Mind over matter

No discussion of IT's identity crisis can ignore Nicholas Carr, whose 2003 Harvard Business Review story "IT Doesn't Matter" shook up the industry. In many ways, his argument that IT is becoming a utility that doesn't necessarily provide a competitive advantage has proved to be accurate.

"By now the core functions of IT -- data storage, data processing and data transport -- have become available and affordable to all," Carr wrote. In that environment, Carr said, companies have to manage technology effectively, keep costs down and cut out waste. "IT management should, frankly, become boring," he concluded.

It's that type of boredom that is driving people such as Dargel out of the industry. But others, such as writer Geoffrey Moore, take Carr's argument one step further.

Moore, managing director at TCG Advisors, is pushing the idea of separating core functions -- those that set you apart from the competition -- from context, which is everything else. The idea is to automate or outsource context as much as possible and focus your energies on core functions.

The commoditization of IT that Carr discussed is actually a good thing, Moore says. "Don't fight it; in fact, accelerate it. That'll free resources to invest in the new IT." The mistake many companies make is taking the savings from optimizing IT functions to the bottom line, instead of reinvesting in IT initiatives that will provide competitive advantage, he says.

That's what Hasbro seeks to do, Schwinn says. "Say you deliver one level of advantage and it isn't sustainable, but then you deliver another and another and another. Over time you've used IT to deliver sustainable competitive advantage."

Processing power

If the symbol of the old IT was the command line commando, the symbol of the new, more mature IT department is ITIL and similar rules that define IT processes.

Even before federal regulations such as the Sarbanes-Oxley Act required IT organizations to follow stringent policies for handling data, the idea of process-oriented IT management was beginning to take hold.

Proponents say following strict, documented procedures for everything from applying a server patch to swapping out a network interface card will result in increased network uptime, lower costs and higher user satisfaction.

Ed Kamins, chief operational excellence officer for Avnet, a Phoenix distributor of components to high-tech manufacturers, is a big believer in process. Kamins came up on the business side of the house, but was asked to take over as CIO a few years ago and given a mandate to fix a decentralized, inefficient IT department.

He centralized infrastructure teams while leaving application-development groups with the business units. He also implemented standards covering everything from network architecture to database software. "We probably took US$50 million of cost out of IT while at the same time, in my opinion, improving the service," he says.

Now Avnet is all about improving its processes, not just in IT but across the company. "As we work on operational excellence, it's really all about fixing the process first, then [automating] through IT," he says. "Today's CIO may very well need to be tomorrow's CPO -- chief process officer,'' he says.

However, process isn't necessarily popular among some IT workers. Alex Ayotte is a systems project administrator for a state agency in Florida. When he sees a server problem, he has to open a work order, then an office of change management ticket. If the problem is critical, it will usually be approved the same day. If not, it may take three days or more. "Hell, you used to go in, see a log error, find a fix and you'd fix it," he says. "All the fun has been sucked out of the job. I spend half my time doing paperwork."

Ferrari, who is a big proponent of ITIL, agrees that process does take some of the fun out of IT work. "There is paperwork," he says. "But if there's a problem, you know what to do" because there's documentation to fall back on.