IT Employment

Ask something
Discussion Locked

Insight or Insanity? What Do You Think?

0 helpful
3 replies

by oldefar

Closed to new repliesThis discussion is closed. It stays readable, but it takes no new replies.

The Evergreen Project was a study of common management practices conducted by top consultants and business school professors. Over 150 companies were included in the study. The book "What(Really)Works" is based on the study.

Among the findings were what didn't contribute to sucess. According to the study Information Technology was not a contributing factor, degree and nature of outsourcing did not influence success, and management programs such as total quality did not correlate to success.

The book or at least a synopsis of it will probably be read by your C levels in the coming months. Just thought I would ask everyone here at TR what their impression is before their CEO asks them.

3 replies

by thechas

I'm not surprised.

The primary factors for a successful business are:
Management
Business plan
Market

Technology can help you perform the task faster, but is not required for the basic operation of most companies.

TQM and other management programs do not make up for poor management, or a bad business model.

The companies that TQM helps are those where management is willing to listen to the needs of employees and the business and respond to those needs.

If management is not willing to listen to it's workers, or follows a strict cost justification program, TQM won't make a big difference.

Chas

by timwalsh

Before drawing any conclusions (or panicing for no reason), the authors conclusions (based on the study results) probably need to be disected at greater detail.

First, according to the synopsis I saw on the Barnes and Noble website, the study does NOT say that either IT or managment programs DON'T contribute at all to the success of a company, but rather that they don't contribute significantly (or as significantly as their adherents claim, or as significantly as other business practices). There is a difference. There is also a difference between saying that a process doesn't contribute significantly to success and saying it really isn't of any use. Did the authors make any distinction between: successful companies that also have very strong IT organizations, those companies that are successful despite having very weak or ineffective IT organizations, and those companies that don't use IT to any great extent?

Next, what type of companies participated in the study? What types of industries were these companies in? What was the distribution of companies among the various industries? Is it statistically vailid to say that because certain business practices weren't significant contibutors to success in several industry categories, that this would hold true for all busineesses? If all 150 (160) companies had been in one of the technology industries, the conclusions could have been very different. There are in fact a large number of companies in many industries where while IT and management programs might contribute significantly to efficiency, efficiency in and of itself is not a primary determinant of the success or failure of that company.

by oldefar

As for technology companies, they have a vested interest in selling technology. The question is whether the investment in IT to support business pays off.

I didn't see the Barnes and Noble synopsis. The authors aren't particulary opposed to technology, only they expect 6 to 7% gains in productivity while showing a cost reduction. The key seems to keeping technology in the realm of tools and out of the realm of objectives.

I will be happy to share what I received with anyone who asks me directly.

This discussion is closed to new replies.