The CIO Playbook: Strategies and Best Practices for IT Leaders to Deliver Value

Chapter 4

Step 4: Deliver

Vision without action is a daydream. Action without vision is a nightmare.

—Japanese proverb

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Deliver: Implement products and services to improve bottom-line performance for your company.

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Chapter 3 discussed how IT can partner with the rest of the business to develop innovative solutions. Acquiring and developing technology is one thing, however; successfully delivering it to employees across an organization is an entirely different matter. Perhaps we should spend less time talking about strategic planning, priority setting, and developing technology and more time talking about operational excellence and how to achieve it. T. S. Eliot once said, “In the annals of innovation, new ideas are only part of the equation. Execution is just as important.” This chapter discusses the operational practices necessary for successfully delivering results. One of the most significant challenges for CIOs is successfully implementing global enterprise systems, such as enterprise resource planning (ERP), customer relationship management (CRM), and supply chain management (SCM). For that reason, I decided to focus this chapter on this topic.

Also, while you and your team may always deliver high-quality products and services, you may not always get the recognition that you deserve. For that reason, this chapter discusses how to create an IT marketing program to set expectations with your business partners and communicate ...