional, consultant, executive or entrepreneur have in common, seeing that business success is a common driver and key performance indicator – the need for a compelling value proposition.

In the blog post “Your Value Proposition” we discussed four simple elements of a value proposition being:

Need
Approach
Benefits
Competition

We concluded that in presenting your value proposition, it is your responsibility to adapt to situations as needed and to ensure that you can validate the actual need, have reassurance that the approach will work, know that the benefits as real and that you are a competitive player in the market. How well you can demonstrate agility in aligning the right value proposition to the customer, will determine your success in business.

In this conclusion lies the clue in how you could go about when building a compelling value proposition?

Validate the actual need
A workable approach
Real benefits
Being a competitive market player

Let’s recap on a Definition of a Value Statement: It is the positioning statement that you communicate to articulate the benefits that you provide for your target audience (customer) and how you do that uniquely well.

Where to start

The need is the most important part of the value statement, the need is the source of innovation and inspiration, the starting point that defines the problem you are trying to solve. Once you understand the real need – you are halfway there, as you’ll have an offset point, a target for your solution – an audience with a the need and interest to buy you product or service.

To identify and understand a real need, you need to do some research to gather some insight in the challenges your potential customers are facing. Asking targeted “what, why, how, who” questions to guide you in finding the real need with questions like:

what is the actual problem,
why is it a problem,
what are the outcome requirements,
what does good or outcome success really look like,
what is currently offered in the market,
what has been tried,
did it work,
what works and what does not work,
why does not work or work,
what is the root cause of the problem

Validating the need

Once you have established the real need you should ask a very important question: “Is the problem worth solving?”

Forbes mentions for 4Us – four questions you should ask when defining your value proposition:

Is the problem Unworkable? (if not fixing it, is their measureable consequences i.e. someone will get fired)
Is fixing the problem Unavoidable? (i.e. driven by new legislation, or a governance mandate)
Is the problem Urgent? (an urgent problem has the attention of the decision makers, the C-suite)
Is the problem Underserved? (absence of valid solutions currently in the market)

If you can answer ‘Yes’ to all four questions you are on the right track in defining a compelling value proposition.

Measure if your solution and associated approach is compelling

Understanding the real need enables you to define the solution – the product or services that will address the need and solve the defined problem.

Forbes mentions having a product or service that is simply faster, cheaper and better is not enough to make it compelling – you should evaluate it in 3D.

Discontinuous innovation – looking at the problem differently and offering transformative benefits
Defensible technology – does it introduce intellectual property that can be protected and create a barrier to entry, hence create a competitive advantage.
Disruptive business model – delivers value in monetary terms to incubate business growth.

A solution with benefits in 3D is worth pursuing.

Ease of Integration

You must ensure that the solution can easily integrate into the life of the customer. Defining the solution in an easy understandable language goes a long way, but if you end up with a complicated, time-consuming and costly project trying to integrate your solution with the customer’s business you are introducing an unwanted barrier of entry. For example – as technologist we can get so caught up in the fascination of cutting edge technology, the technical jargon and functionality, that we loose sight of the actual business driver – understanding and addressing the customers need – the use of the technology must make things easier and better, not more difficult and worse.

When engineering your solution focus on integration with the minimum business operation disruption while still delivering increased business value. This is referred to as the Gain/Pain ratio: the gain your solution brings to the customer versus the effort and cost to the customer to integrate and adopt the solution.

Understand your own SWOT

Remember that you are the core to your value proposition – so keep in mind your own Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats – focus on your Strengths to realise your Opportunities.

Build the Value Proposition

Incorporating the findings – understanding, defining and validating the need, which is addressed by a compelling, easy to integrate solution and playing towards your own strengths – you are ready to build your value proposition.

The value proposition statement could read: For (target audience), who are dissatisfied with (the current alternatives), our product or service is a (your new brilliant service and product definition), that provides (key problem solving capability) and (the benefits to the audience) unlike (the product or service alternatives).

Last tip: Ensure that you capture what you really are about – be true to yourself and authentic in your presentation, people see straight through anything else.

Related Blog posts: Your Value Proposition; Value!?

Your Value Proposition

March 21, 2018May 17, 20182 Comments

Your Value Proposition

Being in business means that you have something of value for sale, that is desired by someone else who is buying. Being in business isn’t just about running your own business, it also means that you are working within a commercial workplace where goods or services of value are being sold and delivered to a customer who is buying. These customers can be external to the business for example selling products and services to another business or to the public, or these customers can be internal if it is delivering value to another department or to your colleagues within the organisation or your workplace. Apart from providing your services to the customers, other people also benefit from your deliverables. These people are stakeholders and they can include your business partner, the board of directors, your manager or team leader, your team, the shareholders or even other businesses for example your vendors and suppliers who would all benefit from your success.

Even if you are not running your own business and are working for an organisation to earn your living, you are in business – the business of selling your own skills, experience and knowledge, which is of value to the company you are working for, in exchange for a salary or wages. The organisation hiring you is in essence your customer.

To be successful in business it is clear that you need to have something of value. Something of value means you have a defined product or services (skills, knowledge and experience) and a market with customers who value what you have on offer and are willing to exchange it for money. The customer must be aware of your product or service and more so must understand its value, before they will engage and buy. Creating this customer awareness is done through marketing, which is dependent on a clear definition of the product and it’s value to the target audience (the customers). This value definition is your value proposition.

Remember – you define your value proposition, but it’s true value is in the eyes of the beholder – your customer. Ultimately it is the benefits that your product and service bring to the customer that defines it’s value.

The value proposition is the backbone of the business – everything what your business is about evolves around delivering and continuously improving the value proposition. To gain new customers and to keep current customers and stakeholders involved and happy, you need to be crystal clear of your well defined value proposition.

Having a look at the value proposition examples of some of most successful companies like Uber, Apple, Slack, Digit, reveals that a good value proposition includes four elements:

Need
Approach
Benefits
Competition

Need – understand what your customer really wants, what do they need, what problems are they looking to solve. This is probably the most important part of the value proposition as without understanding the need, you’ll find it hard to define the solution (the product or services) that will satisfy the customers need in such a desirable way, that they are willing to spend money to get it.

Approach – having a solution to the customer’s need, your approach explains how you go about applying your solution (product or service) to satisfy the customer need – how the solution will solve their problem. The solution must be a direct fix for the problem. The approach you choose in delivering your solution must be the most effective means to apply your solution to the specific problem or customer need. Your approach will consist if specific components i.e. methodologies, solution architecture, prototyping, processes, templates, standards, etc, selected specifically to optimise the success in applying the solution (product or service) to the customer’s problem (need).

Benefits – focussed on the customer, what benefits would they get from using your services or products. Back to defining what value will you bring to the life of the customers when they are using your product or receiving your service. To understand this, you have to understand how the customer experiences your offering, answering fundamental questions like: “How much does this cost?”; and “Is the benefits worth the price?”. Benefits are tangible and measurable – usually in monetary terms. Benefits are not just ideas. Define the benefit in the terms the customer will relate to. Benefits should attract customers to what you offer.

Competition – what is your unique differentiator that sets you apart from your competition in the market. Again this should be approached from the customer’s perspective. How does your customer perceive your offering in relation to the other providers competing for their money. In what way does your offering differentiate from the competition i.e. quality, durability, reliability, guarantee and price.

Example: Let’s apply this to the Apple iPhone Value Proposition

Need: everyone uses smart phones – but it can be complicated to navigate. Your phone has become an accessory, and expression of your personality, a needed tool conducting our day to day lives.

Approach: Apple offers a unique user experience and design; it is not just a phone but also a lifestyle.

Benefits: Hassle free, superior operation – “It just works”. There is nothing quite like iPhone as every iPhone is built on the belief that a phone should be more than a collection of features. Exceptional design and state of the art engineering that oozes with built-in quality. Simple, elegant, beautiful and magical to use. (Just listen to their launch keynotes)

Competition: Genuinely unique iPhone features are highlighted on all marketing media i.e. security. Most of the iPhone features are not unique but experiencing the already known features on a iPhone is magical – that is what sets iPhone apart.

Using your Value Proposition

Breaking down your value proposition using the four elements mentioned above, puts you on the front foot to easily position all customer conversations towards insight and perspective of your proposition, to the value you deliver for your customers and your stakeholders. Following through on all four elements during conversations takes the customer on a journey, a journey that makes it easier for them to relate to you and a clear holistically understanding your offering in context to the bigger picture. It also gives them the reassurance that you have the needed insight in what matters to them. Even if a prospect customer wants to focus on only one area for example the benefits aspects, you will be prepared for the engagement.

Keeping your value proposition front-mind during all customer and/or stakeholder engagements. This keeps you focussed on what’s important for business success – satisfied and happy customers.

To Conclude:

In real live you cannot predict the future, especially as you know that every situation is unique in it’s own right. In presenting your value proposition, it is your responsibility to have the agility to adapt to situations as needed, to ensure that you can validate the actual need, have reassurance that the approach will work, know that the benefits as real and that you are a competitive player in the market.

How well you can demonstrate agility in aligning the right value proposition to the customer, will determine your success in business.

Effective Leadership Communication

March 19, 2018August 23, 20184 Comments

We have all heard the saying: “Communication is the key to success!”

Leadership coaches and successful leaders all agree that when it comes to communication – A leader can never communicate enough! The communication gurus say that even when there is nothing to communicate, the leader should communicate that there is nothing to communicate…

I have been asked the questions: “ How do you communicate effectively to ensure that everyone in the team are on the same page?” and “How do you ensure that you address and manage people’s expectations?”

To answer this, I’ll start by over simplifying in saying that communication is simply the exchange of information between a sender and a receiver, through a specific medium. In electronic engineering information is transferred from a transmitter to a receiver as an electric signal in a controlled way, ensuring the receiver receives the same information that left the sender – effective communication. That is no different with humans. As a leader communicating to your team, you are distributing information amongst other humans, amongst people – and herein the challenge. People, unlike electronic senders and receivers (which are manufactured to be identical) are different, not one is alike. Hence will the interpretation of the information exchanged through communication differ as well. The challenge to effective communication is to align the interpretation of the information into a common understanding between the communicator (speaker/sender) and the audience (listener/receiver).

The ways in which you can ensure that you are addressing and managing people’s expectations better, are in understanding the people better. A better understanding of people, paradoxically comes through effective communication – to ask questions and listen more than actually doing the talking (active listening).

Communication is more than just your words – it is also:

how you say it – tone of voice, passion, authenticity
why you say it – the message’s intention
when you say it – time of day or after a specific milestone or prior an event
what you say AND what you don’t to say – sometimes what you don’t say gives a clearer picture of what you want to say…
your body language – facial expression, gestures and posture communicate a lot of the unsaid word

Communication Empowers

Consuming information leads to knowledge and knowledge is power. Thus communication leads to empowerment.

The ‘One Minute Manager’ refers to empowerment as: “Empowerment is something someone gives you – leadership is what you do to make it work.”

Communication empowers people with knowledge – to be informed and to feel part of something bigger. How the communication is being delivered (leadership) will determine it’s outcome.

What is Leadership – My definition: “Leadership is the art of leading a group of people or an organisation to execute a common task by providing a vision that they follow willingly through the inspiration received from the leader’s passion, knowledge, methodologies, approach, and ability to influence the interests of all members and stakeholders.”

How can you accomplish this if you cannot effectively communicate the vision in a way that people feel inspired to willingly take action towards achieving it? Effective communication is key…

You can have the best team mission with SMART objectives but if you cannot communicate it to your team, you will struggle to make progress. How well you can communicate your plan (unambiguously) will determine if your team will really mobilise and unite behind you and go the extra mile to make it happen. The ultimate success measure of effective communication is: “your plan becomes the team’s plan” – everybody on the same page!

People are not mind readers – they need clear instructions and clear information to make decisions and conduct their work, especially if the work is delivered within a team where coherence and a mutual output objective are of the essence. Ultimately, it is in your best interest to accept responsibility for getting what you need to succeed in the workplace. As leaders it is in your best interest and your responsibility to ensure that what’s needed to succeed, is effectively communicated to your work teams.

Consider This

You can improve the effectiveness of your communication through paying attention to the following aspects, each discussed in more detail below:

Know & Understand your audience
Motivational & Confidence building
Have a Plan
Make sure the communication subject is clear – stick to it
Be Direct
Be Authentic
Enough detail
Bi-directional communication is more impactful
Common Cause
Think before you speak
Emotional Intelligence
Get Assurance – get feedback, assure the message sent is the message received
Build Trust
Situational leadership – choose the communication style to suite the situation

Know & Understand the Audience

Being an effective communicator allows you to address the interests and concerns of your target audience whether it being your team, your customer or client, the stakeholders or an audience listening to your presentation. Knowing and understanding your audience help to ensure that your grab their attention when you communicate and that they feel your are addressing the message to them. To understand your audience better and to structure communication appropriately, you can ask questions like:

Who is the audience?
Why is that the audience? (sometimes this is obvious but by asking this question, really think about who should be getting this message and why? Why not?)
What are we trying to achieve?
What are your plans?
What are the expectations of me as the leader/presenter and of the people the team members/audience?
What will be the desired impact of your message? (Also think about the undesired outcomes and how you can proactively prevent that?)
What will be the impact of your plans to the business, the team and to the people personally? – Do not leave people with more questions than before.
Why can we productively work together? (Understanding this is key to structuring the message to utilise people’s strengths to bring acceptance and empowerment – a sense of belonging.)
How will we know we are doing a great job? (How will this be measured within the audience – everyone needs to understand the metrics.)
Are you using a language (terminology and jargon) that the audience can relate to? There is a difference in technology speak and business speak. Align the vocabulary to your target audience – i.e. when addressing business leaders do not use too much technical acronyms and terms, rather focus on outcomes and financial numbers.
Do you understand the audience’s needs?
How can you, as the leader, meet their needs?
How frequently do I need to communicate? (Constant)
What method, approach and medium (usually a combination of) will deliver the message best? (Face to face, one to one, round table, town hall, informal stand-up, email, presentation (power-point), graphs, bullet points, etc…)
To what level of detail do I need to go into, to describe clearly what I mean? (Post communication, everybody must have the same picture in their minds.)

Motivational and Confidence building

Communication should always be motivational and aim to build confidence within the audience – especially when bad news is being delivered. Ensure that you mention the performance of the team, the success resulting from the efforts. The positive future that awaits and the confidence that you have in the teams abilities to realise that future. Keep repremending content to the point and as short as possible and always follow it up with a positive prospect building trust and confidence.

Have a plan

If you are communicating change or progress, you must come prepared with a plan. Have a relevant understanding of the past, the present and the future. The plan is usually “how” the team will progress from where they have been, using what they have today to build the desired future. Progress against a plan must always be measurable to unsure continuous improvement.

Be clear on what is being communicated

Ensure that everyone is clear of the subject being communicated. Focus on the key message of the communication and present it in a direct and authentic way. Stick to the subject. Ensure that the message comes with the right context and content for the receiver to place it in the right perspective.

Be Direct

I believe in a direct approach – say it as it is. Have the guts to say what is needed. Speak about the hard things that no one talks about but everyone wants to hear. Address the elephant in the room, preferably before you are asked about it.

Be Authentic

My believe is to always be truthful and authentic in delivering your message, be yourself – people see straight through anything else…

Enough detail

Ensure that you communicate just enough detail to ensure everyone has the same picture in his or her minds after you have communicated. Too much detail and people will loose interest. Too little detail and people will makeup their own inconsistent picture. Remember the story of the group of people that were told that there is a cat in the room next door… the storyteller waited for the picture to start forming and then asked each one of the audience to describe it. As you can imagine various different pictures were presented – a black cat, a ginger cat or is it a tiger?

Always be prepared to go into way more detail than what you expect – your ability to use detailed facts to support your message, especially when asked about it, will determine the credibility of your message.

Bi-directional

Successful communication always has to be two-way. You have to be a good listener as well. Be prepared to have collaboratively discussions – listen intently before you respond. Do not formulate your next response in your head instead of listening to what is being said or asked. Your team will have a wealth of knowledge and insight that might help to enhance the right picture. This means being able to have a meaningful discussion with people, understanding, assisting and facilitating the resolution of their problems, ensuring people know what to do and why they are doing it without you having to tell them how to do it. (See Success – people come first).

Effective communication is the continuous search and commitment to seek for a better understanding. Approach conversations from a learning perspective, an opportunity to get to know more rather than a one directional “tell” perspective.

Common Cause

For the message to hit home it must address a common cause – something that address the benefit of the team but also on an individual level. Either create a common cause in your communication or remind people of the common cause – why it is important to be part of something bigger rather than just you as an individual.

Think before your speak

Stop and think things through before you act in haste, sending out an ill-considered communication. Think what needs to happen, what are the benefits, risks, what are the desired outcome… Then compile a well-considered and effective communication. Remember this – Once the message is out, you can never really take it back.

Emotional Intelligence

In the blog post on Emotional Intelligence, EQ is defined under five interconnected components:

Self-awareness
Self-regulation
Motivation
Empathy
Social skills

Use your own EI to assess the situation before your decide on the appropriate way to react and how what needs communicating. In short I say:” Trust your gut feeling.”

Get Assurance

Continuously test the effectiveness of your communication by asking people to relay to you what their interpretation is. Ask this questions at all levels – do not assume that the organisation structure will distribute the intended message to all that needs to hear it – go check for yourself. Get feedback. Get the assurance that people understand what you are communicating and that if people are remembering and acting on what has been communicated. If not – communicate again, again!

Build Trust

You want your communications to be trusted. How do you build trust? By doing what you say you are going to do and build relationships at all levels with integrity and honesty. When you are trusted, your communication is on-boarded more sincerely and you are taken seriously – building rapport.

Situational Communication (and Leadership)

There are many different leadership styles (read more here) as outlined in the list below:

Autocratic Leadership
Bureaucratic Leadership
Charismatic Leadership
Democratic/Participative Leadership
Laissez-Faire Leadership
People-Oriented/Relations-Oriented Leadership
Servant Leadership
Task-Oriented Leadership
Transactional Leadership
Transformational Leadership

The “One Minute Manager” summarised leadership into four basic styles:

Directing – The leader provides specific instructions and closely supervises the accomplishment. (Communicate mainly by telling people what needs to be done)
Coaching – The leader continuous to direct and closely supervise but also explains decisions, solicits suggestions and support progress made. (Communicate a directive or corrective after team collaboration)
Supporting – The leader facilitates and supports people’s efforts toward accomplishment and shares responsibility for decision making with them. (Communicate similarly to the Coaching style)
Delegating – The leader turns over responsibility for decision making and problem solving to subordinates. (Communicate collaboratively and inclusively)

Usually the leaders default communication style is directly related to the leadership style. An effective leader can adapt his management style and hence his communication style according to the situation, including consideration for the audience and the nature of the message to be communicated.

To Conclude

Remember and think about all the aspects mentioned for consideration, before you communicate. Be flexible and agile in your approach to communication – as a leader you must be able to fluently switch between different leadership and communication styles and mediums to ensure optimum results, in the moment. There is no one glove that fit them all, leadership is not a science – hence the art of leadership. You’ll know when you get it right – do more of those!

Every situation is different and hence can a single communication approach not be seen as superior to the other – there are no equals. I’ll conclude with this saying from the ‘One Minute Manager’: “There is nothing so unequal as the equal treatment of un-equals.”

Also Read:

Management Communication Plan

Bimodal Organisations

March 13, 2018May 27, 20183 Comments

The continuous push towards business improvement combined with the digital revolution, that has changed the way the customer is engaging with business through the use of technology, have introduced the need for an agility in the delivery of IT services. This speed and agility in IT delivery, for the business to keep abreast of a fast evolving and innovative technology landscape and to gain an competitive advantage are not just required in the development and/or introduction of new technology into the business, but in the way “keep the lights on” IT operations are reliably delivered through stable platforms and processes enabling business growth as well.

IT Bimodal

We can agree that once systems and solutions are adopted and integrated into business operations, the business requirement for IT delivery changes with IT stability, reliability, availability and quality as key enablers to business performance optimisation. There are thus two very distinct and equally important ways or modes of delivering IT services that should seamlessly combine into the overall IT Service Operations contributing to business growth.

Gartner minted in 2016 the concept of IT Bimodal – the practise to manage two separate coherent modes of IT delivery.

Mode 1: Focussed on *Stability*	Mode 2: Focussed on *Agility*
Traditional	Exploratory
Sequential	Non-linear
Emphasis on: Safety & Accuracy	Emphasis on: Agility and Speed

Each of the delivery modes has their own set of benefits and flaws depending on the business context – ultimately the best of both worlds must be adapted as the new way in which technology delivers into business value. Businesses require agility in change without compromising the stability of operations. Change to this new way and associated new Target Operating Model (TOM) is required.

Bimodal Organisation

This transformation is not just applicable to IT but the entire organisation. IT and “the business” are the two parts of the modern digital business. “The Business” needs to adapt and change their work style (operating model) towards digital as well. This transformation by both IT and “the business”, branded by Gartner as Bimodal, is the transformation towards a new business operating model (a new way of working) embracing a common goal of strategic alignment. Full integration of IT and business are the core of a successful digital organisation competing in the digital era.

The introduction of Agile development methodologies and DevOps, led to a transformation in how technology is being delivered into business operations. IT Service Management (ITSM) and the ITIL framework have matured the operational delivery of IT services, as a business (#ITaaBusiness) or within a business while Lean Six Sigma enables business process optimisation to ultimate quality delivery excellence. But these new “agile” ways of working, today mainly applied within IT, is not enough for the full bimodal transformation. Other aspects involving the overall organisation such as business governance and strategy, management structures and organisational architecture, people (Human Capital Management – HCM), skills, competencies, culture, change management, leadership and performance management as well as the formal management of business and technology innovation and integration, form additional service areas that have to be established or transformed.

How do organisations go about defining this new Bimodal TOM? – In come Bimodal Enablement Consulting Services in short BECS.

BECS – Bimodal Enablement Consulting Services

Gartner’s definition: “An emerging market that leverages a composite set of business and technology consulting services and IP assets to achieve faster more reliable and secure, as well as business aligned, solutions in support of strategic business initiatives.”

To establish a Bimodal enabled TOM, organisations need to architect/design the organisation to be customer centric, focussing on the value adding service delivered to the client/customer – a Service Oriented Organisation (SOO) designed using a Service Oriented Architecture (SOA). This set of customer services (external facing) should relay back to a comprehensive and integrated set of supporting and enabling business services (internal facing) that can quickly and effectively enable the business to innovate and rapidly adapt and deliver to changing customer needs and the use of technology within the digital era. This journey of change, that businesses needs to undergo, is exactly what digital transformation is about – not just focused on the technology, processes, quality and customer service, but on the business holistically, starting with the people working within the business and how they add value through the development and use of the right skills and tools, learning an applying it rapidly throughout the business value chain.

A customer centric delivery approach requires the development and adoption of new ways in which work are conducted – new management structures, building and enhancing A-teams (high performing individuals and teams, getting the job done), optimised processes and the right tool sets.

BECS must address the top bimodal drivers or goals, as identified by Gartner research:

Deliver greater IT value to the business
Shorten the time to deliver solutions
Enable digital business strategies
Accelerate IT innovation
Transform IT talent/culture/operations
Increase the interaction between business and IT
Embrace leading-edge technologies, tools and/or practices
Reduce IT costs (always a favourite)
Change the organisation’s culture

Take Action

Are you ready, aligned and actively engaging in the digital world?

