IT Governance to Drive High Performance

INTRODUCTION

In the late 1990s, Andersen Consulting was preparing to spin off from Andersen Worldwide, the holding company for the consulting firm and for its sister company, accounting firm Arthur Andersen. Faced with building its own information technology (IT) organization, Andersen Consulting (now Accenture) quickly realized it was taking on a formidable challenge. At the time, the firm operated in more than 40 countries, and each country, and even some regions within large countries such as the United States, had their own IT organizations, systems and processes.

This arrangement was a legacy of how Andersen Consulting grew, as a decentralized partnership with profit-and-loss responsibility residing in the local offices. It was also a ...