The Thorp Network

Cloud computing – buyer beware

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 17:53:00 +0000

I am finally getting a chance to get caught up after my somewhat hectic travel schedule outlined in my previous blog. While I was in the UK, I had the opportunity to meet with a number of journalists - I encouraged them to move beyond reporting on technology as technology to focusing more on the business decisions that the business needs to make about how they will actually drive and sustain value from their use of technology. This article, by Warwick Ashford in Computer Weekly, is a great example of the balanced view I would like to see.

Speaking Schedule

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 17:26:00 +0000

As you can see, the "fixed" portion of this site (on the right hand side) needs a little updating - my (all in the family) support person is somewhat consumed with another project right now so I am updating my near term speaking schedule in this blog.

I am heading back down to Australia next week where I will be keynoting the ISACA Oceania CACS Conference in Sydney on Sept 8th, then facilitating a discussion at a CIO Breakfast the following day, the 9th.

I will be in Brisbane on the 11th and 12th presenting at an ISACA Brisbane Chapter luncheon on the 11th , and then participating in a number of other events in the evening and the morning of the 12th.

I will be in Nicosia, Cyprus, on Oct 8th presenting at the 3rd Information and Telecommunications Conference.

I will be in Scottsdale, Arizona on Oct 27th, participating in the first morning of ISACA's IT Governance Forum.

In November, I will be Facilitating an ISACA Toronto Chapter workshop on the 12th then heading to the UK where I will be speaking at a number of events including:

An Institute of Charterd Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW) dinner on the 17th

Cranfield University's School of Management IT Leadership Forum on the 19th

A workshop for the Computer Users Association, Charity IT Directors and Charity Finance Directors on the 20th, as well as an ISACA London Chapter event on the evening of the 20th

I hope to see some of you at these events.

Finally - Val IT 2.0!

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 04:18:00 +0000

My previous blogs indicated that I have been somewhat consumed (an understatement!) working with ISACA/ITGI on the 2.0 version of Val IT. I am really pleased (and incredibly relieved) to tell you that the Val IT Framework 2.0 and a companion Getting Started Guide are now available for free download from the ISACA http://www.blogger.com/www.isaca.org or ITGI http://www.itgi.org/websites.

Pls download and review these documents - I would really appreciate getting your feedback - after all, none of us have the monopoly on truth!

A Turning Point?

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Wed, 21 May 2008 01:13:00 +0000

Well, I am just coming up for air after a hectic travel schedule and being heads down getting the next version of Val IT (2.0) ready for release (coming this June!). I did take time yesterday to participate by video link in an Executive Breakfast in Brisbane Australia. One of the other participants, Peter Carr from Longhaus felt that maybe the breakfast marked a turning point - I hope that he is right.

Realizing Benefits Realization

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 23:45:00 +0000

After arriving from a much delayed trip back from Singapore that started with a cancelled flight and moved on to many other tribulations I realized that I had scheduled an interview with Allen Bernard at cioupdate.com - although not quite on the planet, I apparently did manage some degree of coherence as it resulted in a very good article that I think captures the essence of the IT value problem. The article ends with a quote from Erik Dorr of the Hackett Group relating to Intel where he says "What Intel is doing is not rocket science, it's pretty much the basics." and Allen concluding with "...of course, the basics, which always seem so easy to understand and yet so hard to put into practice, are where most people fall short. Complexity can be exotic and therefore exciting, but the "basics"? Not really." Right on!!

Dealing with the IT label

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Wed, 02 May 2007 19:57:00 +0000

I have long held that we have a labelling problem with IT in that anything with the label attached is thrown over the transom to the IT function when, in many cases, what we are really dealing with is a business issue. HP now seems to have also come to this conclusion - they are, to quote Howard Solomon in the 3oth April edition of IT World Canada, "dumping the moniker" of "information technology" and moving on to "business technology". Ann Livermore, Vice-President of HP's Technology Solutions Group says: "The age of information technology as we know it is over, the shift to business technology enables CIOs to weigh and measure their investment in terms of business outcomes."

