"The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry, and leave us nothing but grief and pain instead of promised joy." These words form the great poet Robert Burns' sum up the sentiments many managers have about projects that started strong but ended miserably.
IT has its share of best laid plans that go awry. From complex CRM implementations that come in grossly over-budget to resource-consuming data warehouses that lie dormant to costly vendor-touted technologies such as ATM that are quickly superseded by newer and faster products, IT often has an inordinate amount of highly visible projects that end miserably.
The issue is not that these technologies are overrated (with the possible exception of ATM); rather the problem is that the IT planning process is often anything but best laid.
In the late 1990s, there was a growing focus on strategic technology planning. Many organizations created in-house technology architecture groups that focused on integrating the application, system and network planning. These groups were tasked with ensuring that the networks being deployed facilitated the applications being developed, which in turn were analyzed to ensure the correct systems were being deployed. The entire process was business-driven, ensuring the overall IT architecture met business goals.
After the dot-com bubble burst in the early 2000s, companies downsized IT and many architecture groups were disbanded. The planning focus of many companies shifted to point solutions that met short-term operational needs - which in itself isn’t a bad strategy. Unfortunately, many IT managers associated point solutions with "no planning needed," so the IT planning process diminished drastically.
Now don’t get me wrong, IT organizations still make plans. Most IT departments have a strategic vision and develop detailed individual project plans. But what's missing is the crucial planning step that occurs between the strategic vision and the project implementation plans. This is the area I call the "IT blueprint." The strategic vision states where IT is going. The blueprints detail how IT gets there: what initiatives need to be implemented, when they need to be implemented, what resources will be needed, how much funding will be required and how the various projects fit together to reach the overall IT strategic goal.
This level of planning is critical to the successful implementation of new technologies. Take VoIP as an example. Many companies have VoIP as a strategic goal and most of these companies have specific project implementation plans for VoIP. However, without an overall IT blueprint that shows where VoIP fits into the overall tehnology architecture, what applications will utilize it, what business units will benefit from it, what vendors will be utilized, how it will interface with the data network, and what the overall financial implications are in terms of timing and deployment, VoIP may wind up being another best laid plan that ultimately goes awry.
An IT blueprint is similar to the blueprint of a house. An architect might have a wonderful concept and each subcontractor might have individual detailed plans for plumbing, electricity and carpentry, but without a blueprint showing how everything fits together, the house will never materialize.
An IT infrastructure built without proper planning - whether from mice or men - is doomed to become another plan gone awry.
