Enterprise IT's Top Enemy: Its Own Arrogance
A new video pokes fun at the fact that the man on the street doesn't know what BI means, which is IT's problem in a nutshell.
The "man on the street" video starts off harmless enough. Andy Bitterer, the co-chair of the Gartner's BI Summit, is in London trying to hunt down any commoners who know about business intelligence tools, data warehousing and corporate performance management.
Take a look:
Gartner BI Summit: London Interviews
Not surprisingly, few experts could be found. I admit, I chuckled a few times, and Bitterer seems like a nice enough chap.
But then I got to thinking about it some more. And it dawned on me that this video is, ironically, the perfect representation of the self-inflicted image problem that IT departments' and the entire IT industry itself have suffered from for decades: A technological arrogance that lurks behind and manifests itself in arcane techno mumbo-jumbo and smug conceit, that, for lack of a better word, really pisses off end users and has turned them against IT departments.
Do you know what a data warehouse is? How about OLAP or ETL tools? Do you have any idea what a database is? Business intelligence?
A befuddled Bitterer sums up: "People don't seem to know about business intelligence!" Shame on you stupid users!
In their own way, the interviewees actually provided Bitterer and the rest of us with the answer to what users most want from IT today—simplicity and ease of use in their software. One woman mentions Excel as her database tool, and one guy says: "I just use the Internet, really."
That shouldn't surprise anyone, especially when considering the massive uptake in SaaS applications: Those intuitive, easily accessible apps that users are flocking to.
Quite simply, IT today has to play the role of "interpreter" for users and then deliver the software that can help users get their jobs done. Period. Can you use a computer? Yes. Can you intuitively understand basic software? Yes. Do you have an Internet connection? Yes. Then you should be good to go. The "consumerization of IT" proves that the masses do care about and love all things tech.
That the "dim masses" of business users don't know the difference between Unix and Linux is not their concern. That's IT's concern.
Look at cars today. My Honda Pilot is one complicated machine, but you don't see the Honda engineers hanging it over my head that I don't know what an iVTEC engine is or how a Variable Cylinder Management functions. The interface on the Pilot is pretty darn intuitive: key in ignition, foot on break, shift into gear and go. The stereo, the heating system, the dashboard—all extremely uncomplicated.
For IT, it appears that the legacy of the past—in the form of a condescending gate-keeper role—is still alive and well. And that's too bad.
To many IT folks and analysts, there were some yucks to be had from that video. But, in fact, the joke is actually on Bitterer and all of the rest of us who feel a sense of importance over the common blokes who know nothing of OLAP and ETL tools.
Which is why IT is, in far too many companies, still viewed as a cost center not to be taken very seriously.
Follow me on Twitter @twailgum. Follow everything from CIO.com on Twitter @CIOonline.
Previous Post: 5 Easy Steps to ERP Software Success!Next Post: So Long, SAP's Leo Apotheker, We Hardly Knew Ye
Most Discussed Posts
Cloud computing has emerged as one of the most significant game changers to hit the technology landscape in the past 20 years. With this massive expansion of the cloud, the perception of the IT organization is shifting from a utility player to a change agent. This eBook breaks down five ways progressive organizations are using cloud-based IT Management solutions to help drive innovation and become more strategic, including: adding visibility and analytics, speeding up time-to-value, lowering costs, improving prioritization, and providing a blueprint for future cloud deployments.
Read the white paper to see how IBM helped Citigroup deliver new services and enhancements to their 200 million customers faster.
There are 3 ways to modernize legacy applications: rewrite completely, acquire packaged solutions or migrate existing code. This paper explains why it's best to migrate and how IBM® Rational® software can help.
Accommodating specific lines of business can result in a hybrid ecosystem of applications and servers. The resulting complexity of this architecture makes for an environment that is costly to maintain and difficult to change when addressing new challenges.
This whitepaper will help you to define a mobile device passcode policy. Security managers must attempt to reconcile two opposing goals. They must: 1) create a passcode policy that is strong enough to protect the device if it is lost or stolen, while: 2) not annoying users with needless length or complexity.
This whitepaper, authored by The Radicati Group, looks at the key reasons organizations should consider moving to a cloud-based archiving solution. Email archiving solutions enable organizations to store, monitor, and collect electronic data exchanged by their users to comply with internal policies and regulations.
ATERNITY will showcase a 30-minute demo on how Fortune 500 companies are leveraging its award-winning FPI Platform to deliver a user-centric approach to Proactive IT Management.
For businesses to move forward and tap into the ever-expanding universe of Internet users and network-enabled devices, it's critical to learn how to make the transition to IPv6. Learn the critical steps your organization must take to make a seamless transition-and keep your business world connected.
Learn how IT teams can protect against spear phishing tactics. Harry Sverdlove, chief technology officer of Bit9 offers a frank discussion about spear phishing - the most common technique used in today's advanced attacks.
Learn how to build a solid business case for your migration to Red Hat Enterprise Linux so you can run leaner, innovate faster, be more flexible and own the New Now.
Social media isn't about you; it's about everything around you. As you consider how your customers want to communicate with you, social media is something that can't be ignored. But what should your strategy be? Is social media "just another channel?" What kind of a plan makes sense for your contact center and for your customers? Join our experts as they share their insight and research results.
Hardware tokens were a popular method of strong authentication in past years but the cumbersome provisioning and distribution tasks, high support requirements and replacement costs have limited their growth. The additional log-in steps that hardware tokens require and the resulting user frustrations have limited adoption and make them impractical for larger scale partner and customer applications.
Sponsored Links
