From Bangalore to London to Boston, Smart Enterprise Exchange members are discussing the need for leaner business practices.

When I first learned that IT departments were following in the footsteps of their manufacturing peers, the idea made sense: Streamlining operations, focusing on customer value and eliminating waste will help save time and money while improving the customer experience It seemed straightforward.

What I didn’t consider — but our global members seem to know — is that the concept of Lean IT varies widely by industry and geography. And while guidelines such as ITIL® and Six Sigma may be used, Lean practices can be broadly applied to business and management with strategic implications.

So, when Orange Business Services’ CIO Vincent Kelly told attendees at our London event in June that Lean IT practices served as a foundation upon which the telecommunications company was revamped three years ago, I was intrigued. He described ways to incorporate Lean thinking to improve customer relations, make better offshoring decisions, demonstrate better TCO, and even get buy-in for green IT efforts.

As our reports from the event indicate, British CIOs “seem to hold some very diverse views of what constitutes the role of the CIO in the application of Lean thinking, and how to achieve a Lean organization.” You can catch up on other global Live Exchanges that you may have missed and read our reports from Rome and Canada.

Even while internal business processes are being optimized, CIOs must turn their attention to one of the most difficult challenges their organizations face: innovation. Smart Enterprise Exchange is hosting Live Exchanges in the U.S. on the topic of Practical Innovation, and we will be examining the theme in depth beginning in October. For some background and thought leadership on the subject, you may want to pick up a copy of Scott Anthony’s recent book, The Silver Lining (Harvard Business Press, 2009). As described in our new Smart Books feature in this month’s Business Technology Strategy track, Anthony challenges CIOs to think beyond spending cuts to view innovation as the way to “stop ineffective initiatives, change key business processes, and start more productive behaviors.” And that sounds quite a lot like the goals of Lean IT.

Finally, I invite you to join the conversation and post your own comments here on the Smart Enterprise Exchange. Do you find our new video on the Collaborative CIO valuable? If you attended one of our Live Events, share your experiences in your own blog. If you weren’t able to attend in person, begin a virtual discussion with your peers who were there. Ask a question of our experts or offer advice. Participation allows you to optimize the value of this community, so please connect with us.

Paula Klein
Editor and Community Manager
Smart Enterprise Exchange
editor@smartenterpriseexchange.com

ITIL® is a Registered Trade Mark, and a Registered Community Trade Mark of the Office of Government Commerce, and is registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Editor's Note

When I first began my career in journalism, a mentor told me that the danger of specializing on a "beat" is that everything looks urgent all the time. In other words, when you focus too narrowly on one thing, you may lose your wider vision and perspective.

If there was ever a time to try a new approach that takes a broader view, it's probably now. In my experience, it's essential to walk in another's shoes and see what's needed from his or her perspective. CIOs need to do this with their business peers, evaluating situations as a businessperson would — not as an IT specialist. Just this week, for instance, I was speaking to the chief of the European division of a U.S.-based company about his dispersed workforce.

Like everyone, economic pressures are making his employees and customers nervous; he wants to reassure them and keep them on track selling products and services. This executive isn't in IT, but IT solutions would address his concerns. Better forecasting tools, collaborative networking and virtualized servers can help him maintain his financial goals and still have budget left for innovation. Is his CIO ready with tools that are easy for the executive to use as well as his global teams? Is the payback clear?

To tackle these issues at your business, we invite you to review two white papers on Smart Enterprise Exchange this month. The first, "Metrics That Matter," by Peter Waterhouse, Senior Principal of Enterprise IT Management at CA, offers ways to demonstrate and report IT's contribution to the business. I have the European division leader in mind when Waterhouse notes that presenting business executives "with reports detailing server uptime or problem-resolution time delivers absolutely nothing." A more relevant metric, Waterhouse suggests, might be to track the percentage of ideas submitted to a discussion board and to offer incentives accordingly. Or, instead of simply reporting IT help desk figures, CIOs can let business leaders know the percentage of customer problems resolved within agreed service levels and link them to customer satisfaction — a far more insightful and useful metric, he says.

The second paper, "Masters of IT Economics," provides best-practice examples of three CIOs who are keeping costs in check while continuing to innovate in the current economy — a tough task, as you well know. The three IT executives are: Ahmed Abdelmoteleb at GE Money Australia; Kamal Bherwani, CIO of New York City's Health & Human Services (HHS) agency; and AXA Group's Senior VP of Technology Architecture & Development, Antonio DiCaro.

I hope that the perspectives of our subject-matter experts — on the Exchange site and at our live and online events — will continue to help sharpen your business focus. Let me know some ways that IT is proving its value at your enterprise.

Paula Klein
Editor
Smart Enterprise Exchange
editor@smartenterpriseexchange.com