Can you accelerate change and enable revenue growth with rock-solid service and business operations?

Are you actively practicing bimodal, continuously adapting to the changing digitally empowered customer demand?

The ultimate test to determine if you are bimodal: Every business process and every enterprise system needs to work without a blip, even as more innovation and disruptors are introduced to make the business more efficient and responsive.

It is time to be a bimodal organisation!

___________Renier Botha specialises in helping organisation to optimise their ability to better integrate technology and change into their main revenue channels – make contact today.

Performance Improvement: Effective & Efficient

February 24, 2018March 11, 20181 Comment

Performance is simply the action taken or process followed in doing a task or function.

Performance improvement – the continuous driver to be better, to grow, to achieve great things!

Directly related to business performance is the ability to change the business processes for greater effectiveness and efficiency increasing productivity while terms like specialisation, standardisation comes to mind followed by measurement, data analysis, statistical analysis, root cause analysis and finally process control and quality control and the overriding metric – customer satisfaction.

Remember the saying by Peter Drucker: “What gets measured, gets improved”…

Measuring performance involves the ability to measure the effectiveness of an initiative or action as well as the efficiency in which it is achieved. Similarly performance improvement involves the enhancement of effectiveness while optimising the efficiency.

Effective: Success in delivering a desired or intended result.

Efficient: Achieving maximum productivity through optimal use of resources with minimum waste or expense.

Depending on your business and your situation you must select or develop key performance indicators (KPIs) to calculate the effectiveness and efficiency of your activities – for business this is usually calculated in monetary terms. Once you understand your current performance you can set KPI targets and work on improvement initiatives.

I found this flow on Pinterest that gives a great overview of the processes involved in enhancing effectiveness and efficiency to increase business performance summarised in 5 habits of the mind:

Know where time goes
Focus on outward contribution
Build on Strengths
Concentrate on selected area that produce outstanding results
Make effective decisions

Linking appropriate KPIs to this flow can measure progress and deliver improving results.

Performance Management

Performance (Effectiveness and Efficiency) can be influenced by various different factors – illustrated in the diagram below.

In using this diagram, a critical path (Shown in red above) can be drawn to improve performance in a specific area i.e. staff performance.

First performance is defined,
then measured to get a specific result (and understanding the impact it has overall).
Understanding the results to determine which key skills, abilities and competeencies or lack there-of are contributing to the specific performance.
Talent is needed to deliver performance – talent skills, abilities and competencies can be trained or recruited.
Engagement is key – involve, motivate and empower your talent to respond and interact with the business – engagement brings a sense of happiness, which is a great motivator for creativity and performance.
And the cycle repeats in never ending quality improvement loop.

This methodology can be adapted and used for performance improvement in any area of the business value chain.

Remember performance improvement is always reflected in the customer satisfaction. Satisfied customers engage with the business recurrently – hence revenue growth!

Let’s Talk – renierbotha Ltd specialises in the performance improvement of business and IT operations. Are you looking to achieve your goals faster? Create better business value? Build strategies to improve growth? We can help – make contact!

Lean Six Sigma – Organisational Development and Change

February 23, 2018May 27, 20182 Comments

Directly related to business performance is the ability to change the business processes for greater efficiency and productivity while terms like specialisation, standardisation comes to mind followed by measurement, data analysis, statistical analysis, root cause analysis and finally process control and quality control.

Remember the saying by Peter Drucker: “What gets measured, gets improved”…

Improvement initiatives bring change.

A brief history of organisational change

Change management has evolved from Organisational Development OD – focused on helping people to manage change and to stay alive post the world war in the 1940S. That lead to Change Management thinking in the 70s and 80s and in parallel project management as another management process, was developed. These processes saw change as linear and hence can it be managed tightly. It starts with a burning platform and a vision to resolve the problem followed by the change journey of solving problems and overcoming obstacles. In the late 80s Appreciative Inquiry emerged changing the focus of change to “best that can be” and driving “what should be” rather than “what is wrong” and driving the “fix it”. The 1990s and 2000s brought more collaborative models and tools to manage change and solve problems and performance coaching got commonly accepted and used.

The drive to improve business performance gave life to various methodologies and frameworks for example:

Toyota Production System (TPS), the origins of Lean Thinking, included the prominent problem solving tools through the “five why’s”, continuous improvement, “Just in Time” production and the elimination of waste.
Business Process Re-engineering (BPR) which encouraged the outsourcing and off-shoring of work deemed to be non essential or too costly to perform.
Balance Scorecard which aims to provide a well-balanced view of the health of an organization through key performance metrics representing the financial, operational, human and environmental aspects of the business performance.
Project Management methodologies and frameworks: PMI, Prince2, Agile SCRUM, LEAN, KANBAN
Quality Control frameworks, methodologies and standards: ISO9001, Six Sigma
Information Technology Service Management (ITSM) frameworks: ITIL

Six Sigma

Six Sigma is a quality improvement approach that seeks to improve the quality of process outputs by identifying and removing the causes of defects and minimizing variability in the delivery processes. This is done through a set of quality tools management tools and statistics.

Another definition – the ability of processes to deliver a very high percentage of the output within a defined specification derived from customer specifications. A key KPI is the defect % and the process to reduce that to be within specification of tolerance – where a defect is defined as any process output that does deliver to customer requirements.

Running a process at Six Sigma quality is defined as defect levels below 3.4 defects per 1M cycles of the process!

Six Sigma principles:

Continuous efforts to achieve stable and predictable process outputs are vital for business success.
Operational business processes can be measured, analysed, improved and controlled.
Achieving sustained quality improvement requires commitment from the entire organization, particularly from the top management.

Each Six Sigma project has a five step sequence (DMAIC):

Problem solving approach:

D – Defining

M – Measuring

A – Analysing

I – Improving

C – Controlling

Defining the problem, and setting a project goal.
Measuring current process performance and collecting relevant data potential root causes.
Analysing the data to investigate and verify cause-and-effect relationships. Determine what the relationships are attempt to ensure that all factors have been considered. The analysis should reveal a root cause of the defect under investigation.
Improving and optimizing the current process by introducing changes that reduce or solve the impact of the identified root cause.
Controlling/Monitoring the newly changed process to ensure no deviation from the expected results occur and that the new process is stable.

LEAN Thinking

You are lean when all you resources are used to deliver value to the end customer – nothing else. This value has to flow through the value chain without any interruptions. All activities not directly supporting in the creation and delivery of this value is considered as waste and therefore reviewed for potential elimination.

Another definition: Lean is focused on getting the rights things to the right place at the right time in the right quantity while achieving a perfect workflow that is dictated by the customers demand to deliver the goods just in time.

LEAN – Five Principles:

Specify value from the customer’s point of view. Start by recognizing that only a small percentage of overall time, effort and resources in a organization actually adds value to the customer.
Identify and map the value chain. This is the te entire set of activities across all part of the organization involved in delivering a product or service to the customer. Where possible eliminate the steps that do not create value
Create flow – your product and service should flow to the customer without any interruptions, detours or waiting – delivering customer value.
Respond to customer demand (also referred to as pull). Understand the demand and optimize the process to deliver to this demand – ensuring you deliver only what the customer wants and when they want it – just in time production.
Pursue perfection – all the steps link together as waste is identified – in layers as one waste rectification can expose another – and eliminated by changing / optimizing the process to ensure all assets add value to the customer.

LEAN Tools:

Five S (5S): A process of keeping the workplace ready for use exercising a discipline of 5 workplace practices beginning with S.
- Sort
- Set in order
- Shine
- Standardise
- Sustain

5S optimally prepare the workplace to perform optimum tasks in the future including the idea of visual management.

Seven Wastes: Waste is any activity that consumes resources but do not not creates value for the customer. The purpose of seven wastes is to identify and eliminate waste in processes hence delivery greater customer value. 7 Catagories of Waste: Defects, Overproduction, Unnecessary transportation, Waiting, Inventory, Unnecessary Motion, Over-processing
Takt Time: The average rate at which a deliverable item is required to meet the customer demand. It is used to create the balance in the process between supply and demand and to help calculate the resources required to efficiently process a process just in time.
SMED
Kaizen
Value-Stream Mapping

Underlining the success of Lean is a culture of respect of people – at all levels. As Lean is a whole-system management methodology that requires a overall culture change to be successful – starting at the top.

Lean Six Sigma

General Electric (GE) adopted Six Sigma in the 1980’s – combining that with the principals adopted by the Toyota Production System (TPS), the origins of Lean Thinking provide the methodology of LEAN SIX SIGMA.

It is a complementary combination between the best of both worlds – Lean Thinking, which is focused on process flow and waste elimination and Six Sigma, which is focused on process variation and defects – driving business operational excellence.

Other relevant posts: Executive Overview of Agile #1 and #2

Let’s Talk – Are you looking to achieve your goals faster? Create better business value? Build strategies to improve growth? We can help – make contact!

The Business Consulting Industry Is Booming, and It’s About to Be Disrupted

February 22, 2018February 24, 2018Leave a comment

Guest Blog: Soren Kaplan via Inc

Image CREDIT: Getty Images

Whether the focus is strategy, operations, tax, finance, HR, or IT, business consultants are a staple of corporate life. Today, over 700,000 consulting firms provide services across virtually all aspects of business globally. From defining strategic direction to simply serving as an additional pair of hands for outsourced work, consultants have become inextricably linked to the success of most large organizations.

Here’s the issue: Festering underneath myriad consulting offerings, methodologies, tools, and firms lie some vulnerabilities that will eventually unravel the consulting business model — the same kind of dramatic disruption that other industries like photography, publishing, health care, and many others have experienced.

An industry becomes susceptible to disruption when it becomes entrenched in its longstanding solutions and financial structure. Disruptive innovations provide simpler or more elegant solutions to existing problems, enabled by new technology and often at a lower cost. Think portable calculators versus computers, Amazon versus bookstores, Netflix versus Blockbuster, or digital cameras versus film.

Management consulting is not immune to the dynamics of disruption. According to IBISWorld, for example, “the Management Consulting industry is in the mature stage of its life cycle. The industry is characterized by growth in line with the overall economy, an increasing number of industry players, and technological change based on improving efficiency rather than developing entirely new services.”

In any industry, when the basis of competition becomes efficiency versus innovation and new solutions, disruption lies on the horizon.

Five fatal flaws of the consulting industry

Here are five inherent qualities of the management consulting industry that make it susceptible to technology-driven disruption:

Labor intensive. Most consulting services rely on humans as the fundamental source of research, analysis, recommendations, process definition, process management, and facilitation.
Billable time-based business model. The fee structure underlying most consulting services is tied to billable hours or days, which encourages lengthy, overstaffed engagements to maximize revenue.
High margins. The cost of “goods” in consulting refers not to products but to people. The billable rates of junior consultants in most large firms far exceed what they are paid by the firms in which they work. Value pricing models also dramatically increase the profitability of many projects and firms.
Time-bound value. With the increasing pace of change, the moment a research report, competitive analysis, or strategic plan is delivered to a client, its currency and relevance rapidly diminishes as new trends, issues, and unforeseen disrupters arise.
Knowledge commoditization. The models, templates, and tools of the consulting trade have historically been kept “secret” by consultants and locked away as intellectual capital. The “democratization” of just about everything, including management information and knowledge, will continue so that anyone can access and apply “best practices” on their own.

Paradoxically, even with these fundamental flaws — all of which are contrary to the best interests of clients — the industry continues to grow. Last year, for example, the management consulting industry saw a 4.1 percent growth rate.

So why be concerned?

Intersecting trends drive disruption.

Rapidly emerging trends have created a new breed of competitor — even if the industry doesn’t yet view these upstarts as competition. Firms like Domo, Looker, Qlik, Radius, and CBInsights tap into the converging trends shaping the future of business, and the world. By creating solutions at the intersection of big data, data analytics, the cloud, cognitive computing, visualization, and cross platform anytime access, these firms provide a glimpse into the type of automated, scalable data gathering, insights, and decision-making made possible by next generation technology.

The first to feel the detrimental effects of disruption will likely be the large research and advisory firms such as Gartner, Forrester, and IDC. With models that rely on armies of analysts, PDF reports that become outdated the moment they’re published, and significant annual subscription fees, these firms embody the most significant vulnerabilities of the larger consulting industry. And this is just the tip of the iceberg. Just about any consultant or firm that conducts primary or secondary research will see the value of these offerings — and clients’ willingness to pay for them — diminish significantly.

While many consultants and consulting firms have established practices advising clients on strategies to leverage disruptive trends and technologies, few apply this to themselves. Investing in the technological innovations and next generation business models is a fundamentally paradoxical concept in an industry driven by billable hours, billable days, and closely held best practices in the form of “knowledge capital.”

Eat your own dog food.

In 2000, I wrote an article in the first issue of Consulting to Management (C2M) about the importance of creating “knowledge assets” as a strategy to scale professional services offerings. The article described the importance of capturing and codifying intellectual capital in the form of process methodologies, tools, and templates. Many firms do that quite successfully today.

Repeatable processes, models and tools are indeed important for efficiency, scalability, and profitability. Yet the physical delivery of these staples of the trade remain chained to an entrenched business model. A new approach is needed if the management consulting industry — let alone individual firms and consultants — will have the chance to unlock the next phase of its evolution and value, before some dramatic external threat forces the issue.

Many clients hire consultants to tap into strategic thinking — seeing the big picture, identifying scenarios, choosing options, and creating game plans. Yet a conspicuous void exists when it comes to addressing strategic questions by and for the industry itself.

Here is a set of questions that can help jump start new business models for management consulting:

Transformative problems. What emerging client challenges and needs exist that, if addressed, would transform their business by 10x, or even 100x?
Radical intelligence. How do we leverage big data, artificial intelligence, collaboration tools, and other technologies to create a step change in the level of knowledge and insight we deliver?
Scalable relevance. How do we scale our tools and methods while ensuring applicability to the widest possible audience globally?
Knowledge democratization. How do we make our models, tools, and resources ubiquitously available while building a sustainable business model?
Collaborative ecosystems. What networks can we build or join that exponentially elevate the value we create and deliver?

In the field of business strategy, the “tyranny of success” is a well-known dynamic: what led to today’s success will ultimately lead to tomorrow’s failure. Individual consultants and consulting firms that recognize the limitations of their existing business model while exploring opportunities that tap into emerging technologies and new delivery models will have the best chance of thriving in the fast-approaching disruptive future.

The opinions expressed here by Inc.com columnists are their own, not those of Inc.com.

Executive Summary of 4 commonly used Agile Methodologies

February 21, 2018June 13, 20225 Comments

AGILE – What business executives need to know #2: Overview of 4 most commonly used Agile Methodologies

In the first article in this series we focussed on an overview of what Agile software development is and referred to the Agile SCRUM methodology to describe the agile principles.

Let’s recap – Wikipedia describes Agile Software Development as an approach to software development under which requirements and solutions evolve through the collaborative effort of self-organizing cross functional teams and their customers / end users. It advocates adaptive planning, evolutionary development, early delivery, and continuous improvement, and it encourages rapid and flexible response to change. For an overview see the first blog post…

Several agile delivery methodologies are in use for example: Adaptive Software Development (ASD); Agile Nodelling; Agile Unified Process (AUP); Disciplined Agile Delivery; Dynamic Systems Development Method (DSDM); Extreme Programming (XP); Feature-Driven Development (FDD); Lean Software Development (LEAN); Kanban; Rapid Application Development (RAD); Scrum; Scrumban.

This article covers a brief overview of the four most frequently used Agile Methodologies:

Scrum
Extreme Programming (XP)
Lean
Kanban

SCRUM

Using Scrum framework the project work is broken down into user stories (basic building blocks of agile projects – these are functional requirements explained in an in business context) which are collated in the backlog (work to be done). Stories, from the backlog, are grouped into sprints (development iteration) based on story functionality dependencies, priorities and resource capacity. The resource capacity is determined by the speed (velocity) at which the team can complete stories, which are categorised into levels of complexity and effort required to complete. Iterations are completed with fully functional deliverables for each story until all the needed stories are completed for functional solutions.

Scrum is based on three pillars:

Transparency – providing full visibility on the project progress and a clear understanding of project objectives to the project team but more importantly to the stakeholders responsible for the outcome of the project.
Inspection – Frequent and repetitive checks on project progress and milestones as work progresses towards the project goal. The focus of these inspections is to identify problems and differences from the project objectives as well as to identify if the objectives have changed.
Adaptation – Responding to the outcome of the inspections to adapt the project to realign in addressing problems and change in objectives.

Through the SCRUM methodology, four opportunities for Inspection and Adaptation are provided:

Sprint Retrospective
Daily Scrum meeting
Sprint review meeting
Sprint planning meeting

A Scrum team is made of a Product Owner, a Scrum Master and the Development Team.

Scrum activity can be summarised within the following events:

Sprint – a fixed time development iteration
Sprint Planning meetings
Daily Scrum meetings (Stand-Up meetings)
Sprint Review meetings
Sprint Retrospectives

XP – EXTREME PROGRAMMING

Extreme Programming (XP) provides a set of technically rigorous, team-oriented practices such as Test Driven Development, Continuous Integration, and Pairing that empower teams to deliver high quality software, iteratively.

LEAN

Lean grew from out of the Toyota manufacturing Production System (TPS). Some key elements of this methodology are:

Optimise the whole
Eliminate waste
Build quality in
Learn constantly
Deliver fast
Engage everybody
Keep improving

Lean five principles:

Specify value from the customer’s point of view. Start by recognizing that only a small percentage of overall time, effort and resources in a organization actually adds value to the customer.
Identify and map the value chain. This is the te entire set of activities across all part of the organization involved in delivering a product or service to the customer. Where possible eliminate the steps that do not create value
Create flow – your product and service should flow to the customer without any interruptions, detours or waiting – delivering customer value.
Respond to customer demand (also referred to as pull). Understand the demand and optimize the process to deliver to this demand – ensuring you deliver only what the customer wants and when they want it – just in time production.
Pursue perfection – all the steps link together waste is identified – in layers as one waste rectification can expose another – and eliminated by changing / optimizing the process to ensure all assets add value to the customer.

KANBAN

Kanban is focussed the visual presentation and management of work on a kanban board to better balance the understanding of the volume of work with the available resources and the delivery workflow.

Six general work practices are exercised in kanban:

Visualisation
Limiting work in Progress (WIP)
Flow management
Making policies explicit
Using feedback loops to ensure customer and quality alignment
Collaborative & experimental evolution of process and solutions

By limiting WIP you are minimising waste through the elimination of multi tasking and context switching.

There is no prescription of the number of steps to follow but it should align with the natural evolution of the changes being made in resolving a problem or completing a specific peace of work.

It focuses on delivering to customer expectations and needs by promoting team collaboration including the customer.

A Pragmatic approach

These techniques together provide a powerful, compelling and effective software development approach that brings the needed flexibility / agility into the software development lifecycle.

Combining and borrowing components from different methodologies to find the optimum delivery method that will deliver to the needs of the organisation is key. Depending on the specific business needs/situation, these components are combined to optimise the design, development and deployment of the software.

Helpful references:

A good overview of different agile methodologies can be found on this slideshare at .

Introduction to Agile and Lean Software Development from Thanh Nguyen

Further Reading:

-> What Is Agile? A Philosophy That Develops Through Practice from Umar Ali

Let’s Talk – Are you looking to achieve your goals faster? Create better business value? Build strategies to improve growth? We can help – make contact!

10 Peter Drucker Quotes that challenges Business Leadership thinking

February 19, 2018March 11, 20181 Comment

Drucker is one of the best-known and most widely influential thinkers and writers on the subject of management theory and practice. In 1959, Drucker coined the term “knowledge worker,” and later in his life considered knowledge-worker productivity to be the next frontier of management.

“What gets measured gets improved.”
“If you want something new, you have to stop doing something old.”
“Doing the right thing is more important than doing the thing right.”
“There is nothing quite so useless as doing with great efficiency something that should not be done at all.”
“Results are gained by exploiting opportunities, not by solving problems.”
“So much of what we call management consists of making it difficult for people to work.”
“Meetings are by definition a concession to a deficient organization. For one either meets or one works. One cannot do both at the same time.”
“People who don’t take risks generally make about two big mistakes a year. People who do take risks generally make about two big mistakes a year.”
“Long-range planning does not deal with the future decisions, but with the future of present decisions.”
“Management is doing things right. Leadership is doing the right things.”

Drucker – management thought leader

February 19, 2018February 21, 2018Leave a comment

His Key Ideas

Drucker is considered the single most important thought leader in the world of management, and several ideas run through most of his writings:

Decentralization and simplification.^[31] Drucker discounted the command and control model and asserted that companies work best when they are decentralized. According to Drucker, corporations tend to produce too many products, hire employees they don’t need (when a better solution would be outsourcing), and expand into economic sectors that they should avoid.
The concept of “knowledge worker” in his 1959 book The Landmarks of Tomorrow.^[32] Since then, knowledge-based work has become increasingly important in businesses worldwide.
The prediction of the death of the “Blue Collar” worker.^[33] The changing face of the US Auto Industry is a testimony to this prediction.
The concept of what eventually came to be known as “outsourcing.”^[34] He used the example of “front room” and “back room” of each business: A company should be engaged in only the front room activities that are critical to supporting its core business. Back room activities should be handed over to other companies, for whom these tasks are the front room activities.
The importance of the nonprofit sector,^[35] which he calls the third sector (private sector and the Government sector being the first two). Non-Government Organizations (NGOs) play crucial roles in the economies of countries around the world.
A profound skepticism of macroeconomic theory.^[36] Drucker contended that economists of all schools fail to explain significant aspects of modern economies.
A lament that the sole focus of microeconomics is price, citing its lack of showing what products actually do for us,^[37] thereby stimulating commercial interest in discovering how to calculate what products actually do for us; from their price.^[38]
Respect for the worker. Drucker believed that employees are assets not liabilities. He taught that knowledgeable workers are the essential ingredients of the modern economy, and that a hybrid management model is the sole method of demonstrating an employee’s value to the organization. Central to this philosophy is the view that people are an organization’s most valuable resource, and that a manager’s job is both to prepare people to perform and give them freedom to do so.^[39]
A belief in what he called “the sickness of government.” Drucker made nonpartisan claims that government is often unable or unwilling to provide new services that people need and/or want, though he believed that this condition is not intrinsic to the form of government. The chapter “The Sickness of Government”^[40] in his book The Age of Discontinuity formed the basis of New Public Management,^[41] a theory of public administration that dominated the discipline in the 1980s and 1990s.
The need for “planned abandonment.” Businesses and governments have a natural human tendency to cling to “yesterday’s successes” rather than seeing when they are no longer useful.^[42]
A belief that taking action without thinking is the cause of every failure.
The need for community. Early in his career, Drucker predicted the “end of economic man” and advocated the creation of a “plant community”^[43] where an individual’s social needs could be met. He later acknowledged that the plant community never materialized, and by the 1980s, suggested that volunteering in the nonprofit sector was the key to fostering a healthy society where people found a sense of belonging and civic pride.^[44]
The need to manage business by balancing a variety of needs and goals, rather than subordinating an institution to a single value.^[45]^[46] This concept of management by objectivesand self-control forms the keynote of his 1954 landmark The Practice of Management.^[47]
A company’s primary responsibility is to serve its customers. Profit is not the primary goal, but rather an essential condition for the company’s continued existence and sustainability.^[48]
A belief in the notion that great companies could stand among humankind’s noblest inventions.^[49]
“Do what you do best and outsource the rest” is a business tagline first “coined and developed”^[50] in the 1990s by Drucker.^[51] The slogan was primarily used to advocate outsourcing as a viable business strategy. Drucker began explaining the concept of outsourcing as early as 1989 in his Wall Street Journal (WSJ) article entitled “Sell the Mailroom.”^[52] In 2009 by way of recognition, Drucker was posthumously inducted into the Outsourcing Hall of Fame for his outstanding work in the field.^[53]

From wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Drucker

The 7 Deadly Sins Of Product Development

January 8, 2018February 24, 2018Leave a comment

Guest Blog: Travis Jacobs via LinkedIn

1. The Pregnant Woman Theory

If one woman can make a baby in 9 months, then 9 women can make a baby in 30 days. Now you may laugh, but this is the most common problem in developing a new product. Throwing more resources at the problem and praying it goes away does not solve anything.