It Is The Business Stupid

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Mon, 18 Dec 2006 18:33:00 +0000

I was interviewed way back in July by Sue Bushell who was writing an article for CIO magazine. We had a great conversation but I had forgotten all about it until yesterday when an Australian colleague of mine sent a link to an article by Sue which he had seen in CIO Australia. Ignoring the fact that I am quoted, it is a great article - it is a real pleasure when a journalist "gets it".

Measure for Measure

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Sat, 26 Aug 2006 17:09:00 +0000

An article by Andrew Rowsell-Jones in the Australian CIO Magazine referencing some "guru" called John Thorpe - now, if only they could get the spelling right!

I never cease to be amazed!

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Thu, 24 Aug 2006 03:54:00 +0000

An August 21, 2006 Computerworld article by Barbara Gomolski, a former Computerworld reporter, now a vice-president at Gartner Inc., is titled "Tie your IT budget to business strategy". Hello! Is this a new idea? No, it certainly isn't and hasn't been for 10 - 20 years - but the sad truth is that this is still news to all to many people - or maybe it's not news - just something that they don't want to hear, don't know what to do about, or, closer to the truth, don't want to do anything about.

Government Enterprise - Tell Us Your IT Disasters

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Tue, 22 Aug 2006 22:05:00 +0000

Today's Information Week Government Enterprise Newsletter www.governmententerprise.com/opinions/index.jhtml had a request from the editor, Rob Preston, for people to submit details of their IT disasters. The request states that "for every FBI, Nike, and CA tale of tech woe, there are probably 100 similar disasters no one but the insiders know about. Something like a third of all IT projects are canceled or never implemented, according to various surveys, while another third to half fall behind schedule or go over budget." I would certainly echo this view and encourage you to respond to Rob.

The ROI of IT

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Tue, 25 Apr 2006 14:56:00 +0000

I am delivering the keynote adress at ISACA's 2006 North American CACS Conference in Orlando on May 8th. The above link is to a pre-conference interview by Brian Summerfield which appeared in Monday's Certification Magazine.

IT Spreads, Industry by Industry

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 16:53:00 +0000

This April 17th Computerworld article by David Moschella reinforces the point that IT is as, if not more important, and, by inference, deserving of board, executive and business management attention as it has ever been, but not in the context of technology - in the context of organizational, business and industry change.

New Val IT® Framework complements COBIT®

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Mon, 13 Mar 2006 19:50:00 +0000

I have been working over the last year with the folks from the IT Governance Institute (ITGI) in developing a new enterprise value framework for governance of IT-enabled business investments - Val IT. Val IT extends and complements Control Objectives for Information and related Technology (COBIT), which provides a comprehensive framework for the management and the delivery of high-quality information technology-based services. Specifically, relative to the Four "Ares" as described in The Information Paradox, Val IT focuses on the investment decision (are we doing the right things?) and the realization of benefits (are we getting the benefits?), while COBIT focuses on the execution (are we doing them the right way, and are we getting them done well?).

The first three deliverables from this effort, the Val IT Framework, a technique guide to The Business Case, and a case study, The ING Case Study are now available for free download from the ITGI website through the link above. I encourage you to look at these deliverables which represent an important step forward in helping organizations truly realize the full potential of IT-enabled change.

How to Talk Business

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Mon, 13 Mar 2006 17:37:00 +0000

The sub-title of the above article by Steve Ulfelder in Computerworld is "Every IT project is a business project". This reinforces the point that I consistently make that IT in and of itself delivers no value - it is how the business manages and uses IT that drives value. The realization of business value from IT is not an IT issue - it is a business issue!

IT managers told to boost growth

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Tue, 24 Jan 2006 16:06:00 +0000

An article by Kevin Allisonin in today's Financial Times quotes Mark McDonald, vice-president of Gartner's executive programmes group, referring to a Gartner survey of 1,400 chief information officers , who says:"IT departments are moving from being providers of technical services to creators of business results." Is this news? More importantly, should this be news? The role of the IT department has, in most organizations, been recognized for years, if not decades, as being to provide leadership, and be responsive to business areas in providing IT capabilities to support the achievement of business goals. This role is not always executed well, nor is it always well recognized, but it is certainly not a new role.

