In business, they say that politics does not happen, if you look after the philosophy and the economics. For the IT Department, this comes down to communication – or we could use the term “marketing.” – to all the executives, especially the CEO.

They have to understand how IT works; what’s possible and what’s not, and what prevents IT from delivering benefits. The days are just about gone when executives prided themselves in never having touched a keyboard, but many executives are still woefully undereducated about information technology. In this “age 2.0″ of the web, they need to know about IT more than they ever have. The businesses that succeed on the web and the web businesses that succeed are those that have good IT skills, those whose executives understand what is and is not possible with IT.

And the ratchet continues – we will all be web or web-oriented businesses soon. The web is infiltrating everything and remoulding the way that many businesses work. PR companies, for example, used to be all about understanding the channels to the media, from magazines to TV. Nowadays the best PR companies are also specialists in Search Engine Optimization. It’s the way of the world.

Reaching The CEO

Senior executives are surprisingly scared of exposing their level of ignorance. An executive of an organisation I know that specialises in educating CEOs in a variety of areas, including IT, told us that he had once suggested organising IT brainstorming sessions where the CEOs could bring their CIOs along with them. However, every CEO to whom he suggested this rejected the idea immediately. None of them wished to expose their IT ignorance to their own CIO, especially not among a group of other CEOs and CIOs.

If a CEO has a poor understanding of IT, it is, in my opinion, the responsibility of the IT Department, and the CIO in particular, to try to rectify this. So let me make a suggestion. Where possible IT Departments should seek to become sources of education for all other departments, especially at the management levels. Depending on circumstance this may be formal or informal, but it is a genuine requirement. Also it has a dual benefit, as those who teach also learn themselves.

And there’s another benefit it puts in the pipeline, because you are, indirectly creating the next generation of business analysts who will be at the coalface of BPM and SOA (unless of course, such staff already exist)

For senior executives, the IT Department should set out to provide a tailored information service that helps them in their role and helps them understand the role of IT and where IT makes a difference. There is a particular need to educate other departments about the potential and actual business benefits of savvy IT. So I’m urging you to agree SLAs, define metrics, gather stats and create marketing literature to send out to your colleagues. Know your customer and market to them shamelessly. The respect for the IT Department will be seen to bring value only if it is actually SEEN to bring value.

Information technology may be growing in importance as every year passes, but the IT Department is still just one of a number of departments within an organisation that has no special status. It is an organ of the corporate body, but usually not the most important one. Its role in respect of other departments is both supportive and co-operative, and if support is properly delivered, it will be reciprocated. Then the political games will, perhaps, diminish or vanish.

One hand washes the other, then both hands wash the face.