Think Thematically

Once CIOs have identified who they want to reach, they need to think through the key messages or themes to convey. For example, if a CIO is having trouble marshalling support from the executive committee for infrastructure investments, a key message might be that sound infrastructure produces value, says Howard Rubin, executive vice president at Meta Group. He suggests explaining how infrastructure can yield value on three levels: economic (lets you operate at low cost), operational (allows you to tune reliability to what you need) and architectural (you can increase business volume without having to pay a dollar more). Another key message for users concerned about IT costs might be that business executives can control IT costs themselves. CIOs can reinforce this, says Rubin, by identifying user costs as fixed or variable, and pointing out how variable costs can be contained.

At MetLife, Sheinheit comes up with an annual theme to drive the year's IT communication. Last year, the theme was "Finding the R in ROI". This year's theme is "Moving IT to the Next Level". Subthemes include investing for growth and increasing agility. Sheinheit and his team mapped all of the year's IT initiatives against the themes, so all communication about projects is put in the context of how they relate to those overriding goals. MetLife's themes get woven into town hall presentations, newsletters, desktop tchotchkes and something Sheinheit calls "meeting in a box": to quickly cascade the theme throughout the IT organization, the top 50 or 60 IT execs receive prefabricated presentations to take back to their groups. Presentations also go on the IT Web portal for other presenters to draw on, saving time and ensuring message consistency.

Sheinheit launches his themes to the internal IT staff before pitching them to the business audiences. "You've got to get yourself aligned," he says. "You can't give a message to the outside community if it doesn't resonate internally. You drive it down and send it up, and it interconnects in the middle."

Brand IT

Because technology can seem complex, confusing or (believe it or not) just plain dull to those outside IT, putting a meaningful brand name on an IT initiative can help CIOs telegraph the value in a concise, accessible and memorable way. In fact, the CIO survey revealed that branding specific IT projects or services is among the most effective and popular marketing practices.

At e-commerce outsourcer GSI Commerce, CIO Joe Seibert branded an initiative to revamp the project management process and improve time to market. He officially launched "Project Velocity" with a large sign hung over the project management office area and a kick-off pizza lunch for 100 assorted constituents. By relating process improvement to a business value - speed - Seibert's team was able to generate awareness and excitement and bring down the level of fear that accompanies business process change. The increased buy-in and project momentum that branding garners "makes my job a lot easier", Seibert says.

If an IT department suffers from a credibility problem, branding can also be used to help readjust negative perceptions once the underlying problems have been addressed.

For example, IT's reputation at the Defence Contract Management Agency suffered from some real (and some merely perceived) failures. When Mike Williams became CIO in 1999, "the feeling inside the agency was that we weren't up to speed with corporate America", he says. True, some software apps had been deployed before they were ready. "There were too many bugs, and we fixed that," says Williams. But there were still residual pockets of negative perception. Williams changed IT's official name to the IT Customer Service Organization, and one of his group's Web designers came up with an official logo. "Branding and the logo helped signal the idea that we're changing," says Williams.

Branding that's out of character with the corporate culture (splashy branding in a company that values consensus and collaboration, for example) is a big no-no, says Michael Gerrard, vice president and chief of research for IT management at Gartner. "The branding strategy has to reflect the customers that you've got," he says. "If you choose a really inept branding strategy, you can end up with negative brand equity. You'll be seen as amateurish when you want to seem professional."