The IT Governance Evangelist

I recently spoke at an Executive Leadership Conference CA sponsored in Los Cabos, Mexico. The opportunity to visit such a wonderful destination was enticing, but it was the prospect of presenting my ideas about IT Governance (ITG) to a room full of CIOs that provided the greatest thrill.

I talked about the value of IT Governance and how Project and Portfolio Management (PPM) is a good place to start when approaching ITG. I provided a brief overview of each of the ITG processes to demonstrate the ubiquitous nature of the discipline. I then went into more detail on PPM processes to substantiate why PPM is a good place to initiate their journey into IT Governance. As in all of my ITG presentations, I stressed the processes required and the importance of great process management discipline.

Jose Mora, CA Product Marketing Director, joined me to give a CA Clarity presentation. All went well despite the language barrier. (Yes, surnames aside, Steve Romero and Jose Mora both spoke in English to a fortunately bilingual audience.) Little did I know that I would soon go from being pleased to being outright delighted with the conference.

The final items on the day's agenda were the roundtable discussions focused on Governance, Management or Security (following CA's three Enterprise IT Management pillars of Govern, Manage and Secure). Of the 38 conference participants, 16 chose the Governance roundtable.

I insisted they speak in their native tongue, which I knew would make their conversations more productive. I was content to stand by for any questions they might have or insights they may have wanted me to share. They wasted little time getting started; passionate and animated exchanges quickly ensued. Their level of enthusiasm would have been gratifying enough, but what pleased me the most was a word I heard repeated again and again--processo.

It began as a smattering of the word here and there, but by the mid-point of the forum, it was constant--processo, processo, processo in almost every sentence!

I am an IT Governance Evangelist because I believe in what IT Governance enables an enterprise to achieve. I am passionate about it and I love sharing that passion. I am even more passionate about process management.

I know process management is all about an acute and unyielding focus on the customer - and delighting that customer. I know good processes and good process management result in making work possible and practical. I know process management executed correctly is enabling, empowering and even liberating for people participating in the process. So hearing processo again and again was joyful for me. But it gets better.

The long day was followed by a magnificent dinner on the beach. It was a great way to conclude the event and it provided me the opportunity to have one-on-one conversations with some of the participants.

One of the CIOs sought me out because he wanted to talk to me about process management. At the end of our conversation he told me he was going to meet with his CEO and ask for funding to staff a Process Consulting group. Somehow I expressed my endorsement without jumping up and down and hugging him.

I ran an IT Process Consulting Group as part of my IT Governance organization in a previous position. It was a task force formally and primarily dedicated to IT Governance and Process Management - the product of my passion and a very forward-thinking CIO. Though I suspect they must be out there, I have yet to personally encounter another organization with an internal staff dedicated to providing process management consulting services to their enterprise.

Our systems and solutions are nothing if not accompanied by good processes. Without good process management, our processes are barely worth the paper on which they are printed. I know how critical the discipline of process management is, and I believe every organization should have people dedicated to providing process management expertise and ultimately ensuring process success.

I was overjoyed to witness this CIO's conviction to convince his leadership to invest in the discipline of process management. I bid the CIO good luck and managed to express my sincere desire that he succeed while barely maintaining a professional demeanor.  Inside, I was delirious.

Viva Processo!