Striking A Balance Between Technical & Business Knowledge 06/18/2010

Whether a business sells simple widgets or complex machinery, data center and other IT managers inevitably must bring a wide range of technology expertise to the table.

Yet in most data center environments, it’s not always feasible to maintain a bank of knowledge about every imaginable technology that a data center might touch. This is particularly true when IT managers find themselves increasingly involved with the business end of their organizations, as this involvement demands a completely different set of expertise.

“Successful IT managers of the future will be part technology and part business people,” says Scott Archibald, managing director with Bender Consulting. “They will be a hybrid, and their career paths could lead them to and from operations, marketing, or other corporate positions that were unheard of for an IT manager only five years ago.”

IT managers need to be able to gauge the importance and relevance of business knowledge. What technologies should they focus on for the benefit of the data center and other areas of IT? How do those technologies relate to the business? Identifying those factors and effectively applying this expertise to the role of IT manager has become a top priority in today’s dynamic environments—and a challenging one.

Targeting Tech

Most IT managers are intimately familiar with the technologies and trends that work for their environments, but it never pays to operate on an island, because there could always be something out there that improves performance, security, or even the business in general. Matt Pollard, director of advisory services at Forsythe Solutions Group (www.forsythe.com), recommends specific strategies for staying on top of the latest technologies.

“Industry conferences and IT association seminars are effective means to stay aware of the latest trends. IT managers should also periodically compare how technology is being used in their environment against industry standards in order to revalidate their existing technologies and identify potential alternatives to consider,” Pollard says.

Archibald adds that IT managers can't understand or even know all the technology that’s available today. As a result, it becomes more critical for the managers to rely on their staff and work in coordination with their peers (through conferences, peer groups, trade publications, and other external resources) to obtain a working grasp on the right technologies for their company. After all, he says, successful IT managers need a fundamental grasp of a given technology to understand both its opportunities and limitations.

Data center and IT managers can easily become mired in run-of-the-mill technologies that are critical for the day-to-day operation of their environments, but they still need expertise beyond common areas such as networking and WAN Internet lines, says Lior Blik, CEO of NITHealth and CIO of Hoboken University Medical Center. In particular, knowledge of advanced technologies, such as virtualization and cloud computing, can help managers stay on the cutting edge.

Closing The Business Gap

Along with that knowledge of cutting-edge technologies, IT managers can be well-served by understanding at least some of the intricacies of the business world. In fact, Blik says he believes there is never enough business know-how and that IT managers should have both industry-specific business knowledge and general business intelligence that can help clients make effective decisions.

“For every problem there is a solution, but there’s also a cost factor that needs to be considered and then managed. Business-savvy managers can help and advise clients as they seek to contain costs as a main priority to any project. When managers have a business mind, they can impact business development by increasing value to the organization and its revenue. By understanding clients’ needs from a business perspective, it makes it easier to not only keep clients, but keep them happy. It’s all about looking beyond just IT,” Blik says.

To help manage and measure the value the IT organization brings to the business, Pollard recommends that IT managers use process management frameworks and control objectives. He also notes that it's crucial for IT managers to develop an understanding of how to leverage computing convergence to establish a flexible, standards-based infrastructure. This route, he says, will help managers more effectively support growth and changes in the business.

“IT managers should be knowledgeable enough about the business to speak in business terms with regards to proposing benefits of, or resolving issues with, the use of technology,” Pollard adds. “It’s as simple as talking—and listening—to the business managers to learn about their key processes and priorities.”

by Christian Perry