TABLE OF CONTENTS When I use a word, Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, it means just what I choose it to mean neither more nor less.
Lewis Carroll Through the Looking Glass
In my Introduction I made the case for focusing our approach to the management of IT product and service delivery on outcomes in order to maximize the value derived from IT investments. So what does our idealized , high value-adding IT environment look like? Presumably this would be the much vaunted world class IT environment with a world class IT IT function at its centre . But what do we mean by world class IT ? Does it have a specific, universally agreed, meaning or does it mean just what the speaker of the day chooses it to mean?
Some time ago a client of mine, the CIO of a large food retailer, asked me precisely this question. Although it is a term generally much bandied about by consultants, it was one of which I have fought shy, partially because it is linked in some people s minds with a specific service offering of KPMG Consulting, but more because I was unconvinced that it was particularly meaningful. As far as I could see, world class IT was something of a cross between a chimera and a chameleon, a fabulously expedient creature that mysteriously took the form of whatever IT panacea was flavour of the month. This view was reinforced when I...
