ITMM 26: Leadership and Innovation

Chapter and page references in the below are to “Leadership Improvement: The IT Maturity Method by Justin Coven, Ph.D.”)

Introduction (Chapters 6 & 7)

One of IT Maturity’s most important slogans is:

“True Leadership is the ability to Methodically and Continuously Create Heroes.”

IT Maturity provides numerous tools for leaders to use to aid individuals in achieving and interacting effectively in a methodical and continuous way (i.e. becoming heroes). Five sets of tools will be discussed: Leadership Principles, Organizational Structure, Tasks and Responsibilities of Organizations, Tracking Organizations, and Tracking Principles.

Leadership Principles: Management & Organization (Chapter 8, pages 43-71)

The first two IT Maturity Leadership Principles are:

Management (i.e. Deliverables, Issues, Schedules, Milestones, Risks, and Prioritization)

 Organization (i.e. Escalation, Delegation, Empowerment, Communication, and Context)

Leadership Principles: Extent & Culture (Chapter 8, pages 72-81)

The next two Leadership Principles are:

Extent (i.e. lightweight, depth, increments, scope)

Culture (e.g. Risk Taking, Customer Focused, Accountable, Verification, Preparation for Uncertainty, Problem Solving)

Example: The Culture leadership principle of “Risk Taking” receives a significant amount of attention at the executive level in today’s business world. However, formalized processes are typically missing. IT Maturity provides such processes. When investigating Risk Taking in greater depth you realize that there are many different types of risks. Some types of risks make sense to take, while other types of risks don’t make sense to take due to potential consequences. IT Maturity provides mechanisms to track and measure not only how much more risk taking is actually being done within an enterprise, but also to measure which types of risks are paying off and which are not.

Leadership Principles: Personal Skills (Chapter 8, pages 82-91)

Most supposed leadership skills are really personal skills. Although useful to individuals in organizations they are not measurable from an “Organization” perspective. This includes Communication Skills (e.g. obtaining multiple viewpoints, Listen, Encourage, Use communication types), and Character Skills (e.g. Motivation, Building Trust, Being Positive, Avoiding Favortism).

Leadership Principles: Vision (Chapter 9)

In today’s ever-changing world, strategy and vision can become stale after a few months or even sometimes in a few days. Thus, Vision can and should be created on an ongoing basis by the larger organization. Methodical and continual Vision tools are discussed across a broad set of categories (e.g . business functions, generic IT, product, service, manufacture, and partner/vendor integration).
Lunch

Organizational Structures, Tasks and Responsibilities (Chapters 10 & 11)

A summary of different kinds of organization is provided, including: Structure Types, Structure Properties, and Organic Properties. Tools are discussed that incorporate all three kinds of organization along with associated tasks and responsibilities. Further, organization consistency workflows are discussed to help ensure effectiveness of organization models.

Tracking Organizations and Principles (Chapters 12- 14)

Tools to track whether leadership principles are used methodically and effectively are described. These tools also help determine which principles are providing business value, which principles have exceptions, and which principles should be revised.  Additionally, this tracked data can be used to tune organizational structure. 

Leadership & Innovation (Chapters 4 & 16)

"Innovation" is a subcategory of the larger category of "improvement". In a business environment there are gradations of both 1) ‘how much improvement occurs’ and 2) ‘what can be improved’. Both of these gradations are discussed in order to understand innovation in a business environment. Additionally, to understand how the full spectrum of improvement can fit into organizational structures the basic membership of modern executive teams is discussed, including: Geographic leaders, Product leaders, Process leaders, Enterprise sub-process leaders, and Enhancement -Integration-Advancement leaders.

Business Specific Innovation (Supplemental Material)

Vision for specific process areas, such as Logistics, using previously discussed tools is demonstrated.

Future Innovation (Chapter 17)

Just as IT has changed how we shop, how we are entertained, how we communicate, and how we socialize, even more dramatic in other areas of human endeavor are soon to come. Of particular interest automation advances just entering the consumer market (e.g. self parking vehicles, vehicles that stay in lanes).  Changes will be more dramatic than the transformation from horses to cars. We will discuss many of these impending transformations and how they impact specific businesses, such as Logistics.

Taking Action (Chapter 15)

This will be a discussion to determine which Leadership and Innovation techniques and tools discussed in this course will provide best immediate value impact for your organization, along with a determination of the next immediate steps that should be taken.

IT Maturity, Inc. (itmaturity.com, 866-614-6888, info@itmaturity.com) provides Enterprise Maturity, Leadership, and Innovation training and services.

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