By DiBy Kishore Sengupta,
Professor of information systems at INSEAD.

Managers who – at various degrees of remove – have been involved in the implementation of IT initiatives, are keenly aware of the complexity and challenges that confront such initiatives. A third of all projects are not completed. Many that are completed do not accomplish their underlying objectives. Not surprisingly, there are increasing questions being asked about the value of IT investments undertaken by organizations, both from a strategic and execution perspective.

Revolutionizing IT is a timely entry in this debate. It focuses on IT project execution, as opposed to strategy. The authors, who have deep experience in IT implementation, propose a set of guidelines for success. These guidelines consist of simple rules on scoping and executing projects as well as establishing goals and accountability. Many of these guidelines make intuitive sense. For example, many of the complexities of a project are only discovered as it progresses. This has two implications for project planning. First, when solving complex problems, incremental approaches work better than comprehensive, radical solutions. Second, it may not be practical to scope a project out in complete detail at inception. Rather, as long as a project is driven by a coherent overall vision, its scope can evolve dynamically, determined by limitations on time and resources available. Other guidelines focus on the size of teams (smaller is preferred), approaches to finding solutions (imitation is preferred to invention; packaged software should be relied on wherever possible), managing IT professionals (focus on attracting and retaining valuable talent), and scheduling projects (create and work with aggressive schedules).

The guidelines are well illustrated with vignettes from the authors’ past experiences. However, some of the vignettes are dated and somewhat stilted in realism. For example, chapter 3 starts with a description of how “Mega-Multi Corporation” executed its project, with a full complement of mistakes and failures commonly attributed to IT projects. While many of these problems did occur in past projects, I wonder, however, if many managers are still so naïve as to succumb to the pitfalls described in the example. The book also omits significant issues that lead to the failure of IT projects, such as a lack of alignment with strategy and business goals. Another issue that would have provided value to the reader is a deeper discussion about managing IT professionals in Chapter 12. The notion of small, highly capable teams proposed in the book is certainly attractive. However, the reality of most project environments is one of great flux and turnover, thereby affecting the stability of project teams. How should hiring policies and project assimilation routines incorporate these realities? The chapter skims these issues without providing adequate guidance.

In summary the book offers a set of practical tools for managers to think about when implementing IT projects. In order to specify its contribution to managerial thinking, it is useful to distinguish between two perspectives to IT projects. One approach – call it the regret minimization approach – involves finding ways to make the best of IT projects, which are difficult and messy, but which are unavoidable. The other approach – call it the opportunity maximization approach – argues that project execution competency can constitute the basis for competitive advantage. The challenge for organizations is, then, to find ways to create such capability on a sustainable basis. If you are interested in opportunity maximization, this book is unlikely to be very useful. If, on the other hand, your organization adopts a regret minimization approach, you will find this book to be of great interest.

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