All good things come to an end...

The semester is coming to an end and it is time to look back at the ground that we have covered. We have discussed everything about IT, including governance, change management, outsourcing, strategy, hardware and software, and countless other topics. Through it all, we have seen companies go (Blockbuster) and come back from the dead (GM) and highlighted the pervasive nature of IT in our corporate and personal lives. Looking back, what stands out for you from the semester? Was it a blog, a podcast, a case, a video, or a panel? Is there a thought or moment that captures the essence of the semester? I look forward hearing your reflections!

Vendor Selection, Planning, and Serendipity

In class today, we had a contrast between the vendor selection process of Cisco versus that of Harley Davidson.  what do you think should drive your vendor selection process - alignment with your organization, cost, or functionality?  And what were your thoughts on the success and failure of the two cases?

We also approached the subject of serependity versus planning.  It is clear that serepndity does play a huge role in your personal success as well as the success of your firm.  What are your thoughts on planning versus pure dumb luck?

Outsourcing - Final thoughts and reflections

With today's panel and Lecture 13 (next week), we are wrapping up our course discussion on IT outsourcing.  As you look back over the past three weeks, we have covered a lot of territory, from vendor selection to motivations to expectations to measuring ROI.   We, of course, could not get to everyone's questions in class today, so here are a few that I thought we should debate and talk about (some of these are from you!) - what do you think about these issues?

• At some point, will outsourcing be more expensive than insourcing?
• If expectations are so important, how do you mediate them?  Is governance the "silver bullet" (it was no accident that we talked about decision/input rights the same week as the panel!)
• How do you handle the "culture class" when deadline with offshoring partners (and sometimes nearshore ones)
• What stops firms from outsourcing core and strategic functions?
• What about rural sourcing, crowdsourcing, and the other emerging complexities of outsourcing governance?

I look forward to hearing your thoughts on outsourcing and your reflections!

Outsourcing - Part II

As we shift from motivation to implementation, our case discussions were focused upon who gets to make the decision, how to choose a vendor, and how the outsourcing relationship is managed. What do you think of the following..

• As a business manager, how much do you want to be involved in the outsourcing decision? Do you want the decision rights or just input rights?
• Which is better - best of breed or single sourcing?  What has been your experience with outsourcing?
• What do you think are the challenges in managing vendors (or clients)?

What stands out for you in outsourcing now that you have a chance to reflect some more?

Motivations for Outsourcing

The topic of the class over the next few weeks will be outsourcing.  We start today by talking about motivation - Cathay was outsourcing to drive down costs and Cisco was outsourcing to spur innovation.  From your experiences, what reasons have you seen for rationale for outsourcing in your company?  And in the news, what outsourcing deals have you seen announced and what was their rationale?

Even close to home, some recent analysis has suggested that one reason for the BP oil spill was due to the outsourcing relationships (scroll to the bottom of this article).

And all of this leads us to ask - where do organizational boundaries end?  And what does it mean for a company to geaux virtual?

Four Stories of Radical Transformation

We heard four great stories of radical transformation from our panelists in class this morning.  Alysia Green (Chevon); Dr. Stephanie Mills (OLOL); Dan Ohlerking (HPC); and Kevin Stone (AA) shared with us about how their organizations approach radical innovation.   Over the course of their presentations, I received over 50 texts containing some great questions, only a handful of which we were able to address.  So, let's continue this discussion here.

A few themes emerged from the discussion...

• IT is about business and speaking the language of business - it is about connecting information to process to people (sounds a lot like socio-technical systems theory!)
• Change management is crucial as you try to "manage the heart" of the change
• Resistance pervades all organizations, so you have to understand your business, the drivers, and the metrics
• The depth of change that IT has made is profound - we saw it even in our conception of what it means to go "to church"
• Data matters - all organizations have it, so now what do we do with it?
• IT is about relationships (network-based strategy!)
• Mobility and social networking are the keys to the future

What stood out for you?  What are your take-aways?

Changing knowledge sharing in knowledge-based firms

This week in class, we began a discussion about encouraging knowledge sharing in knowledge-based firms.  Both CareGroup and Siemens were wrestling with how to encourage their employees to share knowledge with one another.  In the case of ShareNet, Siemens created a structured knowledge base where they struggled to get employee buy-in.  CareGroup created a knowledge sharing app that automatically searched through all of the tacit knowledge to discover patterns to make explicit (albeit with a disastrous outcome!).


Despite their differences, this raises several issues for discussion...


Issue #1: Knowledge sharing


Some questions for you to consider:

• Is the concept of knowledge management inherently flawed?  Is it a noble effort that rests upon flawed assumptions?
• How do firms encourage knowledge sharing?  We know that knowledge is the chief asset for firms today, so how do we encourage employees to share it?
• Are there models of knowledge management and knowledge sharing that might work?

Issue #2: The knowledge of the group

We also raised the issue of the knowledge of the group versus than the knowledge of the individual.  As part of this discussion, we talked about about crowdsourcing - what are your thoughts on this approach?  Just six hours after our class, a column came out discussing crowdsourcing and the use of twitter to discover truthiness (thanks Stephen Colbert!).


Issue #3: The future of knowledge management

I also presented an argument that the future of knowledge management rests in social networking.  Do you agree/disagree and, to return to a topic presented earlier in class, how should firms approach social networking for internal purposes?  JetBlue is currently using Facebook to go downstream and create a better relationship with their customers, but in light of our discussions on ShareNet and CareGroup, are there similarities and approaches that we can glean for internal firm communications?


Issue #4: Knowledge sharing and innovation

Last, as I was reflecting upon what you were sharing in class, I started to wonder about the relationship between the reliance of knowledge gathered from knowledge management systems and innovation.  Does knowledge sharing stifle innovation - if you rely upon the knowledge of others, does it make you less likely to innovatively approach the problem?  Does it create constraints upon you and not allow you to "think outside the box"?

I look forward to your thoughts!