2. Stepping Over A Stack Of $100 Bills To Pick Up A Penny

We can’t spend $10 on an off the shelf tool but we can spend $1,000 to develop our own, which doesn’t work and causes more problems than it solves.

Spending countless hours in useless meetings and then having a meeting to discuss why everything is overbudget and behind schedule.

3. Champagne On A Beer Budget

Expecting everything for free and having It done yesterday. This is a very common occurrence especially when subcontractors are hired.

I want to hire an Engineer with 3 PhD’s, and 30 years of experience for minimum wage

4. The Scalpel Is Only As Good As The Surgeon Who Uses It, Not All Tools Are Created Equally.

A Scalpel is a commodity, the surgeon who uses it to save your life is not.

Not all tools are created equally, choose the right tool for the right job, not just because that tool Is the cheapest and the “sales guy” said it would “work”.

5. You Never Run Out Of Things That Go Wrong

There will always be an endless supply of challenges and things that go wrong. Pretending there aren’t any problems doesn’t make them go away.

6. A Plan Is Just A List Of Stuff That Didn’t Happen & Everything Takes Longer, And Costs More Than You Planned

The battle plan is the first casualty of war, as soon as the first shot is fired the plan goes out the window. Likewise, when the first problem is encountered when developing a new product, the plan and the Gantt Chart go out the window.

7. Good, Fast, Cheap… Pick Any Two

We never have time to do it right, but we always have time to do it over….. and over….. and over…..

I hear time and time again. Just get it done right now, we’ll fix it later. The problem is that later never comes, and the product is only “fixed” after a very expensive product recall. By then it is too late and significant market share has been lost as well as the reputation of the brand. Trying to save a few bucks in product development can cost millions in product recalls.

Top 10 Technology Trends Impacting Infrastructure & Operations for 2018

January 2, 2018February 24, 2018Leave a comment

Does your IT strategy include infrastructure, operations (I&O) practices and data center architectures that are sufficient to meet the demands of the digital business. Digital transformation requires IT agility and velocity that outstrips classical architectures and practices.

David Cappuccio, from Gartner outlines the top 10 trends that will impact IT operations (I&O) in 2018. Each will have an impact on how IT operates, plans, enhances internal skill sets, and supports the business.

Guest Blog: Original Article @ Gartner

Outside forces will shape IT’s journey towards a digital infrastructure.

Legacy infrastructure and operations (I&O) practices and traditional data center architectures are not sufficient to meet the demands of the digital business. Digital transformation requires IT agility and velocity that outstrips classical architectures and practices.

In 2018, IT will be increasingly tasked with supporting complex, distributed applications using new technologies that are spread across systems in multiple locations, including on-premises data centers, the public cloud and hosting providers.

David Cappuccio, vice president and distinguished analyst at Gartner, says I&O leaders should focus on 10 key technologies and trends to support digital transformation.

“These are not necessarily the top 10 technologies, or the hottest trends in IT, but rather the 10 trends we feel will have an impact on I&O teams over the next few years,” says Cappuccio. “Some are happening already, some are just beginning, but each will have an impact on how IT operates, plans, enhances internal skill sets, and supports the business.”

Strategic

Trend 1: Geo Planning
Outside factors including the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), geo specific workloads and global and regional network access are driving IT to spend more time on geo planning as part of their longer term strategies. The long term objective is not to own a global infrastructure, but to build the infrastructure needed to support the business via partners, as well as leveraging an organization’s partner’s infrastructure to help support initiatives such as multiple network connections and infrastructure design and support.

Trend 2: The Intelligent Edge
Many digital business projects create data that can be processed more efficiently when the computing power is close to the thing or person generating it. Edge computing solutions address this need for localized computing power. For example, in the context of the Internet of Things (IoT), the sources of data generation are usually things with sensors or embedded devices. The intelligent edge serves as the decentralized extension of the campus networks, cellular networks, data center networks or the cloud. Organizations that have embarked on a digital business journey have realized that a more decentralized approach is required to address digital business infrastructure requirements.

Trend 3: Intent-based Networking (IBNS)
Gartner predicts that by 2020, more than 1,000 large enterprises will use intent-based networking systems in production, up from less than 50 today. Intent-based networking (IBNS) is not a product, or a market. Instead, it is a piece of networking software that helps to plan, design and implement/operate networks that can improve network availability and agility, which becomes increasingly important as organizations transition towards digital business.

With IBNS, rather than explicitly defining to the network what needs to be done, the software translates the business intent to determine the “correctness” of the network configuration before deployment. The system then continuously compares the actual and desired state of the running network.

Say no to business as usual

Gartner IT Operations Strategies & Solutions Summit 2018

LEARN MORE

Tactical

Trend 4: APIs – Integration Economy
A digital business is supported by technology platforms in five areas: information systems; customer experience; data and analytics; IoT; and ecosystems. The ecosystems technology platform supports the creation of, and connection to, external ecosystems, marketplaces and communities. Application performance interface (API) management enables the digital platform to function.

Organizations should design APIs from the “outside in,” based on ecosystem requirements, not “inside out,” based on existing applications or technology infrastructure. “Ensure that your organization takes an ‘API first’ approach, designing APIs based on the requirements of your organization’s ecosystem,” says Cappuccio. “APIs designed in this way can be mapped to internal technology infrastructure. This approach is more effective than simply generating APIs based on existing infrastructure and data models.”

Trend 5: Reputation and Digital Experience
There are two interlinked trends impacting business today that have nothing to do with IT infrastructure, but everything to do with infrastructure design. Digital experience management (DEM) is the impact of presenting the right digital experience to customers. The experience could be mobile or web-based, and should be always available, continually improving and perform quickly and consistently. If any of these tenants are lacking, customer satisfaction is in peril. If customer satisfaction is in peril, especially in today’s social media savvy world, corporate reputation could quickly be damaged.

Trend 6: Beyond Traditional IT – New Realities
Business units are demanding agility, in opening new markets, taking on emerging competitors, bringing in new suppliers, and creating innovative ways of interacting with customers. Over 30% of current IT spend is not part of the IT budget, but overall responsibility for supporting these new initiatives, once they are tested and stabilized, will reside with traditional IT. Managing those new providers, managing workflows and managing new types of assets in this hybrid environment, regardless of where they are located, will become crucial to IT’s success.

Operational

Trend 7: DCaaS as a Strategy
In a perfect world, at least from the perspective of many business leaders, IT and the data center would be essentially a very agile provider of service outcomes, rather than the owner of the infrastructure. To do this organizations are creating a data center as a service (DCaaS) model, where the role of IT and the data center is to deliver the right service, at the right pace, from the right provider, at the right price.

“Making key short-term decisions can lead to a long-term strategy that incorporates the best of ‘as a service’ and the cloud without compromising IT’s overall goals to both protect and enable the business,” says Cappuccio. “In this manner, IT can enable the use of cloud services across the business, but with a focus on picking the right service, at the right time, from the right provider, and in such a way that underlying IT service and support does not get compromised.”

Trend 8: Cautious Cloud Adoption
For many enterprises the journey to the cloud is a slow, controlled process. Colocation and hosting providers have established private or shared clouds on their premises to provide customers some basic cloud services, enabling controlled migrations, staff skills training and a “safe” cloud environment as a stepping stone to increased cloud adoption in the future. As customers get comfortable with these services and costs, increased migrations to external providers are enabled via interconnect services. Using this partner ecosystem to enable an agile infrastructure is a rapidly emerging trend.

Trend 9: Capacity Optimization – Everywhere
Organizations need to focus on optimizing capacity and guard against stranded capacity – things that are paid for, but not really being used. This issue can be found both in existing on premise data centers and in the cloud. A change in culture is needed to fix this problem. Organizations must learn to focus not just on uptime and availability, but also on capacity, utilization and density. Doing so can extend the life of an existing data center and reduce operating expenditures from cloud providers.

Trend 10: Extended Infrastructure Management
The data center as the sole source of IT infrastructure has given way to a hybrid of on-premises, colocation, hosting, and public and private cloud solutions. These elements are being combined with a focus on providing business-enabling services and outcomes, rather than a focus on physical infrastructure. Enterprises must apply a future-looking, enterprise-wide “steady hand” to IT strategy and planning, and apply appropriate guardrails, or face the possibility of losing relevance, governance and enterprise agility.

How to Be a Great Leader: Stay Human

December 31, 2017February 24, 20183 Comments

How exactly can the five elements of emotional intelligence EI be combined to result in great leadership?

The first step is to remember this: You’re a leader, not a super hero. It’s OK to be human. In fact, it’s critical to maintain all of the qualities of a human, particularly the ones that enable other people to relate to you and like you. Here are six ways to do just that.
#EI #Lead #People #Leadership

Guest Blog: Original article

We all have the ability to influence other people, and are, thus, all leaders in some way. And while leading by example is a known recipe for success, how to combine the actual ingredients for that recipe is often elusive. A huge part of what makes an effective leader is emotional intelligence, the capacity to be aware of, control and express one’s emotions, as well as handle interpersonal relationships judiciously and empathetically. Emotional intelligence, also known as EQ or EI, is a term popularized by Daniel Goleman, who defined these five interconnected components of emotional intelligence:
1. Self-awareness.
2. Self-regulation.
3. Motivation.
4. Empathy.
5. Social skills.

So there’s a list of ingredients, but how exactly can those five elements be combined to result in great leadership? The first step is to remember this: You’re a leader, not a super hero. It’s OK to be human. In fact, it’s critical to maintain all of the qualities of a human, particularly the ones that enable other people to relate to you and like you. Here are six ways to do just that.

Vulnerability (self-awareness)
As counterintuitive as it may seem, great leadership relies on vulnerability. Humans aren’t perfect. We all make mistakes. We all fear something. A leader who can acknowledge and address his or her vulnerabilities is respected and emulated because vulnerability builds connection and trust.

Storytelling (self-awareness, empathy and social skills)
Ken Kesey, professional storyteller and author of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (among many other titles) once said, “You don’t lead by pointing and telling people some place to go. You lead by going to that place and making a case.” This is what stories can do. Instead of telling someone what to do or how to do it, share anecdotes from your life with takeaways that exemplify your values, how you came to appreciate those values and what you like to see in other people. Sharing personal stories (and listening to other people’s stories) also exposes a vulnerability that, ultimately, builds trust. If you’re not a natural storyteller, find a storytelling workshop or encourage your organization to host a storytelling lab. You’ll discover that we, as humans, have been telling stories for thousands of years and are programmed to do it. (In fact, the Latin word “historia,” which is where the word “history” derives from, has the word “story” right in it—because narratives—illustrated, oral and written—are how humans have always shared information.)

De-Powering (self-regulation)
Neuroscientists have studied why power corrupts and found that it impairs “mirroring,” a neural process that is a cornerstone of empathy. While it’s difficult to prevent power from having this affect on your brain, it is possible to remove yourself from power occasionally. To maintain a capacity for empathy, it’s important to not always feel powerful by participating in mundane obligations (e.g. buy milk, pay bills), recalling humbling episodes from your past, and interacting and relating (genuinely) with ordinary, less influential people.

Psychological Safety (motivation and empathy)
Emotional intelligence requires inner motivation, and leadership requires the ability to inspire and energize other people. But if you want an innovative team that enjoys coming to work and comes up with fresh ideas, approach them with compassion in order to nurture an environment where people feel comfortable expressing opposing opinions and taking risks. A supportive environment allows people to experiment with ideas without fear of ridicule or recrimination. Also toward that end, don’t be stingy with praise—but do be sincere.

Knowing People (empathy)
Isolation has a huge price. If your team doesn’t know you, understand you and like you, then the reverse is also true: You don’t know, understand or like the individuals on your team. And that means that you can’t help each person play to his or her strengths. Only by getting to know individuals will you be able to recognize their limitations and special abilities and be able to adapt and find the best role for everyone on the team.

Diffusing Conflict (social skills and empathy)
People push buttons. People disagree. And a good leader needs to know how to flip the script before arguments escalate and damage work relationships. One technique when someone flies off the handle is to simply stop the conversation and ask with genuine concern, “Are you OK?” A conflict-diffusing response like this, which interrupts the tempo of a heated conversation and subdues an amygdala hijack, is often effective.

Costs reduction initiatives: Retain resources – incubate value innovation

December 21, 2017June 25, 20191 Comment

Why is it that technology is always perceived as being too expensive? Do organisations really understand the underlining value technology brings to the business as a foundational enabler? If the answer is yes, then why the continued pressure on Technology Executives to reduce cost? It is interesting that when it comes to cutting cost, business and financial leaders always look at cutting technology resource head count instead of seriously evaluating opportunities to improve productivity and efficiency through value innovation.

In accounting terms there are only two main actions to improve the bottom line – increase Revenue and/or reduce Cost. In technology business operations these two factors can be influenced by several initiatives of which reduction of staff is one option. This should be the last resort, in my view. Despite the known facts that cutting heads in IT, in essence, is cutting intellectual property, knowledge and experience that resides within your team, is it still at top on the list for CFOs, other Executives and Board Members when the cost reduction discussion comes up!

Before we look at reducing the workforce delivering the technology services and products forming the enabling foundation for any organisation, surely we should look at viable alternatives, value innovative initiatives, forthcoming from our staff. Empower your staff to be an incubator for innovation.

Technology operations are all about providing services at a specific level as defined in SLAs (Service Level Agreements) for example:

IT infrastructure hosting email, website, file depositories and intranets,
Software Development of products the organisation sell to clients and/or use in-house,
Implementation, Integration and Customisation projects where software products are deployed,
Help/Service Desk supporting IT end-users, etc.

These services are all provided by technologist, by people, and People Come First (Read more…) Focussing on a professional, efficient and happy team by understanding the needs of every individual, goes a long way in ensuring the appropriate initiatives are forthcoming from your staff to make technology more proficient.

One of the key responsibilities of a technology executive is the efficient management of the resources. This is especially important when technology companies/departments are delivering services where the resources are the biggest expense on the technology P&L (Profit & Loss account or Income statement – Read more…).

Resources, as a high expense, reinforce the importance of proper Resource Management in business governance. Resource Management is not only about ensuring the right staff numbers with the right skills sets are available to deliver to business expectation and demand, but it is also about creating the right environment and support to ensure your staff flourish, grow and freely contribute. In my experience are ‘Resource Managers’ far too undervalued by business leaders not understanding the value of the role. Business leaders should work closely with the Resource Managers to ensure their staff is not seen as major expense but as a key asset contributing not only to current business operations but also future business growth and bottom line improvement initiatives.

Business are investing a lot in building teams of highly skilled and motivated people that feel valued and part of something special. These people are driving a clear and larger than themselves vision, that delivers results leading to recognition and self fulfilment. These people are full of innovative ideas on how to improve the business value proposition.

When it comes to resource management, incubating value driven innovation:

Ensure you have the right staff. Optimise your recruitment process to ensure that you have a robust framework for bringing the right people for your organisation onboard.
Keep your staff happy, mentally stimulated and intellectually engaged in all business processes and services. Make sure they are informed and are actively participating in the decisions driving the business forward.
Give them opportunities to learn in their delivery. Good people has a natural urge to continuous improvement – facilitate it.
Create communities where staff can learn and share knowledge on a formal and informal basis.
Plan your resourcing levels better. Ensure you have the right staff capacity with the right skills to deliver the services to the business demand and expectation.
Use flexible resourcing models combining permanent, temporary contracted and outsourced resources.
Continuously capture task and productivity data.
Utilise analytics, mine the productivity information to give your insight in areas/services costing the most and why. Act on these insights!
Build a framework you can use in planning resource capacity forecasting. Work closely with the business to understand the sales pipeline and product development strategy to ensure you optimise your resource capacity with the demand. There is nothing more disruptive to any organisation than constant resource level fluctuation (increase/hiring and decrease/firing) due to poor strategic and project planning.
Identify your key resources and nurture them, retain them at all cost – they are the knowledge keepers of your IP (intellectual property). It is cheaper to implement initiatives to retain staff than it is to replace them!
People want to feel part of something and if they are happy in their community contributing to a future and in the process they are improving themselves, they are much more likely to stay. Recruitment fees, where staff retention % are low, are a large contributor to cost.

Any cost saving initiative has a fundamentally key measure that needs to answer true: “What is the value to the business?” Revenue and cost do not always define the true value…

What is the true value your staff bring to the success of your business? Have you asked them and really involved them to work with you on ideas to improve business value through innovation rather than cost cutting?

One last point – when you have done your value analysis and it does come to letting staff go, remember this: treat them fare – you never know when you will need them again.

Are you under pressure to cut cost? renierbotha ltd specialises in the fine tuning IT operations for optimum business value – Make contact!

Case Study – Renier Botha’s Game-Changing Leadership at Systems Powering Healthcare (2015-2017)

December 1, 2017May 28, 2024Leave a comment

Posted on November 1, 2017

Introduction:
Back in December 2015, Renier Botha stepped in as the big boss—Managing Director and Head of Service at Systems Powering Healthcare, aka SPHERE. This place is all about delivering top-notch IT services and infrastructure to a whole lot of NHS healthcare workers—over 10,000 to be exact. Let’s dive into how Botha totally revamped SPHERE in his two year tenure, turning it into a powerhouse through his sharp strategic moves, cool innovations, and rock-solid leadership.

Facing the Music and Setting Goals:
Right off the bat, Botha was up against some big challenges. He had to shift SPHERE from an old-school cost-plus model to a snazzy commercial-service-catalogue model while also trying to attract more clients. His main to-dos were to get the company on stable footing, map out a strategic game plan, and make sure they were all about putting customers first.

Key Moves and Wins:

Strategic Master Plan: Botha wasted no time. Within the first three months, he whipped up a six-year strategic plan that laid out all the key investments and milestones to get SPHERE to grow and thrive.
From Startup to Star: Managing a team of 75, Botha steered SPHERE from its startup phase to become a well-known medium-sized business, hitting their three-year targets way ahead of schedule – in just two years!
Tech Makeover: One of his big programmes was pouring £42M into beefing up SPHERE’s tech – think better networks, better hosting, the works. This move was all about making sure they could keep up and stay ahead in the long run.
Service Delivery Shake-up: Botha brought in a new, customer-focused operating model and rolled out Service-Now to up their tech game. This not only made things run smoother but also saved a ton of money, giving them a killer return on investment.
Financial Growth: Under his guidance, SPHERE’s dough rolled in 42% thicker thanks to smart mergers, acquisitions, and raking in new clients. They also managed to save the NHS about £3m a year with their shared service gig.
Cost-Cutting Genius: He managed to slash the “Cost per IT User” by 24% in two years, showing just how much bang for the buck SPHERE could offer.
Big Win: Thanks to a revamped service catalogue, SPHERE nailed a whopping £10m contract to provide IT services for Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust.
Happy Campers: Botha didn’t just focus on the numbers; he also built a workplace where people actually wanted to stick around. Employee retention jumped from 82% to a whopping 98% by the end of his run.

Conclusion:
Renier Botha’s time at SPHERE shows just what can happen when you mix visionary leadership with a knack for making smart moves in healthcare IT. He not only met the big challenges head-on but also made sure that SPHERE became a go-to example of how IT can seriously improve healthcare services. His story isn’t just about a job well done; it’s about setting a whole new standard in the industry.

Empowering Healthcare through Strategic Leadership: Systems Powering Healthcare Case Study (2015-2017)

November 1, 2017October 24, 2023Leave a comment

Introduction:
In December 2015, Renier Botha assumed the role of Managing Director (CEO) & Head of Service (CIO) at Systems Powering Healthcare (SPHERE), an IT specialist organisation providing essential IT infrastructure and shared IT services to over 10,000 healthcare workers in the NHS. This case study delves into Botha’s transformative journey, focusing on his strategic vision, innovative solutions, and steadfast leadership that reshaped SPHERE into a thriving and client-focused enterprise.

Challenges and Objectives:
When Botha took charge, SPHERE faced the challenge of transitioning from a cost-plus model to a commercial-service-catalogue model while expanding its clientele. His primary objectives included stabilising the newly founded business, developing a strategic roadmap, and establishing a customer-centric approach to service delivery.

Strategic Initiatives and Achievements:

Strategic Planning: Within the initial three months, Botha meticulously crafted a six-year strategic business plan for SPHERE. This plan outlined clear annual investment and service delivery milestones, providing a roadmap for the organisation’s growth and development.
Operational Excellence: Botha directed a workforce of 75 employees, overseeing the execution of the strategic plan. Under his leadership, SPHERE transformed from a startup to an established medium-sized enterprise, achieving its third-year targets by the end of the second financial year.
IT Infrastructure Transformation: Botha led a comprehensive IT estate refresh strategy, investing £42M in core capabilities like IP Networks, Service Hosting, End User Computing, and more. This initiative not only modernised SPHERE’s infrastructure but also ensured long-term sustainability and efficiency.
Service Delivery Innovation: Botha introduced a customer-centric Target Operating Model (TOM) and implemented Service-Now as the supporting ERP toolset. This digital transformation not only increased business maturity but also resulted in a five-year £2.4m NPV saving and a remarkable ROI of 493%.
Financial Growth: Through strategic M&A, business transformation, and the onboarding of new clients, SPHERE’s revenue grew by 42%. This growth not only secured significant ROI for shareholders but also saved the NHS approximately £3m per annum through a shared service solution.
Operational Efficiency: Botha defined and achieved the “Cost per IT User” KPI, showcasing SPHERE’s value proposition. The strategic business plan led to an 11% reduction in the Cost per IT User in 2016 and a further 13% reduction in 2017, surpassing the target KPI by 12%.
Commercial Success: Botha developed a compelling commercial Service Catalogue, instrumental in winning a £10m tender bid to become an IT Service Provider to Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust.
Cultural Transformation: Through a focus on commercial awareness, customer-centricity, and employee empowerment, Botha fostered a high-performing team. Staff retention rates increased from 82% in early 2016 to an impressive 98% by the end of 2017.

Conclusion:
Renier Botha’s strategic foresight, operational acumen, and emphasis on innovation and client satisfaction transformed Systems Powering Healthcare into a robust, client-focused organisation. His leadership not only steered SPHERE through critical transitions but also positioned it as a beacon of efficiency and excellence within the healthcare technology sector. This case study exemplifies the profound impact of visionary leadership on organisational growth and success.

The Digital Transformation Necessity

October 10, 2017December 8, 20176 Comments

Listening to every keynote, panel discussion or reading articles relating to business sustainability through technology, one message is repeated over and over again – Digital Transformation is imperative for all businesses!

Although this message is coming through loudly, is it not always clear to business leaders and the workforce, exactly what digital transformation really is and what it means for their organisation.

In explaining digital transformation as the benefit and value that technology can enable within the business through technology innovation including IT buzz words like: Cloud, Automation, Dev-Ops, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning, Internet of Things (IoT), Single Sign-On, Data Mining & Big Data, Bit Chain – does not really make the need for digital transformation any clearer.

