Firms get a whole lot more out of technology when IT and business people learn that neither group deals in absolute certainty.

In the world of legal technology, you're either responsible for delivering IT to the business or you have to find the money to pay for it. Either way, I'm sure that you sometimes feel intensely frustrated with "them" - the people in the other group.

If you're leading the business, you're often disappointed with technology projects and the people that are run them. After all, you have plenty of experience of missed deadlines, escalating costs and systems that don't do what you want.

If you're a technologist, you've developed an equally jaded view of the business and the people running it. You're used to being presented with projects that have unrealistic deadlines, inadequate budgets and objectives that shift constantly with no regard for either.

So can it be true that the Partners and managers in your firm enjoy pulling the rug from under your feet? Unlikely I'd say, since it costs them a lot of money every time they do it. Does each member of the IT department get a deep sense of job satisfaction when they can't deliver? Of course not, would you?

So how do IT and the business end up at cross-purposes, or even in open conflict? Over the years, I have dealt with
Partners and IT people who expect the other group to predict the future with absolute certainty.

You know the feeling - the pressure to say "Yes! Absolutely!" when what you really ought to say is "I'm really not sure." There are lots of reasons to give in to that feeling: - pressure from your peers or superiors perhaps, professional pride or maybe just not wanting to be seen as the "No" person.

The truth is that business management is an exercise in dealing with uncertainty. Most of things that influence business decisions can't be controlled or even predicted that well. The economy, governments and your firm's clients are all doing their own thing. As for your competitors - they're out to make your life as difficult as possible.

As a consequence, business planning is an iterative process:

• Make the best prediction you can about the future.
• Plan for the short, medium and long term and act accordingly.
• Monitor the results and go back to step 1 when reality deviates from the plan.

So if you're in the IT department, stop fretting about the fact that business leaders keep moving the goalposts! Instead picture them chasing the ball around the pitch: - sometimes they may be in command of the situation, but more often they're manoeuvring for advantage or reacting to the other team.

Learn to expect changes of direction and develop methods of anticipating, planning for and managing that change. It's all too easy to put your head down in the struggle to reach your goal, but you should take a reality check every so often to prevent your project from hitting the buffers unexpectedly.

If you're a business leader, it's vital to realise that IT people face a lot of uncertainty in what they do too. Why? Every business has different and changing needs, so it should be no surprise to learn that the most popular and successful software applications are flexible toolkits capable of use in a wide variety of situations.

The price of all this flexibility is a level of complexity that makes it hard to predict how a system will work best with the people, processes and other systems in your business. The only way to be 100% sure is put the system into action and try out some alternative approaches.

In practice, you can't install even the 'simplest' application such as your word processor or email program in a corporate environment without a lot of careful planning and testing. To cope with this uncertainty, the typical technology project also uses an iterative model:

• Figure out how to use IT to meet the project's objectives.
• Develop and test a working model of the system.
• Run a pilot project, and go back to step 2 if you didn't get it right.
• Deploy the system.

In an uncertain world, it's tempting to seek absolute assurances from people that you 'control' such as your IT department and suppliers. The danger is that your IT team will often feel compelled to tell you want you want to hear against their better judgement.

Instead, you should seek to foster an open and honest dialog about the level of uncertainty attached to a particular project. If you don't, all you are doing is denying yourself the opportunity to apply the same risk-management disciplines that you use in other aspects of business.

In short, uncertainty is to be found on both sides of the business/IT equation. The surest way to avoid problems is for all involved to have an open and honest conversation about what they do and don't know and start planning from there. Get your project off to the best start and keep it that way by looking at four key areas:

• Be absolutely clear about what you're doing and why you are doing it. Pull together the threads of business strategy, IT strategy and operational requirements to form a coherent proposal that gets buy in from everyone.
• Put together the best team for the job. Finding the right people, systems and suppliers can be a time consuming task, and mistakes can be very costly. Document your requirements and help you to select the right people and suppliers.
• Get your plans and communication about those plans on the right track. Draw up realistic and achievable plans that deliver benefits as soon as possible. Just as importantly, communicate those plans, keeping everyone in the loop and avoiding unexpected objections down the line.
• Manage your projects for success. Projects go wrong when project managers take their eye off the ball. If you or your team are too busy with the day job, bring in a dedicated project manager or experienced consultant to give you extra help when you need it most.

Key Action Points

When you're about to embarking on your next major project, here are a few issues that business and technology people should sit down and address *together*:

• Download my free Project Proposal Toolkit. It will help you through the vital early stages of planning and launching your project.
• Decide whether this is a short, medium or long term business need? Seek a solution that can be delivered (and pay back) before requirements or priorities change.
• Is this a mega-project? Try to break big project up in to manageable phases that you can deliver in few weeks or months.
• Do you understand the level of risk involved? Has the business planned thoroughly for the best, middle and worst case outcome of the project?
• How will you track changes in the environment? Agree a series of regular reviews of business requirements, for example at the start of each project phase.
• Is it appropriate to change the project's objectives and who decides what's ok? How much change is acceptable before the project has to stop and go back to the planning and approval stage?
• Is there a formal review and approval process to manage major changes? Does it examine at the impact on scope, budget, time-scales and deliverables?

© 2004-2008 Ian Lauwerys. You are free to reproduce this article in whole or in part, provided you use the entire attribution below, including a live web site link. Please also notify me where the material will appear.

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