This post is adapted from A Seat at the Table: IT Leadership in the Age of Agility. Accompanying our transition to an Agile IT world, and subtler in its implications, has been the rise of community as a way of practicing IT. This change is due in large part to the rise of open source, but can also be traced to the demographics and inclinations of today’s emerging workforce, as well as to the interdependence of participants in a DevOps model. A successful business can harness this community … [Read more...]
The IT Leader’s Place in the Business
This post was is an excerpt from the book A Seat at the Table: IT Leadership in the Age of Agility by Mark Schwartz. In the Agile world, senior IT leadership, and the CIO in particular, must look at their jobs in a new way if they want to secure a seat at the table. A few of the critical characteristics of the new IT leadership role include: Driver of Outcomes Manager of Uncertainty Steward of Assets Contributor Influencer and Salesperson Orchestrator of Chaos Enabler Impediment … [Read more...]
The 3 Real Risks Every Project Manager Should Focus On
Adapted from War and Peace and IT: Business Leadership, Technology, and Success in the Digital Age by Mark Schwartz. It turns out that people are pretty terrible at assessing probabilities and risk. In my last book, A Seat at the Table, I cited several examples to make this point—examples that I love because even knowing the right answer I still can’t convince myself it is right. The first example had to do with the TV game show Let’s Make a Deal, in which the contestant is asked … [Read more...]
Q&A with Mark Schwartz and Gene Kim – War & Peace & IT
Recently, Gene Kim and Mark Schwartz had a chance to discuss Mark's upcoming book, A Seat at the Table. It was an enlightening discussion about inspiration, common misconceptions and the often bumpy journey of a CIO. Gene Kim: Share the story of what inspired you to write A Seat at the Table, as well as the first time you realized that a) you didn’t have one, and b) when you finally got one? Mark Schwartz: I remember a conversation I had with the CEO of a company where I was CIO. My IT … [Read more...]