One thing is clear though – we are living in a hyper-connected world where technology and more specifically, digital devices, are the glue linking together people and information in new ways we can hardly comprehend. In this statement, is the clue of what digital transformation entails…

What is digital transformation?

We can define digital transformation as the fundamental changes in the manner in which business and organisational operations are conducted, to adapt to the changes and to leverage the opportunities, caused by the use of digital devices and their accelerated impact on the way we live.

Digital devices, operate on digital signals running through electronic circuits to collect, store, manipulate, interpret and display information. These digital electronic integrated circuits (ICs) evolved since 1947, when the functional transistor was invented, into what we know today as computers. All digital devices are, at its core, a computer of some sorts used by humans to interact with information.

Transformation on the other hand implies a fundamental change in the way things used to be (converting something from one state to another) – it enables new creativity and innovation inspired by technology evolution, bringing change that introduces a new way, a different way to do things, rather than just enhancing or improving an old or current way.

To simplify it, you could say that digital transformation is the profound changes in the way business is conducted, to adapt to the changes in society caused by the continuous evolvement of computers.

A typical example of digital transformation is the “paperless office” – fundamentally changing the way we preserve information by storing it in digital format rather than writing it down on paper. This concept has profound implications in our commerce interaction expectations if you are comparing the speed in which information can be recalled and processed through digital means vs paper files, archives and libraries…

Who should lead the Digital Transformation?

Computers are hardly breaking news anymore as it is widely used within business where technology has become an integral enabling part of any organisation. Modern digital devices i.e. tablets, smart phones, the IoT, smart watches and other smart wearable devices, are changing the way we live and interact in commerce and hence the way we, as the consumer society, expect business to be conducted. Digital transformation is thus more about the change in business operations – processes and systems – than just the adoption of new technologies. Due to the importance of technology in organisations and the key role IT plays in the organisation’s ability to adapt to the society’s changing needs, it is the role of the CIO to lead the Digitial Transformation initiatives.

Digital Transformation matters because…

Any business change is costly and businesses might avoid change, for that very reason. Howard King of The Guardian, (Nov’13) puts it this way: “Businesses don’t transform by choice because it is expensive and risky. Businesses go through transformation when they have failed to evolve.” He continues in saying that evolving businesses never necessarily need to transform as they are continually focussed on their clients. This evolution ensures the key drivers of transformation namely: changing customer demand, changing technology and changing competition, never coincide in such a way that the business operating model can no longer service it’s customers. When it does, the business reaches a tipping point that requires transformation within the business, to adapt and re-align or tip over the edge.

The pace, at which digital devices have evolved, changed the way we interact with information and has become an intrinsic and material part of daily live. This has left organisations, which did not evolve with the technology, at a tipping point. For businesses approaching or reaching this tipping point it might be too late to evolve and hence Digital Transformation becomes a necessity for survival.

Emerging, disruptive technology driven, companies are changing industries leaving competitor companies with one choice – adapt, through digital transformation, or face the consequences of slowly loosing market share and eventually…

What does a typical Digital Transformation strategy involve?

As every organisation delivers their products and services (the value proposition to it’s clients and customers) in a different way, so will the digital transformation within one company differ from the other.

To define a transformation strategy and the associate change programme, one must look at the value chain of the organisation. Each element within the value chain can, and in most cases must, contribute to the scope:

Infrastructure
People – Leadership and the overall Workforce
Technology
Supply Chain
Procurement
Operations
Manufacturing (Engineering)
Fulfillment
Marketing
Sales
Service Delivery
Business Market (Client’s & Customers)

For each of the business value chain components, one must question the impact of the key transformation drivers:

Change in Customer Demand
Change in Technology
Change in Competition

Understanding these impacts will outline what needs to change, which generally comes down to:

Transform the Customer Experience
Transform the Operational Processes
Transform the Business Model

Note that IT is not singled out in the above – this is because IT is the catalyst that should overall enable these transformation initiatives.

The following examples of Digital Transformation Frameworks can also be helpful in defining the strategy:

MIT Sloan:The Nine Elements of Digital Transformation
Cognizant:A Framework for Digital Business Transformation
Altimeter:Six Stages of Digital Transformation
Ionology:A Step-By-Step Guide to Digital Transformation

Change brings uncertainty… Address it!

Transformation, by definition, brings change and a typical digital transformation programme will dramatically change the organisation. This change will especially affect a key business asset within the value chain – the people working within the business – “Success?.. People come First!”.

It will also dramatically effect, if not completely change, the organisation’s culture. Culture comes from the top – make sure that the board and executives are promoting the transformation and are willing to change themselves, as change is always desired until it is required of one-self.

Empower the workforce to understand the reasons why transformation is needed. Involve everyone to actively contribute to the innovative rethinking of their roles – how does digital technologies impact their daily work experience? Articulate the core business focus (what is the value proposition to the clients and customers) and ask, how can enabling digital technologies be used in support of achieving value excellence?

Find ways to make the necessity of the change a positive win for everyone, as supporting the people through the transformation is just as important as the digital technology you are trying to embrace.

To Conclude

Digital organisations outperform organisations doing digital – making Digital Transformation the last survival action for organisations that have not evolved with digital technology.

Transformation is a dramatic change and hence must the people aspect and business culture be treated with extreme care and sensitivity. A strong CIO is needed to drive the transformation programme with full buy-in from the rest of the executives and the whole workforce.

A well executed digital transformation strategy will re-align the business with the growing digital demands of it’s customers, by addressing the needed adoption of technology innovation across the business value chain resulting in an agile business ready for a fast evolving digital future.

Let’s Talk – Are you looking to achieve your goals faster? Create better business value? Build strategies to improve growth? We can help – make contact!

IT Due Diligence – is IT an asset or liability?

October 2, 2017March 1, 2018Leave a comment

Information Technology is an integral part of any organisation and enables the operations of enterprises. Through supporting business operations, IT collates and analyses business data to provide the management information required in making timely and effective decisions. IT can even be the product/service around which enterprises are built. Information is a key business asset. But IT can also be the skeleton in the closet. Technology assets can turn into liabilities costing more and/or introducing risks that are not anticipated. This makes IT a key priority consideration in strategy development, corporate governance and business risk mitigation as well as merger and acquisition (M&A) transactions.

Despite the obvious importance of IT within any organisation, do business executives, who are mostly more focused on the financial and legal aspects, often overlook it. The appropriate attention is not given to the IT diligence as part of corporate governance or during the due diligence in M&A initiatives. This might be due to the continuous limited understanding of the technology discipline amongst business executives and/or the absence of the right expertise within an organisation to conduct the needed IT review. Another contributing statistic is that IT due diligence rarely is the make or break factor in business deals, which in a lot of cases, result in unwanted surprises presented to directors. That is why IT should be part of the scope of business strategy development and be one of the key contributors in M&A negotiations, influencing the deal and price.

The key reason for IT due diligence is to ensure visibility to the directors of concerns relating to IT operations in order to develop addressing strategies and mitigating actions. Investors should also use this information in assessing a potential business asset and it’s associated opportunity versus risk.

A due diligence exercise will cover at least the following main IT considerations: Systems, Projects & Change, Data, Security and IT Service Provision. Each of these considerations should be reviewed covering at least the following four elements: People, Process, Technology and Value.

Meaningful IT due diligence can be accomplished by practitioners who can ask the right questions stemming from the appropriate industry experience and domain knowledge. The art of due diligence is in formulating the right questions around key investment and/or corporate success drivers and interpreting the answers to inform the true state of affairs and it’s associated business enablement ability, future opportunity contributions and the associated business risk. Mostly, this diligence informs on the present and future role and influence of IT assets within the overall business success, for example:

Product, service and information Ownership – does the business really own what IT claims to be the property and assets of the business in relation to it’s true value and the balance sheet?
Reliability – can the business rely on its technology, now and in the future?
Sustainability – does the business have the ability to sustain its IT asset and visa versa?
Scalability – can the technology assets keep up with the business’ growth plans?
Adaptability – how easy can the technology asset integrate or be adapted to integrate with other systems and new emerging technologies in the future?
Compliance – does an IT asset introduce unwanted risk through non-compliance? For example, the introduction of new legislation to address the continuous increase in cyber and information security concerns might have a significant impact on the legality of an IT asset that might result in serious financial risk and penalties, if not addressed.
Finance – how much are IT assets likely to cost the business and what contributions will these expenses have on the financial success of the organisation?

A typical IT due diligence exercise could cover the following areas of IT operations (Some of these areas might not always be applicable in all organisations.):

Clarity on the Business Value Chain
IT Staff
- IT Organisation Structure
- Leadership
- Qualifications & Skills
Certifications & Standards i.e. ISO9001 (Quality), ISO17001 (Security), ITIL (Service Management) or ISO20000 (ITSM)
Products and Services
Documentation
Software Development Processes & Methodologies
Service Management
Software applications and Services utilized
IT Infrastructure
- Hardware
- IP Network Infrastructure
- Hosting Environments
Business Continuity
- Service Availability
- Systems Up-time
- Backup and Recovery
- Disaster Prevention & Recovery
Security
- Cyber & Information Security
- Network Security
- IT Services & Systems Access
- Physical Access
Governance
- Operating Model
- Policies
- Procedures
- Risk Management
- Performance & KPIs
Projects & delivery methodologies
Compliance
Legal
- SLAs
- Supplier & 3rd party Service/Support Agreements
Intellectual Property
Quality Assurance & Improvement
Financial
Client and/or Customers

Understanding this information is vital in corporate governance, strategy formulation and capital investment decisions ensuring business critical assets are sustained and developed appropriately for a viable ongoing business concern.

The content of an IT due diligence report should focus on the objectives of the due diligence review, outlining priority findings with recommendations that present a clear call to action addressing the key issues found. A typical report should contain:

The objectives of the IT due diligence review
An executive summary with the key take aways
Key findings and the associated risk
Recommendations

The review findings and recommendations should be acted upon through appropriate remediation projects and a clear transition & support plan with inclusion into IT & business strategy. The business benefits can only be realised if these post review projects and transition, are successfully integrated into the organisation.

Let’s Talk – Are you looking to achieve your goals faster? Create better business value? Build strategies to improve growth? We can help – make contact!

SPHERE – Growth through M&A – Due Diligence Case Study

September 11, 2017July 20, 2020

SPHERE – M&A Due Diligence – An Intuitus Case Study

Sector: IT Services, Healthcare
Region: UK
Date: September 2017

Summary

Organisations in the healthcare sector, including the NHS, are increasingly reliant on technology to ensure the smooth-running of day-to-day business. It’s important that costs are reduced wherever possible, including within technology and IT operations, to help alleviate the financial pressure faced by businesses in this sector.

West Middlesex University Hospital Trust was acquired by Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust in 2015. IT service provider SPHERE, which is co-owned by Chelsea and Westminster, will be incorporating the IT infrastructure of West Middlesex into their existing IT service provision. Intuitus was approached to provide M&A IT due diligence on West Middlesex in order to identify potential synergies and key risks ahead of the integration by SPHERE.

The Client

SPHERE (Systems Powering Healthcare Ltd) is an IT service provider delivering IT service management and shared IT infrastructure services to the healthcare sector.

The company is jointly and wholly owned by Chelsea and Westminster Hospital and the Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trusts – SPHERE represents a collaboration and pooling of resources between the Trusts to deliver improved IT services to its members.

Challenges

The management team at SPHERE required full visibility of the current status of the IT services currently in place at West Middlesex, including data centre management, network and communications, computing infrastructure and storage, end-user computing, IT service management, and IT security. This would allow management to plan for the integration of the IT infrastructure at West Middlesex into the existing service offering provided by SPHERE.

The recent transition and merger of the two Trusts, coupled with SPHERE’s planned acquisition of the IT infrastructure at West Middlesex, meant that the merger of the two IT teams had to be handled with sensitivity. This had to be taken into account by any third-party consultant brought in.

How we helped

Intuitus was approached to undertake M&A due diligence on the IT infrastructure and associated service contracts and service provisions at West Middlesex, and advise on how these services align with the service proposition provided by SPHERE. The Intuitus team included Alan Lorimer, who has 20 years’ experience in IT, including many years reviewing the processes and operations of managed service companies in order to provide investment advice.

“Intuitus brought a wealth of experience, wisdom and knowledge to the engagement,” says Renier Botha, Managing Director at SPHERE. “It was a sensitive situation and we needed to get an expert, unbiased, impartial opinion. The Intuitus team was respected by everyone involved because they had been in similar situations many times before and knew exactly where to look and which questions to ask.”

The result was a comprehensive report that clearly outlined what actions were required to ensure the successful integration of the West Middlesex IT infrastructure. This report was then converted into a project initiation document, which acted as a foundation for the entire project. SPHERE was also able to use the report findings to compile a full remediation project scope with costings, which was presented to the senior management team. This clearly outlined the key risks and remediation required to successfully onboard the new infrastructure environment.

Results, Return on Investment and Future Plans

In the short term, SPHERE is focusing on delivering the IT services as they are outlined in the SLAs, and meeting the service expectations of the West Middlesex staff.

The major strategic benefit of the incorporation of the West Middlesex infrastructure in the longer term is in the economies of scale, as Renier Botha points out: “With the onboarding of West Middlesex, the scale of the service delivered by SPHERE has increased by 27%. As a result, we’ve been able to reduce the cost per user by 12%. Furthermore, the cost of running the service is 24% lower than what it would have cost the trusts individually were they to run the IT service without SPHERE. If SPHERE can successfully identify additional trusts to work with then there will be an opportunity to further drive down the total cost of providing a shared service.”

About our M&A Due Diligence

Intuitus’ M&A due diligence is an independent, bespoke assessment on behalf of an acquiring company (or strategic buyer) of a target company’s technology and/or IT operations and, where required, either an assessment or production of the technology and/or IT integration strategy and plan, including potential synergies and key risks. The buyer gains commercially focused, pragmatic insight in the form of an actionable report. Our findings and recommendations form an important part of the (integration) plan going forward and overall value enhancement strategy.

http://www.intuitusadvisory.com

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“Intuitus brought a wealth of experience, wisdom and knowledge to the engagement. As a result of the M&A due diligence we’ve been able to make significant cost-savings, without compromising the quality of the IT service offering.”; Renier Botha, Managing Director at SPHERE

Original Case Study – intuitusadvisory.com

SPHERE grows – delivering shared IT services to the NHS’ West-Middlesex University Hospital

August 15, 2017January 19, 2018Leave a comment

SPHERE grows – delivering IT Shared Services to West Middlesex University Hospital NHS Trust

SPHERE, Systems Powering Healthcare Ltd, is incorporating West Middlesex University Hospital NHS Trust into the shared IT service provision that they supply to a number of NHS Trusts. This includes Chelsea & Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, which acquired West Middlesex in 2015.

The project results from several months of preparatory work by SPHERE, assessing its scope and provisioning the service transfer, with completion scheduled for October 2017.

SPHERE is an IT shared services provider to the healthcare sector, primarily NHS Foundation Trusts. It was set up by Chelsea and Westminster and the Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trusts to deliver and support IT infrastructure for both trusts to achieve economies of scale and bring down the cost per user, says Renier Botha, Managing Director of SPHERE:

“Chelsea and Westminster NHS Foundation Trusts is one of the founding members of SPHERE and it made sense for the West Middlesex Trusts to join the shared services management that we provide. We have a proven services model that we can take to a range of other healthcare providers to realise cost savings whilst improving service quality.

“SPHERE will now be supporting an additional 2,000 end users with the commissioning of West Middlesex. This financial year will see the cost per user for member trusts fall substantially through economies of scale,” says Renier Botha.

SPHERE is currently gearing up to support the deployment of the Cerner EPR (Electronic Patient Record) system across the Chelsea Westminster and West-Middlesex NHS Trusts for which it provides shared services.

West Middlesex will be the first Trust to go live with Cerner. Sphere will manage the provision of infrastructure and the overall IT support services and are currently assessing which first line support services will be prioritised for the Cerner platform.

In 2014 Kevin Jarrold, Director on the SPHERE board and CIO at Imperial Healthcare Trust and Chelsea and Westminster, oversaw the deployment of Cerner at Imperial. Sphere will look to capitalise on the learnings of the Imperial team to ensure trouble-free integration of the support services.

To take advantage of the capabilities of cloud computing, SPHERE is moving its primary data centre and specific systems to Equinix, a leading colocation provider, in London.

Equinix has hosted the Cerner platform since 2010 and SPHERE says that this offers a robust solution for the Trusts, improving the IT infrastructure resilience and business continuity capabilities mitigating the key business risks associated with location and services required from IT hosting facilities.

“SPHERE is well positioned to provide improved IT services to the healthcare sector – expanding on the presence of Cerner within the same data centre and utilising the capabilities of the Microsoft Azure cloud platform at Equinix,” says Renier Botha.

For further information please contact SPHERE Head Office – Systems Powering Healthcare Ltd, Unit 101, Harbour Yard London, SW10 0XD – Tel: 020 331 5888.

Quotes to shape Principles of Business Leadership

June 17, 2017June 28, 20242 Comments

“Develop success from failures. Discouragement and failure are two of the surest stepping stones to success.” – Dale Carnegie

“There are only two ways to live life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is.” – Albert Einstein

“Do not look for approval except for the consciousness of doing your best.” – Andrew Carnegie

“The true measure of a person is how they treat someone who can do him absolutely no good.” – Samuel Johnson

“You’ve got to be very careful if you don’t know where you are going because you might not get there.” – Yogi Berra

“Expect more than others think possible.” – Howard Schultz

“If people aren’t calling you crazy, you aren’t thinking big enough.” – Richard Branson

“Never, never, never give up.” – Winston Churchill

Killer Content

June 5, 2017September 26, 2017Leave a comment

Killer Content: Why it Matters, How to Get it

Guest Blog by Patrick Rea

Do the buyers you target know what you do… understand what makes you different… see clearly the value you deliver? Really?

Great content is essential at each stage of your sales and marketing process:-

FIrstly, simply to get attention and creating positive awareness. To stand out from the crowd

Then create interest and understanding about the problems you solve (you do solve problems, don’t you?)

Nurturing prospects, building trust and generating enquiries
Confirming with prospects that you would be the right partner to work with
Then reassuring them that they made the best decision to choose you
Finally, keeping them onboard, protecting the relationship from your competitors

But there is a problem.

Many organisations lack the structure and resources to succeed. To create the crisp, compelling content you need to fuel a high-activity programme through multiple media channels.

So what do you need? Here’s the checklist for a winning content programme:-

Hone your Corporate Message: Set out your specific offering for each market sector and job position (each ‘persona’): the problems you solve, how you solve them and for whom
Be ‘One Voice’ – but in many channels: Select and refine your messages for each media channel: email, blogs, social media, tele-marketing, presentations, PDFs, and others
Set your Campaign Objectives: You want more than a few retweets and new Friends. You want to meet measurable programme objectives for markets you influence, sales enquiries and conversions
Your Response Mechanism is Essential: Get your prospects to respond directly – such as by asking for your free PDFs, webinars, and other collateral. Show the value you deliver
Plan a ‘Multi-Channel’ Programme: This is proven to be the most effective DM strategy: combining email, tele-marketing, PR editorial – even posted letters and leaflets
Prioritise a Monthly Plan: You need a proper monthly plan that sets out target media, frequency and messaging. You must be consistent and persistent for a content campaign to succeed
Keep it Interesting. Don’t Bore Them: In the main you want short, compelling copy that grabs their attention from the off. Written as you speak and avoiding jargon
Make it topical: Great content is relevant and deals with current key issues for your target market. Do you know what the key dates and events are? Exhibitions, major contracts, industry forums, legislative impact?
Keep it regular: Selling is opportunistic. A prospect may have no interest or need today; but this time next month it may be a completely different matter
Be the ‘Subject Matter Experts’: You want to be the go-to company in your key sector; the recognised source of knowledge, help, news on applications and fixes for common problems. So write about the common problems in your sector
Follow-up with Tele-Sales: Yes, lookout for responses to your content – whether it is email click-throughs, Likes in LinkedIn or reTweets. Then follow-up with a quick call to qualify, to express interest and offer help. The sooner the better
In-House or Outsource for your Campaign? Do your staff really have the time or competence to produce professional content, consistently and persistently?
Save Time & Money, get Results: The Press Unit is a single source of content expertise for messaging and media channels. Fast turnaround by professional B2B and technical writers.

Guest Post – Patrick Rea

Leadership definition

June 1, 2017October 23, 20232 Comments

What is Leadership? How do you define Leadership in a concise sentence?

According to Forbes a leader has got nothing to do with title, seniority or position within an organisation, personal attributes and management are definitely not leadership.

So what is leadership then?

Some thought leaders of our time define leadership as…

Peter Drucker: “The only definition of a leader is someone who has followers.”

Warren Bennis: “Leadership is the capacity to translate vision into reality.”

Bill Gates: “As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others.”

John Maxwell: “Leadership is influence – nothing more, nothing less.”

“Leadership is the art of leading others to deliberately create a result that wouldn’t have happened otherwise.”

Forbes: “Leadership is a process of social influence, which maximizes the efforts of others, towards the achievement of a goal.”

Wikipedia: Leadership is “a process of social influence in which one person can enlist the aid and support of others in the accomplishment of a common task“.

My definition: “Leadership is the art of leading a group of people or an organization to execute a common task by providing a vision that they follow willingly through the inspiration received from the leader’s passion , knowledge, methodologies, approach and ability to influence the interests of all members and stakeholders.”

What CEOs are looking for in their CIO

May 24, 2017October 23, 2023Leave a comment

During the CIO-Dialogue 6 held in Brighton in November 2012, I had the privilege to listen to Simon La Fosse presenting. Simon, CEO of La Fosse Associates, is a specialist technology executive search and head-hunter with 25 years experience in the recruitment market.

What does a CEO really want from his CIO?… Simon presented the head-hunters perspective followed by a lively discussion. This presentation had a profoundly positive impact on my confidence especially after pondering on the key aspects that was highlighted (listed below) and measuring yourself to identify areas of strength and where I can improve.

What I took away from the interaction…

The CEO is looking for a CIO that he can build a professional relationship with. Someone they can trust to help them through the disruption technology is continuously causing in business.

The CIO must not be too involved in the daily operations as they have to see the bigger picture and spot opportunities through interaction with peers and bring those to the CEO in clear, concise, precise and commercial terms. To be able to do this the CIO needs a fantastic leadership team in place. Smart people that know how to do their job (see ‘Success?… People Come First’) and bring valuable feedback and management information to the CIO in support of the business. A leadership team that will give the CIO the time to focus on the bigger picture. Measuring your management team with the same criteria is important as your team in essence are the channel that will get the job done.

