General discussion
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Topic
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Open Letter to a CIO
LockedDear Mr. CIO:
I understand we’re in a recession, and the pressure for you to prune your budget is great, but how on Earth do you expect to get the same quality IT outsourcing for less money? I didn’t major in business, but I do know that in a capitalist society, nothing is free. Didn’t they teach you that in economics 101?
Here’s the thing: Trying to save a dollar here and a Euro there during a recession is shortsighted, sir. You need to think long-term. To try to envision the copious ROI that will come your way. I think it was my grandma who said “You reap what you sow” – although someone may have said it before her.
If you put on your MBA cap, you will see that skimping on your IT support will cost you in the end. Your employees will call for help only when their monitors are on fire, or when they forget their password for the fifth time in a month. That’s hardly big-picture thinking.
They will not call when they need help with an Excel pivot table; maybe they’ll fudge it, and perhaps get a figure incorrect, throwing off the numbers for the project they are working on. That could cost you dearly, Mr. CIO. But I suppose what you don’t know won’t hurt you, or, what you can’t see doesn’t exist. My grandma didn’t tell me that. That may have been Dr. Phil.
So anyway, when it comes time for another whopping project, maybe an Access database to be used by an entire department, the pivot table employee will wing it again, and he might bring in the help of a colleague, who knows a wee bit more about Access. The two of them will tinker around with their pet database, and maybe they will get it 98 percent correct. Close enough, right? No, sir. That 2 percent will come back to haunt you.
If you didn’t skimp on IT services, your employees could have called a database expert for help. Although on the surface it may seem more expensive (if you don’t see the demand, does that mean it’s not there?), it’s actually saving you boatloads of grief, and money, over time.
What’s more, that expert will not only fix a misbehaving database, he will also show your employees how to approach database design the proper way. His company will then furnish you with a report that details call complexity for all employees, which can help you identify future training needs. That’s awful nice of him and his employer.
You have the right to try to squeeze the same services out of a provider for less money. That’s why they made you CIO. But don’t say I didn’t tell you so when you are staring at the numbers, waiting in vain for ROI to show up.
Sincerely,
Jen Darr,
blog.pchelps.com