Don't Outsource Program Management

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Thu, 19 Jan 2006 16:45:00 +0000

A Computerworld article in which Bart Perkins stresses that organizations should not abdicate responsibility for program management..."As IT builds less and buys more, effective program management becomes increasingly critical to the success of your programs and ultimately to the success of your company. If you allow your outsourcer to also serve as your program manager, you lose your leverage and allow accountability for the program to drift outside your company. Augment your resources; don't abdicate your responsibility."

Not So Fast!

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Thu, 19 Jan 2006 16:38:00 +0000

A Computerworld article by Mary Brandel stressing the need to look beyond completing projects to delivering real business value..."it's time for ROI to become as important to a project's closure as it is to its inception, whether you're closing the loop on the project's original intent or squeezing out extra value after implementation."

Finding the Value in IT

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Thu, 29 Dec 2005 19:44:00 +0000

I spoke to the Committee for Economic Development of Australia (CEDA) in Melbourne and Adelaide in September. Fujitsu has now made available CD's of the presentation which you can obtain through the link from the title above. You can also get a PDF of a CEDA Australian Chief Executive Magazine which contains an excellent abstract of the Melbourne presentation by going to http://ceda.com.au/public/publications/ace/index.html and downloading the December 2005 issue of the magazine.

The next revolution in interactions

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Wed, 07 Dec 2005 16:48:00 +0000

An interesting article from The McKinsey Quarterly that reinforces the need for organizations to fundamentally rethink their governance and management approaches, and organizational structures if they are to leverage their two most important assets: people and information.

Australia's worst-ever IT Project Failure?

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Wed, 07 Dec 2005 01:53:00 +0000

Yet another avoidable disaster documented by a good friend of mine in Australia, Mark Toomey, in the November, 2005 edition of his Infonomics IT Governance Letter. As Mark said so eloquently in a subsequent interview with The Age newspaper, "...these disasters were preventable. But as the experience of Customs indicates, people will not learn from past mistakes. What is it about big IT projects that turns otherwise intelligent humans into incompetent nincompoops?"

Building business-IT linkages

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Wed, 07 Dec 2005 01:35:00 +0000

A November 25th, 2005 Computerworld Canada article by Mark Els reiterates, yet again, that "there are no IT projects; there are only business projects". This is a thoughtful article which, again, raises the question in my mind "how many more books and articles such as this have to be written stating, what is to me, the 'blindingly obvious', before organizations get it?" Only when we go beyond writing and reading about this and actually take action will we come anywhere near to realizing the potential of IT-enabled change.

The Importance of getting the requirements right

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Wed, 23 Nov 2005 22:19:00 +0000

A good article by Christopher Lindquist in CIO magazine discussing the importance of good requirements and the need to re-think how we get them. He quotes analysts claims that 71% of project failures can be attributed to poor requirements.

Buyers addicted to gambling on IT investments

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Wed, 19 Oct 2005 14:42:00 +0000

I recently returned to a visit to Australia where I spoke with a large number of organizations and presented at a number of forums. The above link is to a write up of one presentation by Sandra Rossi in Computerworld.

Three Reasons Why Good Strategies Fail: Execution, Execution...

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 15:06:00 +0000

An article from Wharton reinforcing that whilst creating sound strategies may not be an easy task, it's the execution of those strategies that provides the greater challenge.

Common sense is not common practice

noreply@blogger.com (John Thorp) — Wed, 27 Jul 2005 23:28:00 +0000

An interesting interview by Neil Sutton with Michael Stanleigh in ITBusiness.ca that reinforces the need to stop talking about the problem of failed IT projects and get on with applying fundamental management discipline. To quote Neil "Stanleigh openly admits that most of the advice he dispenses is obvious and should be second nature to anyone with good business acumen. The problem is the big picture gets lost and the details take over."