Key aspects that are personality trades and skills

that the CIO must possess to satisfy the CEO’s requirements…

Emotional Intelligence – Someone that understands and who can manage emotions. Emotions bridge thought, feeling and actions and affect many aspects of a person and hence teams. There are three aspects of the effect of emotions: Physical, Behavioural and Cognitive. How tuned in is your intuition to understand and manage emotions? Emotional intelligence is about two key principles: firstly it is about awareness, identifying and understanding emotions and secondly it is about using and managing emotions. Emotional intelligence is a key trade in the success of influence and motivation of people. How emotionally intelligent are you?
Ambition – CIOs have to have a desire for achievement, success, honor and the willingness to strive for it’s attainment. Ambitions drives change for the better which is should be a constant in any CIOs strategy and objectives.
Advocacy – Supporting the CIO in his business vision, mission and strategy and continuously recommending technology innovative ideas and plans in support of the his technology team to drive the success of the CIOs objectives.
Influence – Gravitas within his personality to be a compelling force in the organisation that effects peoples actions, behaviour, opinions, decisions for the better good of the business.
Assertiveness – Be confidently self assured and positive in his communication, strategy and decisions to build the confidence in others that the right things are going to happen. Someone that can stand his ground without being aggressive.
Authenticity – You get hired for the person you are. Be truthful to yourself and others and do not wear a mask at work.
Results – CEO are looking for results, getting the job done by not taking too high risk.
Simplicity – Do your thinking before hand and present to the CEO in a compelling way. Exercise the art of taking a complex subject and present it in a simple compelling way that enable the CEO to make knowledgeable and quick decisions.
Commerciality – Continuously keep an eye on the business commercials. Look for ways to improve the bottom line. How can you improve the revenue and reduce the cost? Question if the status quo are still relevant. Constantly drive improvements. Keep coming back with savings.
Dissatisfaction – Always look for ways to improve without demoralising your team. Evaluate and embrace innovative ideas.
Leadership – Leadership is the art of leading a group of people or an organization to execute a common task by providing a vision that they follow willingly through the inspiration received from the leader’s passion , knowledge, methodologies, and ability to influence the interests of all members and stakeholders. (see ‘Leadership by Definition‘) Do not just lead your technology team – lead from the top, also lead your piers – lead sideways. Be accountable and responsible.
Values – The basis for ethical action and believes. Values defines your sense for right and wrong. Values influence attitudes and behaviours. Ethical personal and cultural values are very important. Understand the business ethics and the values of your CEO.
Culture fit – Specifically referring to organisational culture which is the behaviour of the people working within the organisation. You must be getting on with people. Understand when the culture is changing and influence the change to the desired outcome.
Sector Knowledge – Know your subject (technology) in relation to the business but more importantly know your organisation’s product, their market and the opposition.
Supplier Relationships – Know the industry to bring options in supplier selection. Understand how the CEO wants this to be managed. Build meaningful and, more importantly, business valuable relationships. Aggressively manage the suppliers by always comparing and looking for the best value delivery – this is not always the cheapest option…
International Experience – We live a multi-cultural society where a dynamic mixture of races, languages and culture are working together in a global environment. The CIO must be confident and at ease in his environment through cultural understanding, exposure and experience gained through international exposure.
Agility – You must ensure that you and your organisation have the ability to rapidly respond to change without disrupting the stability to operations on a continuous basis.
Trust – The CEO is relying on the CIO and visa versa. Trust involves two parties with a ‘trustee’ and a ‘trustor’ – The trustor is reliant on the actions of the trustee. In the CEO and CIO relationship the trust is mutual to each other. Trust is the believe that the other will do as expected to ensure a positive outcome of a situation with an unknown outcome in the future. Trust is so key that if you loose the trust of the CEO, move on.
Accountability – According to Wiki is Accountability the acknowledgment and assumption of responsibility for actions, products, decisions, and policies including the administration, governance, and implementation within the scope of the role or employment position and encompassing the obligation to report, explain and be answerable for resulting consequences. The CEO has to know that the CIO will take accountability for the actions of his devision. CIOs have to take accountability with comments like: “leave this to us/ IT”, “it is our issue, we’ll sort it out”.
Complexity – Technology is complex but the CEO relies on the CIO to keep things simple. The CEO has lots on his mind and relies on the CIO to be short, precise and to the point explaining a complex situation or proposition in simple terms.
Surprise – Most CEO will agree with this, they just do not like surprises! Keep them informed so no situation or communication turns into a surprise.

A view additional trades and skills – from my perspective…

Visionary – Have the ability to read the current trends and envision the future. Have a clear and specific view of the future incorporating the advances in technology and social or political arrangements. Bring those views to the CIO to incorporate in his vision for the business.
Motivator – The ability to get the best out of people through your ability to understand, manage and work with people. This links in closely with Leadership and Emotional Intelligence. You must be able to motivate and keep your teams motivated to ensure optimum productivity and delivery to expectations.
Coach & Mentor – Build a relationship with your staff and piers to help encourages the lending of assistance, guidance and help. Nurture relationships of learning, open dialogue and challenge to drive towards greater knowledge, experience that ultimately leads to increased wisdom which in turn achieve the goals of the business.
Catalyst for Innovation – Encourage and reward the continuous renewing, changing and creating of move effective products, operational processes and business models to adapt to a changing environment. This links in with agility mentioned above.
Integrator – Be the person that ensures the forming components of an organisation, for example the different departments, sub systems, infrastructure, governance groups and teams, etc. sufficiently integrate with each other forming a single unit driving towards the same business objectives. Technology can and should provide the glue between the different components. To accomplish this, a very good understanding of the bigger picture of the organisation is needed. Innovation with different parts of the business will not deliver it full value without effective integration into the revenue streams of the business.

What other trades and skills do you feel is key for a CIO to fulfil the expectations of the CEO?

Let’s Talk – Are you looking to achieve your goals faster? Create better business value? Build strategies to improve growth? We can help – make contact!

Decision Making – Technique or Gut-feel

May 23, 2017March 20, 20181 Comment

Lessons in live, just like opportunities, sometimes come from the strangest sources or situations.

As I was driving from London to Canterbury University to meet an old colleague and friend, I tuned in to the radio station ‘Magic’. The presenter announced that it was time to give away some money to a lucky family for holiday spending money in a dial-in competition. The concept of the competition is that the presenter has a particular item in mind which the contestants must determine. The presenters provides a clue through asking a relevant question to which the answer is this particular item he has in mind. Contestants dial in and can ask two questions to determine what the item is the presenter has in mind, after which a final answer must be provided.

The relevant question was: “I am going to the beach to enjoy a lovely sunny day of sea and sand, what am I taking with me?” Now usually I would start solving a mystery question like this by means of elimination narrowing down the field of possibilities and thus zooming in onto the correct answer. For example asking an initial question like: “Do I use this item in the water or on the beach sand?” Dependent on the answer of either water or sand you’ll start narrowing things down by questioning if you use the item to play, can you eat or drink the item, etc. The catch is though that you can only ask two questions and then have to guess the correct answer. So you have to carefully think of which two questions to ask, while the clock is ticking…

An eleven-year-old boy won £1800 for his family in summer vacation spending money in playing the game? Instead of applying a problem solving technique like elimination, he went directly to obvious answers, which he phrased as questions. His first question was: “Is it a spade?” to which the presenter answered: “No, it is not a spade…”. His second question was: “Is it a bucket?” “Yes! It is a bucket, you just won your family £1800 in cash!” The presenter answered in delight.

This was making me think as I participated in my mind making up questions to determine the correct answer myself – by means of elimination… “Is it something that you use in the sea? No! Is it something you use on the sand? Yes, on the sand, right. Oh, my two questions are up, now I have to guess…”

What has just happened – the 11-year-old boy, who probably had no official training in problem solving techniques or skills, solved the mystery in two questions without having to guess an answer at the end.

As a director I am facing hundreds of questions and problems (sometimes mysteries) every day. Surely there is a lesson or two I could take away from this…?

Lesson 1 – go straight for the obvious, the chances are the answer is right in front of you and if you are right you save a lot of precious time.

Lesson 2 – sometimes you do not have to analyse the situation, applying sophisticated techniques and methodologies to make the right decision just go with your gut, take small steps, adapt as you go and recover quickly as needed. Almost like the Lean software development methodology that uses the concept “Fail Early, Fail Fast, Fail Often” to ensure measurable progress is rapidly delivered that aligns with end user expectation.

Now, you could argue that the boy was just lucky, which he was, but going for the obvious, keeping things simple, in most cases provides you with the right answer without spending wasted time and energy. If you tend to make things more complicated than they are, remember the old saying in engineering and development ring true, KISS – Keep It Simple Stupid!

AGILE Software Development – What business executives need to know

May 23, 2017January 4, 20234 Comments

AGILE Software Development – What business executives need to know

As a business executive how much do you really know about the Agile approach to software development? As the leaders within the company responsible for using technology innovation as an enabler to accelerate the business operations and improve the companies results, do you really understand your role and involvement in the technology development methodology used in your organisation? How can you direct the team if you do not understand the principals of the software development game?

All executives in businesses using an agile approach for software development must understand the basic principals, rules, practices and concepts of “Agile”. With an understanding of the methodology the software development team is following, a better understanding and appreciation of the team and their efforts are reached improving your ability to lead and direct the people involved across the business.

This series of Blog Posts provides an executive summary of the “Agile Software Development Approach” to get your tow in the water.

Agility is expected in modern software development and the customers assume that through appropriate planning, solutions are build with the ability to anticipate changes and to realign over time, as requirements and needs are changing.

Agile comes from the Latin word ‘agere’ which means “to do” – it means the ability to progress and change direction quickly and effectively while remaining in full control.

Software development delivering products and solutions, usually come about through the same phases within the business:

A need – The business has a particular demand and/or requirement and need a new software product or changes and enhancements to existing software solutions to address this demand and deliver value to the client and/or customers.
Funds – Budgets are drawn up and the business secures the availability of funds required to deliver the new project
Project Acceptance – The business stakeholders approves the software development project and it is chartered.
A Plan – Project Planning and Management is the fist but also a continuous key exercise in any project.
Execution – Build it!
Acceptance and Go-Live – The business accepts the software as fit for purpose, addressing the need and it is released into production.
Support – The provision of operational and technical support to keep the new software working after deployment into production.

In addressing this business need, software technology development teams follow a typical cycle – The Software Development Cycle:

Requirements –> Design & Architecture –> Functional Specifications & Use Cases –> Acceptance Criteria –> Technical Specifications –> Code Engineering –> Testing –> Deploy –> User Acceptance –> Production –> Support –> Requirements for a new cycle

In traditional software development, individual specialised groups of Business Analyst, Testers, Architects, Designers, Developers and Network Engineers completing each step by working through the full scope of the project before it is handed over to the next step. A lot of effort is spent in each of the steps and more time is spent in handing over documentation and knowledge from one step to the other until the project is done.

In agile software development, the entire project team, consisting of members from specialised groups, is responsible to complete small increments of working software that deliver value to the business. Collaboration, across the whole company and the end user, client or customer during the development of each increment, ensures the need is met. The full Software Development Lifecycle is followed in the development of each increment, which is concluded with a release of working software into production. Change is the only constant in today’s world, so the project planning is done one increment and release at a time starting with high-level functionality. More incremental releases are completed adding more detail to the functionality until the full project scope has been completed or until the business is satisfied that the need has been addressed.

Agile project management is not meant to replace formal project management methodologies, but to compliment it.

Agile Software Development’s Prime Goal: High value, high quality software, delivered quickly and frequently!

Agile is all about – expecting change through rapid feedback and interaction though-out the project; the ability to adapt and anticipate change events, delivering scalable components that address the stakeholder’s needs; parallel cycles of work delivery with good communication and progress feedback; keeping it simple assuming the lowest cost and simplest solution is the best; demonstrating the progress after each cycle and evaluate improvements to feedback into the next cycle.

Agile Framework

Being agile is all about being flexible and adaptable to continuous change. Agile project management can help to manage change consistently and effectively. It is all about thinking lean and making optimum use of resources as well as looking after the team though continuous interaction, coaching and mentoring to increase the performance.

Inception – Setting the project up for success

During inception all members of the team collaborate and define the outcomes of the project and what success looks like. The team grasps an understanding of the business requirements, meet the stakeholders, and compile a prioritised list of the features and functionality required broken down as “user stories”. The high level solution design and underlining technical architecture are compiled followed by an estimating exercise defining the high-level effort required to deliver the project scope.

Iteration 0 – Preparation that enables the team to be productive from Iteration 1

In this iteration preparations of the team’s workspace, tools and infrastructure are completed.

Execution – The execution consists of a series releases that each consists of a series of time-boxed iterations – also called sprints – where the software increments are planned, built (coded and tested), deployed and demonstrated to the stakeholders.

Closing – Was the business need met by this project delivery? Ensure everyone understands how the new changes introduced by the project will work in operations with appropriate handovers from the project team to the operational teams. The team does a retrospective to discuss the ‘Lessons Learned’ – What has worked well? What caused difficulties? What value and benefits were added? How accurate was the estimates? What should be done differently next time? These answers are an important feedback loop to continuous improvement.

Cycling through the iterations, the focus is on continuous improvement of the functionality, productivity and efficiency to optimize the use of funds and reduce waste. Through this constant cycle of adapting and learning, excellence becomes an reality.

Agile Methodologies: The next post give an executive overview of four of the most commonly used Agile Methodologies.

Let’s Talk – Are you looking to achieve your goals faster? Create better business value? Build strategies to improve growth? We can help – make contact!

Career Plan – Life Plan

May 19, 2017March 11, 20181 Comment

Having a career game-plan is so key in today’s ever changing and challenging employment environments!

With a global economy balancing on a knife’s edge for the last 10 years the meaning of ‘job security’ is somewhat of a myth. Never get yourself in the mindset that you are irreplaceable – we all are replaceable.

Five and half years ago a colleague and I recognised the need and importance of a career game plan. We realised that life is too short to not be actively planning where you want to be in your career in the future. Taking responsibility for your own destiny and happiness is a key aspect of feeling accomplished. Planning your future is taking responsibility for your own happiness. Quotes that holds true – “Planning is a waste of time, but not planning is planning to fail!”, “Plans are worthless, but planning is everything!” “A Plan never executed, holds no learning and hence no value!”

Realise this – the company you are employed by, will ever, at most, provide you with a certain level of opportunities that will assist you in your personal and career growth, there after – it is up to you to take the action to progress.

My life reality – 90% of my awake life, and more than often while I am sleeping as well, are spend working. Working to build your future either as an employee, an employer, a business owner, entrepreneur, etc. With this high percentage of my life spent working, it is understandable that my feelings towards the execution of my work defines the biggest part of who I am. The conclusion is that my career plan in essence IS my life plan…

I came across a very insightful and thought provoking article written by JT O’Donnel . In this article JT gives two examples of people progressing their careers. One is progressing with a career plan to stay secure within employment working towards the employers growth (working for an employer) and the other with career plan of personal growth working towards her life/career goals (working with an employer) – Working for an employer vs Working with an employer.

Which one are you…?

Success?.. People come first!

May 16, 2017December 15, 201913 Comments

Successful business, enabled through technology delivery, is a combination of a large amount of different factors of which smart people is a key ingredient. People make projects and business initiatives successful. People do the work. In technology, people define requirements, document the features, engineer the solution, write the code, develop the solution, build and configure the infrastructure, test the product, deploy the system into production and provide the technical after sales support services. It is people building the marketing collateral, following up on sales leads, completing proposal documents and presenting pitches. People work in teams doing the work as their job. At the head of every team is a leader who’s primary job should be the team.

Every single person, as an individual but also as a member of the team, has different needs. Fulfilling these needs is a large part of making people happy, effective and productive that results in successful work delivery.

The other part of success resides in the knowledge of and delivery capability in the different tasks that are executed within teams. These tasks can be grouped into distinct disciplines and every discipline has a key role to play in the team. Getting the team to work in synergy results in successes that defines the individual and the team. The ability to help people fulfill their needs, leads to successful work delivery and ultimately defines the successes of the leaders.

For a leader, knowing enough of each discipline within a successful team is essential – but what is enough knowledge when it comes to management?

In my view, enough is the knowledge and experience required to enable a manager to add value to each discipline, to facilitate decision-making and to align the ‘to do’ and ‘business as usual’ with the business vision, mission, objectives and strategy. This means being able to have a meaningful discussion with people, understanding, assisting and facilitating the resolution of their problems, ensuring people know what to do and why they are doing it without you having to tell them how to do it.

Smart people are hired because they are the experts in what they do. Your expertise as a manager should be management. If you have to tell people constantly how to do their jobs you have a serious problem – either you do not have the right people in the right roles that can be trusted to get the job done, and/or you do not have what it takes as a manager to get the best out of your staff…?

Smart people know how to do their jobs – why is a leader/manager needed then? People and teams require a leader to reinforce a purpose, to not just break down the tasks at hand into to-do’s but also to explain to them why it needs doing in the journey of accomplishing the purpose. Leaders are always there for their team during the execution of their role and support them in their actions, help them when the answer is not obvious. Understanding not just the disciplines but also each individual person within the team, will ensure the leader can facilitate individual needs fulfilment while keeping an eye on the teams deliverables to achieve the expected target.

Good leaders make decisions on the tough challenging questions and situations of which the answers and outcome are not obvious. They do this by using not only their own knowledge and experience but also the continuous input from the people in the team, applying the art of management. There is no right or wrong answer to these tough questions as every situation might be different – hence the art of management as it is not an exact science.

Want to be a success? For me it comes down to this fundamental point – People make or break a business. Smart people are a key ingredient to any successful business – no smart people, no business… People come first!

Let’s Talk – Are you looking to achieve your goals faster? Create better business value? Build strategies to improve growth? We can help – make contact!

Originally Published on 12 July 2013

Revolutionizing Healthcare Technology Management: Systems Powering Healthcare Case Study

November 16, 2016October 24, 2023Leave a comment

Introduction:
Systems Powering Healthcare, a leading healthcare technology solutions provider, faced a critical challenge in optimizing their service delivery. Renier Botha, the Managing Director, and Head of Service recognised the need for innovation and efficiency to meet the evolving demands of the healthcare industry. This case study explores how Botha’s strategic vision and decisive actions transformed Systems Powering Healthcare into a trailblazer in healthcare technology share service management solutions.

Background:
Systems Powering Healthcare specialised in providing cutting-edge technology solutions to healthcare providers, aiming to streamline operations and enhance patient care. Despite their reputation, the company grappled with inefficiencies in service delivery, leading to customer dissatisfaction and internal frustrations.

Challenges Faced:

Inefficient Service Delivery: Systems Powering Healthcare struggled with delays in product deployments and customer support, impacting client satisfaction.
Outdated Systems: Legacy software hindered the company’s ability to adapt to emerging technologies and market demands.
Competitive Pressure: Rising competition in the healthcare technology sector necessitated innovative solutions to maintain market leadership.

Renier Botha’s Strategy:
Renier Botha, recognizing the urgency of change, devised a multifaceted strategy to address these challenges.

Investment in R&D: Botha spearheaded a robust Research and Development initiative, focusing on developing state-of-the-art healthcare management software tailored to the unique needs of clients.
Process Optimization: He implemented lean methodologies, optimizing internal processes to reduce operational bottlenecks and enhance efficiency.
Talent Development: Botha championed training programs and talent acquisition, ensuring the team was equipped with the latest skills and knowledge.
Client-Centric Approach: Systems Powering Healthcare adopted a client-centric approach, actively engaging with customers to understand their needs and concerns, shaping product development accordingly.
Technological Upgrade: Outdated systems were replaced with cutting-edge technology, enabling the company to offer scalable and adaptable solutions.

Results:
Renier Botha’s strategic initiatives led to significant improvements at Systems Powering Healthcare:

Enhanced Service Delivery: Streamlined processes and innovative solutions reduced deployment times by 40%, delighting clients and improving customer satisfaction.
Market Leadership: Systems Powering Healthcare regained its competitive edge, securing new contracts and partnerships, expanding its market share.
Innovation Recognition: The company gained recognition for its innovative products, earning accolades and awards in the healthcare technology sector.
Revenue Growth: Efficient operations and increased client satisfaction translated into a 30% growth in revenue within the first year of implementing Botha’s strategies.
Employee Morale: Talent development and a focus on employee well-being improved morale, fostering a positive work environment and increasing productivity.

Conclusion:
Renier Botha’s visionary leadership and strategic acumen revitalized Systems Powering Healthcare, transforming it into a market leader in healthcare technology solutions. His emphasis on innovation, efficiency, and customer satisfaction not only resolved the company’s challenges but also positioned it for sustained success in the dynamic healthcare industry. This case study stands as a testament to the transformative power of strategic leadership in overcoming challenges and achieving organizational excellence.

O-ISM3 BASED HIGHLY MATURE ISMS MANAGEMENT

September 29, 2016February 24, 2018Leave a comment

SPHERE invests in knowledge training…

This course is specifically designed to improve your skills as an information security manager. Using O-ISM3 as a framework, you will master process management, and you will be able to:

Prioritize security efforts using business significant criteria
Communicate the value that Information Security Department brings to the organization
Design, implement and use information security metrics proven in the field, enabling short cycle continuous improvement
Simplify ISO27001 compliance
Complement ITIL security
Manage outsourced security services with SLA’s
Implement TOGAF and SABSA architectures.

O-ISM3 is an information security management maturity standard published by The Open Group, a leader in the development of open, vendor-neutral IT standards and certifications.

SPHERE, and other organizations like the Swiss Armed Forces, the National Bank of Panama and Bankia use O-ISM3. Our student, Pedro Valcárcel, a professional with 15 years’ experience in security said about the course: “This course opened my eyes. I wish I had taken it sooner”

Trainer Profile
Vicente Aceituno is the Senior Information Security Manager of SPHERE. He is leader of the standard Open Information Security Management Maturity Model; he has broad experience in outsourcing of security services and research. His focus is information security outsourcing, management and related fields like metrics and certification of ISMS.

Mark your calendar

London Course – Monday 12th to Wednesday 14th December 2016

What you will learn:

Deep understanding of complex security and management concepts
Alignment of security objectives with an organization’s mission
Classifying and setting requirements for information systems that satisfy security objectives
Communication of the value of information security
Access control management concepts
Implementation of security processes
Process management activities
Design, implementation and use of information security metrics
Understanding of the relationship between metrics, management practices, capability and maturity
Techniques for visualization of security metrics
Understanding of distribution of responsibilities concepts
ISM3-RA Risk Assessment
Management of Outsourced Security processes.

Course Outline

Day 1 – 9:00 – 17:00

Concepts: You will gain a deeper understanding of complex security concepts.
Assets & Goals: You will be able to set security objectives aligned with your organization’s mission, and you will be able to communicate what is the value that the information security department brings to the organization.
Security Objectives: You will be able to set requirements for information systems that satisfy security objectives.
Access Control: You will gain an understanding of the management ramifications of access control.
Classification of Systems: You will be able to prioritize efforts using business significant criteria for systems classification.
Activities & Deliverables: You will gain an understanding of the relationship between activity and achievement of goals.
Bottom-up Process Implementation: You will learn how to apply O-ISM3 to processes under your own responsibility.
Top-down Security Program: You will learn how to apply O-ISM3 when you have support from top IT management.

Day 2 – 9:00 – 17:00

General Processes: You will familiarize yourself with auxiliary but essential processes.
Strategic Processes: You will familiarize yourself with processes related to goals definition and provision of resources.
Tactical Processes: You will familiarize yourself with processes related to continuous improvement and resource distribution.
Operational Processes: You will familiarize yourself with technical hands-on processes.
Management Practices: You will learn the basics about process management activities.
Metrics: You will learn in detail how to design, implement and use information security metrics.
Maturity: You will become familiar with the relationship between metrics, management practices, capability and maturity.
Reports, Dashboards & Visualization: You will learn how to make the best of metrics, enabling interpretation and communication.

