Closing the Gap Between Business and IT
by Dr. Ivar Jacobson and Kurt Bittner
From the time that computers were first applied to solving a business problem more than 50 years ago, there has been a communication gap between Business and IT. For almost as long we have sought solutions, but the gap grows only wider, until it now is a chasm that needs a fairly substantial bridge.
From the Business you may hear that “we have no confidence in IT’s ability to deliver useful solutions”, or “we have limited visibility of progress, risks and problems”, and “we don’t know how we should measure the value of our investments in IT.” From IT you may hear that “they (the Business) don’t fund the projects adequately”, or “they don’t know what they need”, or “they don’t know what is possible to develop”. Each side feels the other is responsible for the problem. And, you know, both are right.
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All right, but maybe a little outdated
While I agree with the contents of this article, I find it somehow outdated. It could have been written 20 or 30 years ago, without any change.
But in the real world the relationship of business with IT has changed during these years. So much that IT as a separate organizational structure might in fact disappear, since information systems only work when their evolution is fully driven by business.
There are already many symptoms of this trend, not only in small and medium organizations, but also in big ones. As an example, HP is eliminating 9,000 IT positions.