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May 24, 2005

Gartner Symposium Recap: How To Solve Pressing CIO Problems

Boris By Boris Pevzner

Now that the Gartner Symposium is over and I had some time to reflect (read: enjoyed a few lengthy plane rides across the country), it’s time to ask: What was the main takeaway from the show?

Here is how I would summarize the dominant line of reasoning that was threaded through the entire event:

  • CIOs have top-priority problems (they always have, of course): insufficient Business / IT alignment, ineffective communication within IT and between IT and the Business, compliance is hard to achieve, “I've cut as much as I can cut, and now I am asked to cut some more... now what?," etc.
  • If you think about these problems systematically, you will realize that they all have a common root cause: complexity.
  • Perhaps if you could “fix” complexity, you would help to address CIO’s issues?  The Gartner folks think so.
  • So how do you address complexity in a practical, incremental, non-disruptive? – through the “IT Productization” transformation.
  • And what is the current best-practices way to help implement IT Productization? – it’s service delivery management based on an actionable Service Catalog.

In one form or another, this message came through loud and clear in many Symposium talks, some of which I had a chance to summarize in this blog.  Based upon the audience’s reaction at the conference sessions and on the trade show floor, it appears to have resonated quite well.

One closing thought.  To paraphrase the eminently quotable Steve Mills (IBM’s software chief, who gave a keynote at the conference), “Some firms use labor to solve complexity” – and they will invariably be the ones at a competitive disadvantage.  It’s those that “solve complexity via technology” (such as the service catalog) that will be the ones to carry the day.

Posted on May 24, 2005 | Permalink

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