Day 3 – 9:00 – 17:00

Security Organization: You will understand how the distribution of responsibilities make processes tick, and how to avoid related risks.
Security Modelling: You will gain a working knowledge of advanced security models.
O-ISM3-RA: You will learn to perform a simple yet meaningful Risk Assessment.
ISO27001: You will learn how to make O-ISM3 help you with ISO27001 compliance.
IT Architecture: You will learn how to use O-ISM3 effectively with SABSA and TOGAF.
ITIL & SLA’s: You will learn how to complement ITIL with O-ISM3, and how to design SLA in order to manage outsourced security processes.
Certification: You will peek at O-ISM3’s certification process.
Techniques & References: You will learn general security techniques in order to treat security threats.
Recapitulation: You will look back at the last three days highlighting the most important ideas and concepts.

Who should attend
This course is designed for security professionals who are or have the goal to acquire management level responsibilities in their organizations.

Student/Instructor ratio
The maximum number of students is 10.

Book now
Contact security@sphere.services for details.

https://www.systemspoweringhealthcare.com/the-news/first-article/

Systems Powering Healthcare – Corporate Video

September 16, 2016February 24, 2018Leave a comment

SPHERE (Systems Powering Healthcare Ltd) is an IT Service Provider delivering IT Service Management and shared IT infrastructure services to the healthcare sector. In March 2015, the Chelsea & Westminster NHS Foundation Trust and the Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust moved to a shared service model for common IT functions through the formation of SPHERE (Systems Powering Healthcare Ltd). SPHERE, is a company jointly and wholly owned by Chelsea & Westminster Hospital and the Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trusts – it represents a collaboration and pooling of resources between the Trusts to deliver improved IT services to its members.

https://www.systemspoweringhealthcare.com

Writing the perfect LinkedIn Recommendation

September 15, 2016September 15, 2020Leave a comment

Step 1: Start With a Knockout Line

As with any good writing, you want to start with a line that grabs your audience and makes them want to read more. (After all, what good is a great recommendation if no one reads all the way through?)

Ideally, this line will show right away what an awesome person your recommendee is. Be careful, though, to avoid phrases like “one of the best” or “one of my favorite employees”—while, no, not everyone’s going to be the ultimate superlative, there are plenty of words and phrases that sound just as strong, but less qualified.

“It’s rare that you come across standout talent like Mike.”

“Few people have the opportunity to report to a manager who is also a coach and mentor—but I did when I worked for Susan.”

“‘Ridiculously efficient’ is the phrase that comes to mind when I think about Tim.”

Step 2: Describe Your Relationship

Next, you’ll want to give the reader some context as to how you know the person, including your reporting relationship, what you worked on together, and the length of time you’ve known each other. While you don’t have to give all the details (LinkedIn will show the company and both of your job titles on your recommendation), it’s important to let readers know why you’re qualified to give the recommendation. (And, of course, be sure to note that it was a positive working relationship!)

“I had the pleasure of working with Jim for two years at the Smith Company, collaborating on several project teams.”

“I hired Carrie as a freelance designer in 2011 after seeing her online portfolio, and she’s completed six flawless projects for me since then.”

“Mark expertly filled the role of social media coordinator for my company’s marketing team for just over a year.”

Step 3: Share a Standout Trait

If you’re recommending someone, there’s a good chance you think he or she is smart, talented, organized, wonderful to work with, the list goes on. So, there’s no need to use the limited characters in your recommendation to state the obvious.

Instead, think about one or two things this person does better than anything else—or that really stand out to you above others—and focus your recommendation there. You can also ask the person if there’s something he or she would like you to talk about: For example, if she was your executive assistant but is now applying to her first management role, she’ll likely want you to highlight her experience managing volunteers over her organizational skills.

“I was particularly impressed by Kelly’s ability to handle even the toughest clients—effortlessly. That skill often takes years to develop among customer service professionals, but it seemed to come perfectly naturally to her.”

“I was always in awe of Fred’s ability to command a room and get people on board with ideas—even people who were initially on completely different pages.”

“Matt’s ability to juggle multiple projects was unlike any I’ve seen before and made a dramatic difference in the productivity level of our team.”

Step 4: Add a Touch of Personality

Let’s face it: Everyone wants to hire someone who not only gets the job done, but who’s also great to work with. So, if you can share a tidbit about what it’s like to work with this person or some insight into his or her personality, do so! (Just, you know, know your audience. “Sophie planned the best office happy hours ever!” might not go over so well with her future employers.)

“Oh, and she made sure our Monday morning staff meetings were never without bagels and coffee. Talk about motivating a team!”

“And we still miss her on the office softball league!”

“No matter how tense a meeting, Annie made sure everyone left with a smile.”

Step 5: End With Your Solid Recommendation

Finally, it’s always nice to seal your recommendation with a final line that makes it clear that you give your contact an enthusiastic thumbs-up. You don’t need to do much here—think short, sweet, and solid.

“Allison would be an asset to any team.”

“As a team member or a leader, Steve earns my highest recommendation.”

“Any employee would be lucky to have Michelle as a manager.”

Try It!

While we recommend following the steps above to create a new recommendation for each contact, here’s a quick example of how to put them all together (and a template to use if you’re pressed for time!).

“[Descriptive phrase] is the phrase that comes to mind when I think about [name]. I’ve had the pleasure of knowing [name] for [length of time], during which [description of your working relationship]. Above all, I was impressed with [name]’s ability to [description of what makes person really stand out]. And, of course, his/her [personality trait]. [Name] would be a true asset for any positions requiring [1-2 skills needed for position] and comes with my heartfelt recommendation.”

That’s it—five steps, five lines, and five minutes to a recommendation that will make sure your contact shines.

Original article: https://www.themuse.com/advice/your-5minute-guide-to-writing-an-amazing-linkedin-recommendation

Welcome to Systems Powering Healthcare Limited (SPHERE)

February 22, 2016February 24, 2018Leave a comment

Letter to new joiners…

On behalf of everyone at SPHERE, I would like to welcome you to our dynamic ITservices company.

We’re excited that you have joined our team and I hope our excitement here at SPHERE will soon be your excitement as well.

Our culture puts our people first and for that reason we provide a progressive working environment that is supportive, diverse and flexible.

We care are about our clients, our members and have a passion for providing exceptional IT services.

We hope that you will enjoy working with us, and that this guide gives you an insight into life at SPHERE. It contains much of the information you’ll need in understanding

the context and culture of our business, including pertinent policies that we operate

under.

You can discover a little more about the business, and what is important to SPHERE

in delivering a fantastic service.

You will see that we have an energetic business proposition in SPHERE, and we looking forward to your contribution to add to our continued success and growth.

I sincerely hope that you enjoy your time with us, and that the challenges and rewards meet all of your expectations.

Best regards,

Renier Botha

Managing Director

MD’s Introduction Email to everyone@sphere

January 19, 2016October 28, 2018

Hello Everyone,

I am Renier Botha. As Neil announced recently, I’m the new Managing Director and Head of Service for SPHERE. I started in Dec’15 and have already met some of you but thought it might be helpful to introduce myself via email as well, acknowledge the great work of the team to date and to lay out some of our priorities to conclude the current financial year (FY) and compiling the future business plan.

It is a privilege to be taking on this leadership role. I have been engaged in executive freelance/interim leadership roles for the past two and half years following almost seven years with The Collinson Group.

I have focussed on building a career and reputation in business leadership

and direction through innovation and integration of technology products and services to improve the business value proposition and increase customer satisfaction, retention and business revenue. In these technology enabled journeys, I also place people first.

On a more personal level, I am married to Yolandi and we live in Kenley, Surrey. I enjoy the outdoors especially 4×4 and motorcycle adventures, photography, a good round of golf and I am a keen archer. Interests outside work, especially spending time close to nature, help me keep things in perspective and balance.

I would like to use this opportunity to congratulate each and everyone on taking the step in joining and establishing SPHERE. Starting a new technology business venture is never a small feat and SPHERE has accomplished a lot already, in the mere ten months of operation, in setting the bar on best practise in IT service delivery within the NHS. This is testimony to your commitment and efforts as a team and to the solid leadership of Neil Walker, whom I would like to personally thank for his support and wish him all the best for the future.

I am looking forward to get to know you all better, and mutually sharing/listening as together we scope our future Team Performance Acceleration Plan. As a brief heads-up, some of the emerging imminent priorities for us – which I shall be sense-checking with you – appear to be as follows:

Status reporting on progress against this year’s business plan
Compiling our business plan for the coming year
Moving to a per user financial model
Focus on completing the remediation and transformation programme
On-boarding West Middlesex Hospital
Work to mature our Target Operating Model, business procedures, best practise frameworks and processes
Mature & commercialise our Service Catelogue and use it to grow the business
Continuous improvement through innovation and integration
In the meantime the SMT is scheduling a series of one-to-one sessions.

Let me close by saying that I’m looking forward to working with you all. See you on Friday 22 Jan’16 at the staff meeting and looking forward to meet you at the Waterside afterwards.

Regards

Renier

Leadership Styles

January 11, 2016March 19, 20181 Comment

1. Autocratic Leadership
Autocratic leadership is an extreme form of transactional leadership, where leaders have a lot of power over their people. Staff and team members have little opportunity to make suggestions, even if these would be in the team’s or the organization’s best interest.

The benefit of autocratic leadership is that it’s incredibly efficient. Decisions are made quickly, and work gets done efficiently. The downside is that most people resent being treated this way. Therefore, autocratic leadership can often lead to high levels of absenteeism and high staff turnover. However, the style can be effective for some routine and unskilled jobs: in these situations, the advantages of control may outweigh the disadvantages.

Autocratic leadership is often best used in crises, when decisions must be made quickly and without dissent. For instance, the military often uses an autocratic leadership style; top commanders are responsible for quickly making complex decisions, which allows troops to focus their attention and energy on performing their allotted tasks and missions.

2. Bureaucratic Leadership
Bureaucratic leaders work “by the book.” They follow rules rigorously, and ensure that their people follow procedures precisely. This is an appropriate leadership style for work involving serious safety risks (such as working with machinery, with toxic substances, or at dangerous heights) or where large sums of money are involved. Bureaucratic leadership is also useful in organizations where employees do routine tasks (as in manufacturing).

The downside of this leadership style is that it’s ineffective in teams and organizations that rely on flexibility, creativity, or innovation.
Much of the time, bureaucratic leaders achieve their position because of their ability to conform to and uphold rules, not because of their qualifications or expertise. This can cause resentment when team members don’t value their expertise or advice.

3. Charismatic Leadership
A charismatic leadership style can resemble transformational leadership because these leaders inspire enthusiasm in their teams and are energetic in motivating others to move forward. This ability to create excitement and commitment is an enormous benefit.

The difference between charismatic leaders and transformational leaders lies in their intention. Transformational leaders want to transform their teams and organizations. Charismatic leaders are often focused on themselves, and may not want to change anything.

The downside to charismatic leaders is that they can believe more in themselves than in their teams. This can create the risk that a project or even an entire organization might collapse if the leader leaves. A charismatic leader might believe that she can do no wrong, even when others are warning her about the path she’s on; and this feeling of invincibility can ruin a team or an organisation.

Also, in the followers’ eyes, success is directly connected to the presence of the charismatic leader. As such, charismatic leadership carries great responsibility, and it needs a long-term commitment from the leader.

4. Democratic/Participative Leadership
Democratic leaders make the final decisions, but they include team members in the decision-making process. They encourage creativity, and team members are often highly engaged in projects and decisions.
There are many benefits of democratic leadership. Team members tend to have high job satisfaction and are productive because they’re more involved in decisions. This style also helps develop people’s skills. Team members feel in control of their destiny, so they’re motivated to work hard by more than just a financial reward.

Because participation takes time, this approach can slow decision-making, but the result is often good. The approach can be most suitable when working as a team is essential, and when quality is more important than efficiency or productivity.

The downside of democratic leadership is that it can often hinder situations where speed or efficiency is essential. For instance, during a crisis, a team can waste valuable time gathering people’s input. Another downside is that some team members might not have the knowledge or expertise to provide high quality input.

5. Laissez-Faire Leadership
This French phrase means “leave it be,” and it describes leaders who allow their people to work on their own. This type of leadership can also occur naturally, when managers don’t have sufficient control over their work and their people.

Laissez-faire leaders may give their teams complete freedom to do their work and set their own deadlines. They provide team support with resources and advice, if needed, but otherwise don’t get involved.
This leadership style can be effective if the leader monitors performance and gives feedback to team members regularly. It is most likely to be effective when individual team members are experienced, skilled, self-starters.

The main benefit of laissez-faire leadership is that giving team members so much autonomy can lead to high job satisfaction and increased productivity.

The downside is that it can be damaging if team members don’t manage their time well or if they don’t have the knowledge, skills, or motivation to do their work effectively.

6. People-Oriented/Relations-Oriented Leadership
With people-oriented leadership, leaders are totally focused on organizing, supporting, and developing the people on their teams. This is a participatory style and tends to encourage good teamwork and creative collaboration. This is the opposite of task-oriented leadership.
People-oriented leaders treat everyone on the team equally. They’re friendly and approachable, they pay attention to the welfare of everyone in the group, and they make themselves available whenever team members need help or advice.

The benefit of this leadership style is that people-oriented leaders create teams that everyone wants to be part of. Team members are often more productive and willing to take risks, because they know that the leader will provide support if they need it.

The downside is that some leaders can take this approach too far; they may put the development of their team above tasks or project directives.

7. Servant Leadership
This term, created by Robert Greenleaf in the 1970s, describes a leader often not formally recognized as such. When someone at any level within an organization leads simply by meeting the needs of the team, he or she can be described as a “servant leader.”

Servant leaders often lead by example. They have high integrity and lead with generosity. In many ways, servant leadership is a form of democratic leadership because the whole team tends to be involved in decision making. However, servant leaders often “lead from behind,” preferring to stay out of the limelight and letting their team accept recognition for their hard work.

Supporters of the servant leadership model suggest that it’s a good way to move ahead in a world where values are increasingly important, and where servant leaders can achieve power because of their values, ideals, and ethics. This is an approach that can help to create a positive corporate culture and can lead to high morale among team members.

However, other people believe that in competitive leadership situations, people who practice servant leadership can find themselves left behind by leaders using other leadership styles. This leadership style also takes time to apply correctly: it’s ill-suited in situations where you have to make quick decisions or meet tight deadlines.

Although you can use servant leadership in many situations, it’s often most practical in politics, or in positions where leaders are elected to serve a team, committee, organisation, or community.

8. Task-Oriented Leadership
Task-oriented leaders focus only on getting the job done and can be autocratic. They actively define the work and the roles required, put structures in place, and plan, organize, and monitor work. These leaders also perform other key tasks, such as creating and maintaining standards for performance.

The benefit of task-oriented leadership is that it ensures that deadlines are met, and it’s especially useful for team members who don’t manage their time well.

However, because task-oriented leaders don’t tend to think much about their team’s well-being, this approach can suffer many of the flaws of autocratic leadership, including causing motivation and retention problems.

9. Transactional Leadership
This leadership style starts with the idea that team members agree to obey their leader when they accept a job. The “transaction” usually involves the organization paying team members in return for their effort and compliance. The leader has a right to “punish” team members if their work doesn’t meet an appropriate standard.

Although this might sound controlling and paternalistic, transactional leadership offers some benefits. For one, this leadership style clarifies everyone’s roles and responsibilities. Another benefit is that, because transactional leadership judges team members on performance, people who are ambitious or who are motivated by external rewards – including compensation – often thrive.

The downside of this leadership style is that team members can do little to improve their job satisfaction. It can feel stifling, and it can lead to high staff turnover.

Transactional leadership is really a type of management, not a true leadership style, because the focus is on short-term tasks. It has serious limitations for knowledge-based or creative work. However, it can be effective in other situations.

10. Transformational Leadership
Transformation leadership is often the best leadership style to use in business situations.
Transformational leaders are inspiring because they expect the best from everyone on their team as well as themselves. This leads to high productivity and engagement from everyone in their team.
The downside of transformational leadership is that while the leader’s enthusiasm is passed onto the team, he or she can need to be supported by “detail people.”

That’s why, in many organisations, both transactional and transformational leadership styles are useful. Transactional leaders (or managers) ensure that routine work is done reliably, while transformational leaders look after initiatives that add new value.
It’s also important to use other leadership styles when necessary – this will depend on the people you’re leading and the situation that you’re in.

Book Summary: “Staying in the Helicopter: The Key to Sustained Strategic Success” by Richard Harrop

January 5, 2016June 5, 2024Leave a comment

“Staying in the Helicopter: The Key to Sustained Strategic Success” by Richard Harrop is a business leadership book that emphasises the importance of maintaining a strategic, high-level perspective to achieve long-term success. Harrop uses the metaphor of “staying in the helicopter” to illustrate the necessity for leaders to rise above daily operations and view their organisation and its environment from a broader perspective.

Key themes of the book include:

Strategic Vision: Encourages leaders to develop and maintain a clear, long-term vision for their organisations.
Adaptability: Stresses the need for organisations to be flexible and adaptable in response to changing market conditions.
Leadership Skills: Discusses the qualities and skills necessary for effective leadership, including decision-making, communication, and the ability to inspire and motivate others.
Continuous Improvement: Advocates for a culture of continuous learning and improvement within organisations.
Balanced Perspective: Emphasises balancing short-term operational demands with long-term strategic goals.

Through practical advice, case studies, and personal anecdotes, Harrop provides insights and tools for leaders to enhance their strategic thinking and ensure sustained success in their organisations.

As a senior business leader, I highly recommend reading “Staying in the Helicopter: The Key to Sustained Strategic Success” by Richard Harrop. This book has been invaluable in helping me understand the importance of maintaining a high-level perspective while managing the complexities of daily operations. Harrop’s practical advice and compelling case studies provide the tools needed to balance immediate demands with long-term vision, ensuring sustained success and growth. This guide has enhanced my strategic thinking and enabled me to lead my organisation with greater clarity and foresight.

New Amberlight chief executive heralds a fresh emphasis on design

May 25, 2015January 19, 2018Leave a comment

LONDON, May”15 — Change is afoot here at Amberlight – some very exciting changes that mean our clients will see a new, improved service from our executives, consultants and researchers.

Renier Botha is our new Chief Executive Officer, while our founder, Mark Milton, is moving to a new role as Chief Innovation Officer. Together, they will be driving Amberlight forward to add a new dimension to our services, with a new focus on design.

Amberlight has always been an experience design company but sometimes that has taken second place to our reputation as the market leader in user research. Renier is putting design back at the heart of Amberlight’s proposition.

“We want to have a deeper relationship with our clients,” Renier says. “Amberlight is renowned for having one of the finest user research teams out there. Our research suggests that not everyone realises the work of our design practice.“

“For years Amberlight has worked on design from concept to completed service, and the rigour of our user research teams ensures that our clients launch needed services that people love to use. So we’re going to be doing much more of that in the future.”

Renier joins the team from Regus PLC, the international workplace provider, where he was Global Head of Systems and Head of Professional Services. He has a reputation as an accomplished leader, with a track record of working with high-growth software companies across multiple market verticals, and brings a mix of leadership, inspiration, operational experience, technical breadth, and passion for customer care.

He is impressed by Amberlight’s history as a company with market-leading expertise in user experience research and design.

“As a technologist at heart, I am excited to see so many new opportunities and I am deeply honoured to have this opportunity to lead the Amberlight team during this important time of transformation,” he says.

“Amberlight has a long history in experience design, connecting end users with products. We are well positioned to tap into the continuous opportunities in technology innovation. The incredible talent and passion of the Amberlight team provide us with a unique opportunity to help shape the future of our clients.”

With Mark taking on the role of Chief Innovation Officer, Renier is excited about the possibilities that come from embedding change in the organisation structure.

“By concentrating on innovation and growth initiatives we are planning to expand on the strong foundation we have built over the past fifteen years,” Renier says. “We will also continue to develop industry-leading user experience research, design and product development expertise that drives our client technologies and products across a diverse set of markets to secure sustainable and profitable growth.”

Mark cofounded Amberlight in 2000 and he has spent the last few months acting as interim managing director trying to map out a new future for us, and as part of that process found Renier.

“I am proud to welcome such an experienced industry professional as Renier to lead the company as CEO. He will be building on the strengths of the company and working with our clients to shape the future of the business.”

As the new Chief Innovation Officer, Mark will be responsible for managing the innovation process inside Amberlight. His role will be to identify strategies, business opportunities and new technologies and to develop ideas for new products and services.

He will also be developing new capabilities and architectures with partners, new business models and new industry structures to serve those opportunities.

“I’m excited to be able to focus on the area in which I can make the most significant contribution.

“Working with Renier means that I can focus exclusively on our future with and help ensure that the business is agile in responding to the needs of a developing market.”

Amberlight strengthens with new appointments to senior management team

May 25, 2015January 19, 2018Leave a comment

May’15 – Amberlight today announces several high-level changes to its board and senior management team.

Renier Botha is appointed as Chief Executive Officer, while co-founder Mark Milton is taking on the role of Chief Innovation Officer.

They take up their positions with immediate effect.

Renier joins the team from Regus PLC where he was Global Head of Systems and Head of Professional Services. Renier is an accomplished leader, with a track record of working with high-growth software companies across multiple market verticals. He brings a great mix of leadership, inspiration, operational experience, technical breadth, and passion for customer care. He will be responsible for working with the team to deliver against the company strategy.

Mark Milton, the company Chairman, moves from interim MD to take a permanent executive role as Chief Innovation Officer where he will lead the innovation process. His role will be to identify strategies, business opportunities and new technologies and develop new capabilities and architectures with partners and new business models to serve those opportunities.

Renier Botha said: “As a technologist at heart, I am excited to see so many new opportunities and I am deeply honoured to have this opportunity to lead the Amberlight team during this important time of transformation.

“Amberlight has a long history in experience design, creating needed services that people love to use. We are well positioned to tap into the continuous opportunities in technology innovation and have a unique opportunity to help shape the future of our clients.

“Amberlight has a deep experience in product design, connecting end users with products. We are well positioned to tap into the continuous opportunities in technology innovation.

“By concentrating on innovation and growth initiatives we are planning to expand on the strong foundation we have built over the past fifteen years.

“We will also continue to develop industry-leading user experience research, design and product development expertise that drives our client technologies and products across a diverse set of markets to secure sustainable and profitable growth.

“I look forward to work with the newly appointed leadership and every member of the Amberlight team.”

Mark Milton said: “I am proud to welcome such an experienced industry professional as Renier to lead the company as CEO. He will be building on the strengths of the company and working with our clients to shape the future of the business.”

“I’m excited to be able to focus on the area in which I can make the most significant contribution.

“Working with Renier means that I can focus exclusively on our future and with help ensure that the business is agile in responding to the needs of a developing market.”

Case Study: IT Transformation and Operational Excellence at Regus

April 15, 2015May 24, 2024Leave a comment

Background:

Regus, a global leader in providing flexible workspaces and business solutions, faced the challenge of enhancing its IT systems and professional services to meet the growing demands of a dynamic market. To address this, Regus appointed Renier Botha from renierbotha Ltd, as the Global Head of Systems and Professional Services on a contractual basis. Renier’s objective was to lead the IT Systems and Professional Services teams, ensuring the delivery of a comprehensive portfolio of IT programmes and projects, and maintaining high availability of operational IT systems across 25 countries.

Challenges:

Diverse Geographical Presence: Regus operated in 25 countries, each with unique IT needs and challenges, requiring a cohesive global strategy.
Legacy Systems: Outdated legacy systems led to technical debt, hindering operational efficiency and scalability.
Operational Costs: High operational costs required optimisation without compromising service quality.

Solution:

Renier Botha, with his expertise, initiated a transformative approach focusing on efficient IT service delivery, cost optimisation, and integration of modern technologies.

