I recently heard of some folks referring to my hero Peter Weill as being, "Too pie in the sky." It will come as no surprise to those of you who know me, this pushed one of my buttons.

Peter is the Chairman of the Center for Information Systems Research (CISR) at the MIT Sloan School of Management. Almost 10 years ago he wrote with Jeanne Ross, Director of MIT CISR, what continues to be the definitive book on IT Governance. (They wrote another stellar book just last year called "IT Savvy.") Peter and Jeanne lead a number of MIT research scientists at what I consider to be the best IT research organization on the planet. MIT CISR has been asking and answering the same question for the past 36 years, "How do Enterprises realize the most value from their investment in technology?" In the twilight of my now 32 year IT career, this one question now drives my every day.

I was at MIT just last week. It was my fourth time attending their phenomenal MIT CISR Executive Summer Session. The week was comprised of those things MIT CISR research shows as having the greatest effect on IT success in Enterprises today. Here was their agenda:

• Maximizing Business Value in IT Savvy Firms
• IT Leadership in a Business Transformation
• Driving Competitive Advantage Through Agility & Innovation
• The IT Unit of the Future: New Technologies, New Designs
• IT-Enabled Change: Business Approaches, People Challenges

Friday's agenda on IT-Enabled Change focused on IT Governance, what Peter describes as the single most influential aspect of IT success. You can see why he is my hero.

I'm sure you can also understand why the pie-in-the-sky comment pulled my chain. If I had heard this admonishment a few years ago I would have surely ranted out loud, alone in my hotel room like a crazy person. But thanks to Twitter I now have a venting channel at my disposal 24/7. I immediately sent the following tweet:

"I'm sick of folks viewing IT-as-innovator as pie-in-the-sky. But OK, say it is. So let's find leaders to make it pie-on-the-table."

I followed that tweet with another: 

"Not enough folks w/ the audacity/courage to make IT what it should be. Too many folks just want help doing the wrong thing better."

This triggered a flurry of tweets from @theitskeptic, @PeterKretzman, @_jfeldman, @wmmonroe, and @michael_keen on IT's role in the Enterprise. @mskaff had this offering:

"Or even pie-on-fork. Sadly, too many technology projects end up as pie-in-face."

The cleverness of his tweet aside, Michael Skaff, CIO of the SF Symphony, gets to the issue at hand - IT has problems requiring immediate solution. This immediacy places everyone (in the business as well as IT) in a position of simply wanting to know what to do to "just fix IT." I've mentioned this before. I occasionally encounter folks who roll their eyes after my IT Governance presentation, and here are some of their comments:

• "It all sounds good, but it will never happen in my organization."
• "THAT will take WAY too long."
• "Just tell me what to do...NOW!"

As I continue to say, IT Governance is a journey. It is a journey that requires audacity, courage, perseverance and resilience. And the results of that journey are incredible, placing IT in the role of Strategic Business Asset vs. cost-center-to-be-managed.  IT Governance raises the potential for IT organizations to move from supporters of the business (or worse, overheard) to innovators of the business.

And the beauty of taking the IT Governance journey is the potential to solve just the problems preventing many organizations from undertaking the journey in the first place. All of the day-to-day machinations of IT fall under the purview of IT Governance. Sound IT Governance is capable of improving systems development capability or provisioning or project delivery or any IT tactical issue requiring solution. The alligators in the swamp become the first bite you take out of the elephant with the vision for IT Governance painted on the horizon offering light at the end of the tunnel. (And yes, I was trying to set the record for number of clichés used in a single sentence.)

Peter and Jeanne will each tell you if IT is to have any chance of assuming the role of innovator, it must first "fix itself" and establish a reputation in the business for delivering the "bread-and-butter" aspects of IT's role. They will tell you it is only then that IT can consider maximizing business value, business transformation, driving competitive advantage & innovation and enabling business change - all of those "pie in the sky" aspirations.

All of this talk of pie has conjured a couple of peripheral thoughts. First, my wife bakes the best pies ever. Second is a sequence from one of my favorite movies of all time, Pulp Fiction. In one scene Bruce Willis' character Butch is talking about breakfast with Maria de Medeieros' Fabienne character:

• Fabienne: "I'm ordering a big plate of blueberry pancakes with maple syrup, eggs over easy, and five sausages."
• Butch: "Anything to drink with that?"
• Fabienne: "A tall glass or orange juice and a black cup of coffee. After that, I'm going to have a slice of pie."
• Butch: "Pie for breakfast?"
• Fabienne: "Any time of day is a good time for pie."

I agree, even if it's pie in the sky.

Steve Romero, IT Governance Evangelist