Waltzing with the Elephant

Mark Toomey's latest newsletter is a good, easy to read summary of the major issue in getting value from IT; that business leaders must be engaged in directing and controlling their organisation’s use of IT to achieve their business goals. That is fundamentally what governance of IT is about.

The article refers to Sir Peter Gershon's address to the ISACA Oceania conference in Canberra, where the Elephant in the Room was identified in the context of public sector governance of IT but applies equally in business:

"Realising the dream of world class governance of IT in the public sector largely depends on the behaviour of those at the top."

The article goes on to explain why leadership in governance is needed; Directing and controlling the use of IT is part of the much bigger picture of directing and controlling the business.

"IT is an enabler of radical change. But, the mere act of buying or building an IT solution does not of itself deliver the change – a reality that has been proven again and again through the failures of projects where there seems to have been a delightfully naïve expectation that this would indeed be the case."

After reading the article I'm looking forward to reading Mark Toomey's new book, Waltzing with the Elephant.