Achievements:

Strategic Leadership: Renier led a team of 105 multi-disciplined technologists across 25 countries. His strategic vision and effective team management ensured streamlined operations and standardised services globally.
IT Department Transformation: Renier developed a comprehensive IT Department transformation plan. By modelling technology requirements into a service delivery framework, the plan accomplished an annual operational saving of £3.6m. This was achieved through process optimisation, resource reallocation, and leveraging cost-effective technologies.
Oracle Sales Cloud Deployment: Renier successfully programme managed the deployment of Oracle Sales Cloud, a £7m initiative covering 32 projects and workstreams. This integration of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and Customer Relations Management (CRM) solutions replaced legacy systems, reducing technical debt and improving operational agility.

Results:

Operational Efficiency: The implementation of the IT transformation plan significantly enhanced operational efficiency. Standardised processes and optimised resource allocation led to streamlined operations, reducing costs and improving productivity.
Modernised IT Infrastructure: The deployment of Oracle Sales Cloud and integration of ERP and CRM solutions modernised Regus’ IT infrastructure. This enhanced system performance, scalability, and flexibility, enabling Regus to adapt swiftly to market changes and customer demands.
Cost Optimisation: Through strategic planning and efficient resource allocation, Renier achieved an annual operational saving of £3.6m. These savings were reinvested into innovation and further enhancing customer experience, ensuring long-term sustainability.

Conclusion:

Renier Botha’s tenure as the Global Head of Systems and Professional Services at Regus exemplifies how strategic leadership, meticulous planning, and effective team management can drive transformative change within a global organisation. By optimising operational efficiency, integrating modern technologies, and achieving significant cost savings, Renier not only enhanced Regus’ IT capabilities but also positioned the company for sustained growth in a competitive market. His achievements stand as a testament to the impact of visionary leadership on organisational success and operational excellence.

Mastering Cashflow Management: Essential Strategies for Sustaining Financial Health

March 29, 2015May 29, 2024Leave a comment

Cashflow management is a critical component of any successful business strategy. It involves the process of monitoring, analysing, and optimising the flow of money in and out of your business. Effective cashflow management ensures that your business has the liquidity needed to meet its obligations, invest in opportunities, and avoid financial distress. Here’s what good cashflow management entails and how you can achieve it.

Understanding Cashflow Management

Cashflow is the net amount of cash moving into and out of a business at any given time. Positive cashflow indicates that a company’s liquid assets are increasing, enabling it to settle debts, reinvest in the business, return money to shareholders, and provide a buffer against future financial challenges. Conversely, negative cashflow means a business’s liquid assets are decreasing.

The Importance of Good Cashflow Management

Operational Stability: Ensures you can cover daily expenses such as salaries, rent, and utilities.
Investment Opportunities: Provides the capital needed to invest in new projects or technologies.
Debt Management: Helps you manage and reduce debt by ensuring timely repayments.
Financial Planning: Facilitates better planning and forecasting for future growth.
Crisis Mitigation: Acts as a buffer against unforeseen financial setbacks.

Key Strategies for Good Cashflow Management

Regular Monitoring and Forecasting
- Cashflow Statements: Regularly prepare and review cashflow statements to understand your financial position.
- Forecasting: Create cashflow forecasts to predict future cash needs and identify potential shortfalls.
Optimise Receivables
- Invoicing: Send invoices promptly and follow up on overdue payments.
- Payment Terms: Offer incentives for early payments and establish clear payment terms.
- Credit Management: Perform credit checks on new customers and set credit limits.
Manage Payables
- Negotiation: Negotiate favourable terms with suppliers to extend payment periods without incurring penalties.
- Prioritisation: Prioritise critical expenses and defer non-essential payments if necessary.
Control Overheads
- Cost Control: Regularly review and cut unnecessary expenses. Implement cost-saving measures such as energy efficiency or outsourcing non-core activities.
- Budgeting: Stick to a strict budget and avoid impulsive spending.
Maintain Adequate Reserves
- Emergency Fund: Set aside a portion of your profits into a reserve fund to cover unexpected expenses or cash shortfalls.
- Liquidity Management: Ensure that you have enough liquid assets to cover short-term obligations.
Diversify Revenue Streams
- Product/Service Diversification: Expand your product or service offerings to create multiple revenue streams.
- Market Expansion: Enter new markets to spread risk and increase revenue opportunities.
Leverage Technology
- Accounting Software: Use accounting software to automate cashflow tracking and reporting.
- Financial Tools: Implement financial management tools for better insights and decision-making.
Access to Credit
- Credit Lines: Establish lines of credit with banks to provide a safety net during cashflow shortages.
- Investor Relations: Maintain good relationships with investors and financial institutions for potential funding.

Achieving Good Cashflow Management

Achieving good cashflow management requires discipline, strategic planning, and continuous monitoring. Here’s a step-by-step approach:

Assess Your Current Cashflow: Start by reviewing your current cashflow situation. Identify patterns, peak periods, and potential issues.
Set Clear Goals: Define what you want to achieve with your cashflow management. This could be reducing debt, saving for expansion, or stabilising operational finances.
Create a Cashflow Forecast: Based on historical data and future projections, create a detailed cashflow forecast.
Implement Controls: Put in place controls for monitoring and managing cashflow. This includes regular reviews, adjusting strategies as needed, and using technology for accurate tracking.
Engage Stakeholders: Ensure that all relevant parties, including employees, suppliers, and investors, are aware of your cashflow management strategies and goals.
Review and Adapt: Continuously review your cashflow and adjust your strategies based on the changing business environment.

Good cashflow management is the lifeblood of a thriving business. By implementing these strategies, you can ensure that your business remains financially healthy, resilient, and poised for growth.

Structure Technology for Success – using SOA

September 17, 2014October 28, 20182 Comments

How do you structure your technology department for success?

What is your definition of success?

Business success is usually measured in monetary terms – does the business make a profit, does the business grow?

What is the value contribution on IT within the business?

Are the IT staff financially intelligent & commercially aware?

Renier spoke at Meet-Up about how you can design your IT function, using Service Orientated Architecture (SOA) to design a Service Orientated Organisation (SOO), to directly contribute to the business success.

Slide Presentation pdf: Structure Technology for Success

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Management Communication Plan

August 18, 2014July 31, 20194 Comments

https://www.pmi.org/learning/library/secrets-running-project-status-meetings-7009

A good project Communications Management Plan ensures that you have effective communications throughout the life of your project. Everyone knows that 80% of a Project Manager’s time is spent communicating; therefore, to be an effective Project Manager you must have good communications skills. Our Communications Management Plan template helps you to think through the communication requirements for your project and plan for the most effective communications. This template is based on the communications guidelines according to the fourth edition of the PMBOK.

If you like this Communications Management Plan Template please do share with your colleagues.

COMMUNICATIONS MANAGEMENT PLAN TEMPLATE

Introduction

The purpose of the Communications Management Plan is to define the communication requirements for the project and how information will be distributed. The Communications Management Plan defines the following:

What information will be communicated—to include the level of detail and format
How the information will be communicated—in meetings, email, telephone, web portal, etc.
When information will be distributed—the frequency of project communications both formal and informal
Who is responsible for communicating project information
Communication requirements for all project stakeholders
What resources the project allocates for communication
How any sensitive or confidential information is communicated and who must authorize this
How changes in communication or the communication process are managed
The flow of project communications
Any constraints, internal or external, which affect project communications
Any standard templates, formats, or documents the project must use for communicating
An escalation process for resolving any communication-based conflicts or issues

This Communications Management Plan sets the communications framework for this project. It will serve as a guide for communications throughout the life of the project and will be updated as communication needs change. This plan identifies and defines the roles of persons involved in this project. It also includes a communications matrix which maps the communication requirements of this project. An in-depth guide for conducting meetings details both the communications rules and how the meetings will be conducted, ensuring successful meetings. A project team directory is included to provide contact information for all stakeholders directly involved in the project.

Communications Management Approach

Approximately 80% of a Project Manager’s time is spent communicating. Think about it – as a Project Manager you are spending most of your time measuring and reporting on the performance of the project, composing and reading emails, conducting meetings, writing the project plan, meeting with team members, overseeing work being performed, meeting with clients over lunch and many more activities related to your projects.

You should give considerable thought to how you want to manage communications on this project. By having a solid communications management approach you’ll find that many project management problems can be avoided. In this section give an overview of your communications management approach.

The Project Manager will take a proactive role in ensuring effective communications on this project. The communications requirements are documented in the Communications Matrix presented in this document. The Communications Matrix will be used as the guide for what information to communicate, who is to do the communicating, when to communicate it and to whom to communicate.

As with most project plans, updates or changes may be required as the project progresses or changes are approved. Changes or updates may be required due to changes in personnel, scope, budget, or other reasons. Additionally, updates may be required as the project matures and additional requirements are needed. The project manager is responsible for managing all proposed and approved changes to the communications management plan. Once the change is approved, the project manager will update the plan and supporting documentation and will distribute the updates to the project team and all stakeholders. This methodology is consistent with the project’s Change Management Plan and ensures that all project stakeholders remain aware and informed of any changes to communications management.

Communications Management Constraints

All projects are subject to limitations and constraints as they must be within scope and adhere to budget, scheduling, and resource requirements. Project planning and documentation are no exception to this rule. There may also be legislative, regulatory, technology, or organizational policy requirements which must be followed as part of communications management. These constraints must be clearly understood and communicated to all stakeholders. While communications management is arguably one of the most important aspects of project management, it must be done in an effective manner and within the constraints of the allocated budget, time, and resources.

All project communication activities will occur within the project’s approved budget, schedule, and resource allocations. The project manager is responsible for ensuring that communication activities are performed by the project team and without external resources which will result in exceeding the authorized budget. Communication activities will occur in accordance with the frequencies detailed in the Communication Matrix in order to ensure the project adheres to schedule constraints. Any deviation of these timelines may result in excessive costs or schedule delays and must be approved by the project sponsor.

ABC Corp. organizational policy states that where applicable, standardized formats and templates must be used for all formal project communications. The details of these policy requirements are provided in the section titled “Standardization of Communication” in this document.

ABC Corp. organizational policy also states that only a Vice President or higher level employee may authorize the distribution of confidential information. The project manager is responsible for ensuring that approval is requested and obtained prior to the distribution of any confidential information regarding this project.

Stakeholder Communication Requirements

Most projects consist of a broad range of stakeholders all of whom may have differing interests and influence on the project. As such, it is important for project teams to determine the communication requirements of these stakeholders in order to more effectively communicate project information. There are a number of methods for determining stakeholder communication requirements; however, it is imperative that they are completely understood in order to effectively manage their interest, expectations, and influence and ensure a successful project.

As part of identifying all project stakeholders, the project manager will communicate with each stakeholder in order to determine their preferred frequency and method of communication. This feedback will be maintained by the project manager in the project’s Stakeholder Register. Standard project communications will occur in accordance with the Communication Matrix; however, depending on the identified stakeholder communication requirements, individual communication is acceptable and within the constraints outlined for this project.

In addition to identifying communication preferences, stakeholder communication requirements must identify the project’s communication channels and ensure that stakeholders have access to these channels. If project information is communicated via secure means or through internal company resources, all stakeholders, internal and external, must have the necessary access to receive project communications.

Once all stakeholders have been identified and communication requirements are established, the project team will maintain this information in the project’s Stakeholder Register and use this, along with the project communication matrix as the basis for all communications.

Roles

Project Sponsor
The project sponsor is the champion of the project and has authorized the project by signing the project charter. This person is responsible for the funding of the project and is ultimately responsible for its success. Since the Project Sponsor is at the executive level communications should be presented in summary format unless the Project Sponsor requests more detailed communications.

Program Manager
The Program Manager oversees the project at the portfolio level and owns most of the resources assigned to the project. The Program Manager is responsible for overall program costs and profitability as such they require more detailed communications than the Project Sponsor.

Key Stakeholders
Normally Stakeholders includes all individuals and organizations who are impacted by the project. For this project we are defining a subset of the stakeholders as Key Stakeholders. These are the stakeholders with whom we need to communicate with and are not included in the other roles defined in this section. The Key Stakeholders includes executive management with an interest in the project and key users identified for participation in the project.

Change Control Board
Also knows as the Change Authorisation Board or CAB, the Change Control Board is a designated group which reviews technical specifications and authorizes changes within the organizations infrastructure. Technical design documents, user impact analysis and implementation strategies are typical of the types of communication this group requires.

Customer
You should identify the customer if the project is the result of a solicitation. In such a case, the customer will be involved in reviewing prototypes, approval of designs and implementation stages and acceptance of the final project the project generates.

The customer for this project is . As the customer who will be accepting the final deliverable of this project they will be informed of the project status including potential impacts to the schedule for the final deliverable or the product itself.

Project Manager
The Project Manager has overall responsibility for the execution of the project. The Project Manager manages day to day resources, provides project guidance and monitors and reports on the projects metrics as defined in the Project Management Plan. As the person responsible for the execution of the project, the Project Manager is the primary communicator for the project distributing information according to this Communications Management Plan.

Project Team (Working Groups)
The Project Team is comprised of all persons who have a role performing work on the project. The project team needs to have a clear understanding of the work to be completed and the framework in which the project is to be executed. Since the Project Team is responsible for completing the work for the project they played a key role in creating the Project Plan including defining its schedule and work packages. The Project Team requires a detailed level of communications which is achieved through day to day interactions with the Project Manager and other team members along with weekly team meetings. Depending on the nature of the work, the project team can be organised into Working Groups.

Steering Committee
The Steering Committee includes management representing the departments which make up the organization. The Steering Committee provides strategic oversight for changes which impact the overall organization. The purpose of the Steering Committee is to ensure that changes within the organization are effected in such a way that it benefits the organization as a whole. The Steering Committee requires communication on matters which will change the scope of the project and its deliverables.

Technical Lead
The Technical Lead is a person on the Project Team who is designated to be responsible for ensuring that all technical aspects of the project are addressed and that the project is implemented in a technically sound manner. The Technical Lead is responsible for all technical designs, overseeing the implementation of the designs and developing as-build documentation. The Technical Lead requires close communications with the Project Manager and the Project Team.

Project Team Directory

The following table presents contact information for all persons identified in this communications management plan. The email addresses and phone numbers in this table will be used to communicate with these people.

Role	Name	Title	Organization/ Department	Email	Phone
Project Sponsor	A. White	VP of Technology	IT	a.white@abc.com	(555) 555-1212
Program Manager	B. Brown	PMO Manager	PMO	b.brown@abc.com	(555) 555-1213
Project Manager	C. Black	Project Manager	PMO	c.black@abc.com	(555) 555-1212
Project Stakeholders	See Stakeholder Register	See Stakeholder Register	See Stakeholder Register	See Stakeholder Register	See Stakeholder Register
Customer	J. Doe XYZ Corp.	Manager	IT	j.doe@xyz.com	(555) 555-8121
Project Team
Technical Lead

Communication Methods and Technologies

Many times, the methods and technologies used to communicate are just as important of a consideration as the information being communicated. Imagine a large project with many stakeholders who all have different technological capabilities. Some may have access to a share drive while others do not. Some may have access to video teleconferencing and others only have telephone and email capabilities. In order to be effective, project information must be communicated to everyone involved by some method using available technology. Determining communication methods and what technologies are available should be part of determining stakeholder communication requirements.

The project team will determine, in accordance with ABC Corp. organizational policy, the communication methods and technologies based on several factors to include: stakeholder communication requirements, available technologies (internal and external), and organizational policies and standards.

ABC Corp. maintains a SharePoint platform within the PMO which all projects use to provide updates, archive various reports, and conduct project communications. This platform enables senior management, as well as stakeholders with compatible technology, to access project data and communications at any point in time. SharePoint also provides the ability for stakeholders and project team members to collaborate on project work and communication.

For stakeholders who do not have the ability to access SharePoint, a web site will also be established for the project. Access to the website will be controlled with a username and password. Any stakeholders identified who are not able to access SharePoint will be issued a unique username and password in order to access the web site. The project manager is responsible for ensuring all project communications and documentation are copied to the web site and that the content mirrors what is contained on the SharePoint platform.

ABC Corp. maintains software licenses for MS Project software. All project teams are responsible for developing, maintaining, and communicating schedules using this software. PERT Charts are the preferred format for communicating schedules to stakeholders. The project schedule will be maintained on both the SharePoint platform and the project website.

All project communication and documentation, in addition to being maintained on the SharePoint platform and project website, will be archived on the internal ABC Corp. shared drive which resides in the PMO program directory. Organizational naming conventions for files and folder will be applied to all archived work.

Communications Matrix

The following table identifies the communications requirements for this project.

Communications Matrix example :: Download the file here…

Report Drumbeat example :: Download the file here…

Communication Flowchart

Flowcharts provide a visual representation of a process or processes which often allow a better understanding of how the process is intended to work. Project communications may be extremely complex depending on the size and scope of the project and the number of stakeholders. A flowchart provides all stakeholders with a better understanding of the steps involved with the distribution of all project communications.

The communication flowchart below was created to aid in project communication. This flowchart provides a framework for the project team to follow for this project. However, there may be occasions or situations which fall outside of the communication flowchart where additional clarification is necessary. In these situations the Project Manager is responsible for discussing the communication with the Project Sponsor and making a determination on how to proceed.

Guidelines for Meetings

Meeting Agenda
Meeting Agenda will be distributed 5 business days in advance of the meeting. The Agenda should identify the presenter for each topic along with a time limit for that topic. The first item in the agenda should be a review of action items from the previous meeting.

Meeting Minutes
Meeting minutes will be distributed within 2 business days following the meeting. Meeting minutes will include the status of all items from the agenda along with new action items and the Parking Lot list.

Action Items
Action Items are recorded in both the meeting agenda and minutes. Action items will include both the action item along with the owner of the action item. Meetings will start with a review of the status of all action items from previous meetings and end with a review of all new action items resulting from the meeting. The review of the new action items will include identifying the owner for each action item.

Meeting Chair Person
The Chair Person is responsible for distributing the meeting agenda, facilitating the meeting and distributing the meeting minutes. The Chair Person will ensure that the meeting starts and ends on time and that all presenters adhere to their allocated time frames.

Note Taker
The Note Taker is responsible for documenting the status of all meeting items, maintaining a Parking Lot item list and taking notes of anything else of importance during the meeting. The Note Taker will give a copy of their notes to the Chair Person at the end of the meeting as the Chair Person will use the notes to create the Meeting Minutes.

Time Keeper
The Time Keeper is responsible for helping the facilitator adhere to the time limits set in the meeting agenda. The Time Keeper will let the presenter know when they are approaching the end of their allocated time. Typically a quick hand signal to the presenter indicating how many minutes remain for the topic is sufficient.

Parking Lot
The Parking Lot is a tool used by the facilitator to record and defer items which aren’t on the meeting agenda; however, merit further discussion at a later time or through another forum.

A parking lot record should identify an owner for the item as that person will be responsible for ensuring follow-up. The Parking Lot list is to be included in the meeting minutes.

Communication Standards

Standardization is a proven way to simplify the complexities of project management communications. Many organizations develop and use standard templates or formats for the various communication tools used throughout projects. Standard templates and formats may be applied to certain types of project meetings or specific types of communication (i.e. emails, status reports, etc.). By using standardization, organizations can help ensure that its project teams and stakeholders have a thorough understanding of what is expected and achieve consistent and effective communications.

In addition to standard templates and/or formats, organizations may standardize file naming or sharing conventions. An organization may use SharePoint or some other type of Web Portal/Network tool (blogs, message boards, etc.) as a standard platform from which to share information and communicate. Additionally, an organization may have standard file naming conventions for their stored data on their internal share drives. Many of these tools and new technologies are used in today’s projects with team members and stakeholders often spread over wide geographic areas. Standardization provides a level of simplicity to an organization’s communication platforms and improves effectiveness and efficiency.

For this project, ABC Corp. will utilize standard organizational formats and templates for all formal project communications. Formal project communications are detailed in the project’s communication matrix and include:

Kickoff Meeting – project team will utilize ABC Corp. standard templates for meeting agenda and meeting minutes. Additionally, any slides presented will use the ABC Corp. standard slideshow template.

Project Team Meetings – project team will utilize ABC Corp. standard templates for meeting agenda and meeting minutes. Additionally, any slides presented will use the ABC Corp. standard slideshow template.

Technical Design Meetings – project team will utilize ABC Corp. standard templates for meeting agenda and meeting minutes. Additionally, any slides presented will use the ABC Corp. standard slideshow template.

Monthly Project Status Meetings – project team will utilize ABC Corp. standard templates for meeting agenda and meeting minutes. Additionally, any slides presented will use the ABC Corp. standard slideshow template.

Project Status Reports – project team will utilize ABC Corp. standard templates for meeting agenda and meeting minutes. Additionally the standard project status report document, available on the share drive, will be used to provide project status.

Informal project communications should be professional and effective but there is no standard template or format that must be used.

Communication Escalation Process

As issues or complications arise with regards to project communications it may become necessary to escalate the issue if a resolution cannot be achieved within the project team. Project stakeholders may have many different conflicting interests in a given project. While escalations are a normal part of project management, there must be a documented process that defines how those escalations will take place.

Efficient and timely communication is the key to successful project completion. As such, it is imperative that any disputes, conflicts, or discrepancies regarding project communications are resolved in a way that is conducive to maintaining the project schedule, ensuring the correct communications are distributed, and preventing any ongoing difficulties. In order to ensure projects stay on schedule and issues are resolved, ABC Corp. will use its standard escalation model to provide a framework for escalating communication issues. The table below defines the priority levels, decision authorities, and timeframes for resolution.

Priority	Definition	Decision Authority	Timeframe for Resolution
Priority 1	Major impact to project or business operations. If not resolved quickly there will be a significant adverse impact to revenue and/or schedule.	Vice President or higher	Within 4 hours
Priority 2	Medium impact to project or business operations which may result in some adverse impact to revenue and/or schedule.	Project Sponsor	Within one business day
Priority 3	Slight impact which may cause some minor scheduling difficulties with the project but no impact to business operations or revenue.	Project Manager	Within two business days
Priority 4	Insignificant impact to project but there may be a better solution.	Project Manager	Work continues and any recommendations are submitted via the project change control process

** NOTE: Any communication including sensitive and/or confidential information will require escalation to VP level or higher for approval prior to external distribution.

Glossary of Communication Terminology

Term	Definition
Communication	The effective sending and receiving of information. Ideally, the information received should match the information sent. It is the responsibility of the sender to ensure this takes place.
Stakeholder	Individuals or groups involved in the project or whose interests may be affected by the project’s execution or outcome.
Communications Management Plan	Portion of the overall Project Management Plan which details how project communications will be conducted, who will participate in communications, frequency of communications, and methods of communications.
Escalation	The process which details how conflicts and issues will be passed up the management chain for resolution as well as the timeframe to achieve resolution

Also Read:

Effective Leadership Communication

PMI – Secrets of Running Project Status meetings

Managing Outsourced Relationships – an in-source approach

November 19, 2013March 12, 2018Leave a comment

IT outsourcing is big business and a provide real business value, financial savings and resource flexibility.

But is cheaper really better?

You cannot outsource a mess! Get your own house in order first before engage in a outsourcing partnership and managing IT vendors.

You should not outsource your core business proposition! Determine what your business is about and excel in the delivery of that – everything that is not core can be candidates for outsourcing.

Renier Botha spoke at the CIO Dialogue in Brighton about the value and risk associated with IT outsourcing. He introduced an insource Service Orientated (SOA) approach to outsourcing to mitigate the risks and ensure the appropriate governance delivering the right quality and customer service are achieved.

Slide Presentation pdf: Managing Outsourced Relationships

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Renier’s Biog for the Conference:

Allegiant Air Loyalty – Case Study

October 16, 2013May 24, 2024Leave a comment

Consulting to Cloud Troopers as the Interim Head of Loyalty Products & Programmes – Renier directed the design, software development and implementation of the points based Allegiant Airlines Loyalty and Rewards Programme to fully leverage the Allegiant services and brand strength to provide new revenue streams and increase the effectiveness of others. The Allegiant Rewards programme is based on a co-branded credit card provided by an American Bank.

Guest Blog by Brian Sumers – 1 Sep 2016

Allegiant Air knows less about its most loyal customers than it would like. Its new co-branded credit card could help change that. But will anyone apply for it?

Despite being among the world’s most consistently profitable airlines, Allegiant Air knows relatively little about its customers, though it has learned, through surveys and from Mastercard that they have an average household income slightly above $100,000 and prefer to eat at Olive Garden and shop at TJ Maxx.

The problem is that Allegiant’s customers fly the airline infrequently, with about 80 percent booking one or two tickets per year. And since Allegiant has not had a frequent flyer program, it has fewer opportunities than other airlines to learn about its customers.

But Allegiant, which has reported 53 consecutive profitable quarters, believes it has finally solved its problem. Almost two decades after its first flight, the airline on Thursday launched a co-branded credit card — a Bank of America Mastercard — the first for Allegiant, a niche carrier that prefers routes other airlines avoid, such as St. Cloud, Minnesota to Phoenix, Minot, North Dakota to Las Vegas and Belleville, Illinois to Jacksonville. Allegiant will enter a market saturated with travel-themed cards from nearly every airline and hotel company, but it is hopeful the new card will give it more insights into its passengers.

“I am surprised it has taken them this long,” said Jay Sorensen, president of IdeaWorks Company and an authority on airline ancillary revenue schemes. “But what is unique about Allegiant is their base of business is probably very distinct from the traditional airlines. It is an interesting position.”

Credit card deals can be lucrative, and when American re-upped deals with Barclays and Citi in July, it said they could produce $1.5 billion in pre-tax revenue over two and a half years. Allegiant is tiny compared to American — the discounter had 85 aircraft at the end of June — but its deal should be lucrative, too.

“We think it is going to be valuable piece of business,” said Brian Davis, Allegiant’s vice president for marketing and sales, declining to give exact numbers. “We see our peers and the revenue generated from programs like this.”

The card comes as Allegiant, long an iconoclast in the U.S. airline industry, starts to look more like its competitors, all of whom have long had co-branded credit cards and loyalty programs. Allegiant, which had bought only used planes, recently placed its first order for new aircraft from Airbus. And, despite mostly flying between small and medium sized markets for most of its history, Allegiant is expanding at larger ones, including Newark, New Jersey. It is even starting to compete with larger airlines on some routes after having long avoided direct competition.

Still, with its co-branded credit card, Allegiant is trying something different. Unlike every other U.S. airline, Allegiant will not award points for travel. Instead, only card-holders, who will pay a $59 annual fee, will earn them. They’ll receive three points for each dollar they spend on Allegiant, two for spending on dining, and one for all other purchases. They can use points for discounts on travel, and the 15,000 points that come as a sign-up bonus can be redeemed for $150 off the price of any ticket. As sweeteners, cardholders receive a free drink when flying Allegiant, as well as discounts on hotel packages. (Allegiant hopes this will help it sell more packages.)

There’s no chance for travelers to redeem for business class airfare to Asia, but Davis said Allegiant’s customers have little interest in complicated redemption schemes.

“Those are built around travelers who travel a ton, and it is worth their time to learn about the rules,” he said. “If you only travel once a year, you’re not going to tolerate a lot of rules and conditions.”

Monitoring customer habits

When card members start spending, Allegiant will have access to more data about its core customers. Bank of America will not share information about individuals, but it will give the airline macro-level insights it does not have today.

“To the extent that people use it as their primary card, you have opened up the window to a lot more data,” Sorensen said. “That data can include, ‘Are they buying products from your competitors? And where are they using the card?”

This is a big deal for Davis. If a customer books a ticket using any credit card on Allegiant, he can learn some details about where else those customers shop, but a branded credit card will give Allegiant access to more aggregate data about what key customers want.

“If through this card, we learn our customers have a really strong affinity for a particular chain of restaurant, then I hope in the next year or two I would hope we would reach out to that restaurant chain about a [tie-in,]” Davis said.

Sorensen said an airline can use data to tailor offers to customers. Allegiant makes considerable revenue on vacation packages, but presumably many of its customers buy hotels independently on Orbitz or another site. If Allegiant can learn more about where its card-holders are staying, it will know more about which hotels to show in prominent positions on its website.

Allegiant also expects to use the card to maintain a year-round relationship with its most loyal customers. Today, it emails customers with deals, but it wants to have other reasons to contact them.

“For the first time, many customers will have a reason to stay connected with us for the other 51 weeks of the year,” Davis said. The goal is to “expand the company’s relationship” with customers, he said.

A challenge to attract card members

Many airlines first start a frequent flyer program and then add a credit card. They create the programs in this order because a carrier with millions of customers in a database has a natural market for its cards.

“It will be a handicap,” Sorensen said. “A general rule of thumb is that once you have a million or more people in a frequent flyer program, then you can start talking to a bank.”

But Allegiant expects to have something other airlines do not — motivated flight attendants. On every flight, they will make announcements and give out paper applications. They will ask passengers to fill them out and will collect them before landing. The on-plane collection is important, Davis said, because the airline fears customers will forget to mail them in.

With the card, Allegiant expects to the same people who buy the bulk of the airline’s tickers — the female head-of-householders. The airline says its core customer is Christie, 48, a married former school teacher with two kids living in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Her husband is co-owner of the local insurance company. “Christie has always been in charge of booking vacations for the family and hates wasting time and money,” Allegiant says in internal documents.

Ultimately, though, the card’s success may on how aggressively flight attendants sell it. Other airlines also ask flight attendants to promote cards with limited success, but Allegiant is optimistic its employees, who already earn commissions for other on-plane sales, will be motivated. The flight attendant responsible for each credit card approval will receive a $30 commission.

“At legacy airlines, there is almost always pushback,” Sorensen said. “Flight attendants say, ‘We’re not sales people.’ Hopefully, Allegiant is an airline where the flight attendants understand they are sales people.”

Original Article from Skift click here

Cash Flow Statement

October 5, 2013June 25, 20191 Comment

The Cash Flow Statement shows how successful cash is managed within a business. It tracks how much cash is received and paid out for the particular period of the statement. It is important to understand that the Cash Flow Statement reflects only the movement of cash and shows the cash amounts that have moved up (increased) or down (decreased).

Depends on the Cash Flow item tracked showing a upwards/increase or downwards/decrease movement, can the Cash Flow value be positive if cash is increased or negative if cash is decreased.

The Cash Flow Statement usually shows the tracking of cash movement in three distinct sections:

Operating Cash Flow (Operational Cash Flow)
Cash Flow before Financing
Cash Flow from Financing

A business with a positive overall cashflow (OCM) is a healthy business.

In the Book “What the Numbers Mean“, Renier provides a detailed overview of the three financial statements that makes up the set of business accounts. With the Income Statement, The Balance Sheet and Cash Flow Statement you have a full picture of the financial performance and well being of an organisation. The Income Statement (P&L) shows you the profit within an accounting period but profit is not cash and profit does not pay debt only cash does. The Balance Sheet shows you the activities linked to asset investment but does not show how cash rich a business is. The Cash Flow statement is key in linking up the P&L and Balance Sheet from a cash perspective. Cash is the hard currency of business – Cash is King!

You can obtain a copy of the book “What the Numbers Mean” from LeanPub here…

Also Read…

For High Performing Teams, CIOs must Lead by Character

October 1, 2013February 24, 2018Leave a comment

Guest Blog: Doug Moran via Heller Search Associates

As CIO, you can lead with character, by knowing what are your values and what you believe.

Character is the attribute we ascribe to people whose lives and actions reflect their beliefs and values. Strong character requires emotional maturity and self-confidence. But leading with character goes beyond simply havingcharacter. Our ability to lead is in large part based on our ability to trust ourselves and instill trust in others. Those we lead want and need to trust us. And to trust us, they must know us. That means allowing them to get close. It means sharing and exposing our beliefs and values.

Leading with character can be uncomfortable. We are in essence giving others insight into who we truly are. Leading with character also means exposing ourselves to criticism and doubt, especially when our actions diverge (or appear to diverge) from our stated values.

The Part Character Plays in the CIO Role

Character has special importance for CIOs and other IT leaders. This has nothing to do with moral superiority. It is simply a function of the unique perspective our roles provide. Because technology is a critical enabler connecting and touching every part of the enterprise, we have the ability to see how the groups or functions interact and interrelate. We can see what works well and where challenges exist. We can see the unintended consequences of actions and the knock-on value that no one anticipated.

“Strong character forms a strong leadership foundation. It gives us the confidence to do what is right regardless of the doubts and complaints of others..”

Connecting Character to Great Leadership

Our unique perspective is an invaluable resource. Unfortunately, we often fail to exploit it fully. The problem is that most of us fail to see how important our character is. We fail to see the connection between our beliefs and values and the service we provide. Great leaders, however, see the connection. They recognize that their character enables them to guide and propel their organizations into the future.

Although I’ve spent nearly 20 years working in IT, my greatest challenges have rarely been technical. My biggest obstacles to overcome have been organizational complexities or dysfunctions. These challenges provide CIOs many opportunities to develop their ability to lead with character.

CIOs play a key role in the softer side of business. We are key contributors to things like defining and promoting corporate culture and organizational identity. The character of an organization is often a reflection of its leaders’ beliefs and values. As we provide solutions that cut across the enterprise and connect different parts of the organization together, we can often see things as they really are. We observe the behaviors that reinforce or undermine the organization’s values. For example, an organization may place a premium on collaboration and honesty. Do our business partners look for ways to share resources or collaborate when they acquire new capabilities? Does our reward and compensation system promote or discourage this type of behavior? Our perspective enables us to see the interactions that either reflect a particular value or run counter to that value.

Why Character Matters in IT Leadership

It is easy to see the role character plays in the softer side of business. What about the more objective functions? How does character contribute to things like strategic planning, R&D, technology innovation, project prioritization, capacity planning, vendor/product selection, and the myriad other tasks for which we are accountable? Character matters for these things, because our values determine what and how things are done. For example, we all strive for objectivity and intellectual rigor in our decision-making processes. Look at how business cases are evaluated and priorities are set. How often do sponsors “game” the system to get their project done? Does the CEO’s pet project that has questionable value make the cut because no one is willing to ask the hard questions? How can you influence those processes to ensure that they remain objective and analytically sound?

Ultimately, we can use our position and visibility to understand and change fundamentally how our organizations operate and behave. We can encourage positive behavior while identifying and correcting problems. The challenge for us is to overcome our trepidation about the personal (and often polarizing) aspects of character. It is important to find balance in how we express our values and beliefs. At one extreme, we can come across as self-righteous. At the other, we seem irresolute.

Strong character comes from knowing oneself. Self-knowledge gives us the confidence to trust ourselves. The more we demonstrate the strength of our character – by ensuring that our words and deeds are consistent with our beliefs and values – the stronger that trust grows. Strong character forms a strong leadership foundation. It gives us the confidence to do what is right regardless of the doubts and complaints of others.

How do we build and demonstrate a strong character? Here are five steps that one can take to begin the process.

Decide that character matters. The simple act of making character important will raise your awareness of whether your actions are harmonious with your beliefs.
Take time to inventory and examine your beliefs and values. Your beliefs and values are your character’s foundation. The process of fully understanding them is unending, so get started now! While you are at it, take a look at your organization’s beliefs and values. Examine the character of other leaders around you. Are your beliefs and values aligned?
Share your beliefs and values. Leading with character means being open and explicit about what truly matters. This means talking about your personal beliefs, your organization’s beliefs and what they mean to you.
Test your actions and decisions. Critical self-examination will help us maintain alignment between our actions and our beliefs and values.
Have the character to act on your self-examination. It takes character to stay the course when all doubt you. It also takes character to change your position, especially one that you hold dear. Leadership demands that we be able to do both as the situation dictates.

Character builds our self-confidence and trust. It allows us to trust ourselves and others. Being a leader often means taking unpopular positions. It means making difficult decisions. Our positions and decisions may cause others to doubt us. At times, we may even share their doubt. When our actions are based on who we are and what we believe, we will have the strength of character to endure these doubts. Success in the face of doubt depends on our ability to remain true to our principles and beliefs. Failures will occur, and we will make mistakes. Character is not about perfection. It is about striving to seek the wisdom to know what is right and having the conviction to do it regardless of the opinion of others.

How to choose a Tech Stack

September 27, 2013December 8, 20171 Comment

WHITE PAPER – How to choose a Technology Stack

What is a Technology Stack?

A technology stack (Tech Stack) is a set of software code that is made up of modules used in software products and programming languages to build (develop/code) a software application.

The lower in a Tech Stack you go the closer you get to the hardware, for example a Operating System is the part of the tech stack that provide an interface between the computer user and the computer hardware, it communicates directly with the computer hardware. The higher you go in a Tech Stack the more specific and specialized the functionality becomes for example a DBMS (Database Management System) that provides the interface and platform to manipulate, store, manage and administrate data into databases.

Choosing a Primary Tech Stack usually involves the choice of the Operating System, programming languages, standard development libraries, frameworks, DBMS and a support community. The Primary Tech Stack will be used by most of the developers and software engineers in building the software product/application but several Secondary Tech Stacks may be used in support of the Primary Tech Stack to fulfill specific specialized requirements.

There are lots of different, competing technologies made up of different tech stacks, to build a website or software application with. A software application usually consist of the following main components: the Front End of the site/application (what the end users see on the screen and will be interacting with), the Admin Portal (that the application/program administrators or back office personal will use as an interface to administer and manage the application or site), the Middleware, Logical Layer or Application Layer (that performs all the ‘automatic’ actions and is the heart of the application doing all the calculations, processing and data manipulation), and the Database where all data used within the application or site is stored. Each of these components making up an application or website can be developed with a different software product or programming language but preferably within the same Tech Stack to reduce the complexity of supporting the application/site.

How do you choose a technology stack, what factors and key technical aspect should be considered to avoid the wrong choices?

When choosing your tech stack it is important to choose components that designed to easily integrate – the frontend technology must integrate with the admin, logic and database. The integration of the different application components is illustrated in the hand drawn diagram.

The challenge today is choosing a Tech Stack, which supports current trends, and also future proofs your technology solution for the future. You can only focus your choice towards the Tech Stack that will be appropriate and the best fit for your business today and with that realize that the Tech Stack might change in the future as technology evolves – in other words there is no such thing as a fully future proof tech stack.

Considerations and Factors to keep in mind when choosing your Tech Stack

- Development Lapse Time / Time to Market: How long will it take to develop an application in one tech stack vs the other. If the tech stack give you access to frameworks and platforms it will reduce the development lapse time and hence your time to market (in other word the application can be developed quicker).
- Compatibility: Will the new technology work with exiting tools and software used within the business? Can you reuse previous developed software code in the new tech stack? Integrating the new tech stack into your existing environment, will it cause disruption or large quantities of rework of existing systems and infrastructure?
- Cutting Edge: The more cutting edge the technology the more bumps their will be on the road ahead as the cutting edge still has some way to go to maturity and stability.
- Productivity: If you already have a development team in-house, are they qualified to work with the tech stack? DO the developers have any issues with the new tech stack? What issues and pain did you and your development team have with the previous tech stack – are those addressed in the new?
- Engineering Talent Availability: Is the right people available to support the tech stack you intend to use? The right people will be across the board including, architects, tech leads, senior developers, developers, database developers / administrators, etc. Will it be easy to find these people? This is linked to the popularity of the tech stack – the more popular the more talent will be available. Where (in which location) will you need the talent – what is the availability of the talent in your preferred location, the location where you want to build you in-house and offshore teams?
- Recruitment and Retention: How ill you recruit the talent for the tech stack? Will what you have to offer (salary, working environment, training, personal growth, business prospects and growth, etc.) be attractive to the market of professional knowledge workers (technologist)? Make sure that can recruit and retain your technology staff to support your tech stack, otherwise it might be an expensive choice.
- Expertise: What level of expertise on the new tech stack do you have within your (in-house or outsourced, on-shore, near-shore or off-shore). Make sure that you have staff that are well experienced with the tech stack and ensure that they understand your business drivers and your requirements. Ensure that within your team you enough experts (at the right levels i.e. Tech Leads & Snr Developers) that thoroughly understand the tech stack intrinsically.
- Maintenance & Support: Different programming languages promote different style for example Object Oriented (OO), Strongly Type (Functional) and Dynamic styles. As the complexity and the magnitude of the technology solution increase and/or the team that develop the solution is large then OO style programming languages bring a lot of value. Strongly typed languages and their frameworks like C++, C#, Java and Scala support better tools while Dynamic one like PHP, Pyhton, Ruby, Javascript take less development time. The trends based on the above is that strongly type OO languages are mainly used in enterprise solutions where code base size, team size and maintenance matters. Another factor to consider is the standards and methodology followed by developers in writing the code. Some software development methodologies introduce very robust quality assurance and code validation that delivers a very superior, bug free solutions that are easier to support. A well-written technology solution is also adequately documented to ensure maintainability and supportability. Other factors like team knowledge, expertise and the availability of resources/talent (as mentioned in other points in this section) to form a solution support team must also be kept in the equation.
- Scalable: Scalability refers to the ability of a solution to easily adapt to service more users, process more data within a specific timeframe without increasing the overall software and development cost. Hardware is mostly directly related to the scalability for example the more the solution scale the more hardware might be needed to support the technology solution. Scaling can take place horizontally – that is adding more hardware (servers) to the overall solution or vertically which increases the ability to process more data and/or request/users on a particular server. Will the tech stack scale to meet your requirements in performance? How easy is it to scale the solution horizontally? How does the tech stack compare with others in vertical scaling? If you know your solution will be receiving high traffic (lots of users) or will be processing loads of data the choice of your tech stack becomes very important. The difference in the scalability of two tech stack can be seen in timing and compairing the systems’ response in processing the same about of user requests or data for example:
  - Ruby is 30 x slower than C
  - PHP is only 8 x slower than C
  - Java is a mere 2 x slower than C
- Community: How strong is the community for your selected tech stack? A strong community is a key factor is selecting a tech stack as an active and devoted community ensures the following:
  - Availability of Documentation
  - Fast response to bugs, issues and problems. Response and support to resolution of issues that might appear to be specific to your solution
  - Availability of issue and problem solutions and the source code to copy/paste speeds up the resolution
  - Continuous updating of the basic framework, increasing the availability modules and libraries, producing new releases that results in a more stable tech stack
  - Availability of resources/talent understanding the tech stack
- Quality of Tools: Ensure the tech stack provide adequate tools to the development and support teams to use for example IDEs (Integrated Development Environment), Debuggers, Build Tools, etc. Adequate tools will ensure you have an empowered and engaged development team that can get the job done.
- Licensing: Tech stacks are licensed differently – either Open Source or Commercial licensing applies. Open Source tech stack has grown tremendously over the past view years. Statistics show that on the internet, more open source tech stack driven solutions (solutions based on the LAMP stack consisting of Linux, Apache, MySQL and PHP) are present than commercial tech stack based solutions like Microsoft consisting of Windows server, IIS, SQL Server and .NET. When deciding on a tech stack it is important to understand the different licensing types and the associated cost to the license to use the software not just for development but commercially in the mainstream production environments of your business. Open Source licenses are usually cheaper than commercial licenses. Make sure that you understand the type of license the tech stack components are under and that you have the associated budget.
- Hardware Resource Hungry: What level (quantity and specification) of hardware will the tech stack require to run your application effectively according to expectations and requirements? Some tech stacks require several different servers to run a single application dependent on the complexity. This should be taken into consideration especially in conjunction with the budget constraints. Tech stack and Hardware requirements are dependent on the performance and uptime requirements of the operational technology solution. A solution that needs to be up and running every second of the every day and/or are procession large volumes of data in the shortest possible time, will have a higher dependency on the hardware with infrastructure design incorporating the resilience against hardware and connectivity failures. Hardware is not directly dependent on the tech stack for redundancy but some tech stacks are better suited for high availability with build in capabilities, than others.
- Popularity: See point on Talent Availability and Documentation
- Future Proof: This is a relative concept because none of us have a crystal ball to gage exactly what the future will hold in order to choose our tech stack accordingly. How long into the future are you looking to proof your application, recognizing that technology is rapidly changing and no single tech stack has ever been and will ever be available and around for ever. Even tech stacks like Microsoft that has been around for twenty plus years has changed within and the older tech stacks from Microsoft are absolute while newer options are introduced every two to three years – sometimes without appropriate backwards compatibility. Your tech stack must be agile (adapt to change), backwards compatible, scalable (to accommodate your business and market growth), from a reputable supplier (a supplier that is credit worthy and likely to be around for the future) and popular. Popularity is very important and the community following, embracing and developing a tech stack will ensure the availability of talent and support resources to ensure your application build in a particular tech stack can be supported long into the future.
- Documentation: Are the appropriate documentation available for the tech stack to completely enable your team to utilize the power of the tech stack? Documentation includes printed manuals, internet information resources, sample code, module and libraries, community forums where issues and problems are discussed and resolved with solution code that can easily be copied/pasted.
- Maturity/Stability: What is the latest released version of the tech stack. A mature tech stack with release versions will be much more stable than a version 1 release, for example.

Company Constraints: Is your tech stack choice affected by certain constraint within your business i.e. if you are looking to develop a native mobile application for iPhone or iPad who have no other choice but Objective C for your programming language. Do you have access to a DevOps team (operations team ensuring the software development and operational infrastructure seamlessly integrate)? If not you might want to consider a PaaS option and use the stack it supports. Other constraints can be: legal requirements like PCI DSS (Credit Card and Personal Information security legislation and requirements), budget and operational costs.

What are the popular choices in Tech Stacks?

Operating Systems

· Microsoft Windows

· Apple OS X

· Linux

· Mobile

· iOS

· Android

Programming Language	Associated Web Framework
Java	· Spring/Hibernate · Struts · Tapestry · Play! (Scala)
Javascript	· JQuery · Sencha · YUI · Dojo
PHP	· CodeIgniter · Zend · Cake · Symfony
Python	· Django · web2py · TurboGears · Zope
Ruby	· Rails · Sinatra
C#	· ASP.NET

Web/Application Servers

· Apache

· Tomcat

· Netty

· Ngnix

· Unicorn

· Passenger

· IIS

· Microsoft Windows

Databases

· Microsoft SQL Server

· MySQL

· Postgres

· Oracle

Cloud PaaS (Platform as a Service)

· Heroku

· CloudFoundry

· Microsoft Azure

· Redhat Openshift

· EngineYard

Let’s Talk – Are you looking to achieve your goals faster? Create better business value? Build strategies to improve growth? We can help – make contact!

Source & Reference List:

Web frameworks at wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_web_application_frameworks
Job listing based language popularity: http://jobstractor.com/monthly-stats
Open source project language popularity: http://lang-index.sourceforge.net/
Web search language popularity: http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/index.html