building successful organization

Copyright © July 2001 All rights reserved MDE Enterprises

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Building a Successful IT Organization

M

DE


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Introduction An IT Manager’s ability to accomplish great things is dependant upon the organization that gets the work done. Build a strong team and you will accomplish great deeds. Building a Successful IT Organization steps you through a process of identifying what you need and an approach to build a successful team. Once the team is in place, it is critical for the manager to focus the resources effectively to achieve the most benefit for the company. Building an organization that will be successful is more than simply filling technical positions. This document explores the necessity and means of establishing a winning attitude that will lead the team to greater success. The techniques and insight contained within this publication and my other publications in The IT Manager Development Series have been part of how I’ve managed IT organizations for many years. Results will vary for individual interpretations and implementations of the techniques and concepts discussed. Two tools are used to enhance the material: Sidebar: an example or additional information provided to clarify a point. Personal Note: a personal experience or “war story” used to reinforce a point or concept. I have included a bit of humor to make the reading more enjoyable and to reinforce points. Managing organizations at a high level is serious business, but having fun along the way is half the battle. I hope you find the material helpful in your quest and I welcome your feedback. You may contact me at [email protected]. The IT Management Development Series includes the following titles: IT Management-101 Developing an IT Business Plan Building a Successful IT Organization Building a Strategic IT Plan IT Project Management Acquisition - IT Due Diligence IT Staff Motivation and Development Acquisition - IT Assimilations Technology Asset Management What to Look For in a CIO To learn more or to view Table of Contents for each publication, log onto www.mde.net/cio . Coming in 2002 is training based upon the topics published in the IT Manager Development Series. MDE Enterprises will provide one to three-day seminars in major cities throughout the US. For more information, go to www.mde.net/manageIT for schedules and registration information. Information contained within this publication may not be copied or distributed in any form without the express written consent of MDE Enterprises. Mike Sisco


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Building a Successful IT Organization Table of Contents

Introduction 2 I. Assess Your Organizational Needs 4 II. Quantify What You Have 17 A. Quality 18 B. Quantity 19 C. Processes 20 III. Do We Understand 'Client Service' ? 21 IV. Identify Gaps and Prioritize New Hires 24 V. Funding New Staff and Managing Expectations 27 VI. Recruiting and Interviewing 32 A. Job Descriptions 33 B. Interview 36

C. Offer Letter 41 VII. Starting Out Right 43 A. Orientation 43 B. Benefits 45 C. Equipment 45 VIII. Performance Plans 46 IX. Communication is Key 58 X. Motivating and Rewarding 62 XI. Involve Each Resource 65 XII. Weed and Feed - Step Up to Your Problems 66 XIII. Reinforce Focus 68 XIV. Report Cards and Measurement Tools 70 APPENDIX: A. Sample Organization Chart – Functional Requirements 72 B. Sample Organization Chart – Infrastructure 73 C. Sample Organization Chart – Special Projects 74 D. Sample Organization Chart – Business Applications 75 E. Sample Organization Chart – Acquisitions & Assimilations 76 F. Current Employee Skills Matrix 77 G. Blank Skills Matrix Template 78 H. Technology Resource Interview Guide 79 I. Sample Offer Letter 80 J. Sample New Employee Orientation Guide 81 K. Job Description Template 82 L. Performance Plan Template 83 M. IT Support – Key Indicators Trend Report 85


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I. Assess Your Organizational Needs

In order to build anything, you have to determine what you need. Creating a successful IT organization is no different. Before we jump into identifying specific needs of an IT organization, we should step back for a moment and look at a broader picture. There are a few traits that exist in any successful IT organization that are not necessarily technical skills. You will focus much of your time on filling technical gaps within an organization, but there is a more important concept to think about first. A successful IT organization has a culture that permits success to happen. Maybe, we should even say, “successful organizations have a culture that cause success to happen”. Success doesn’t happen by “falling off the log”. It’s a bit more difficult. If it were that easy, everyone would be successful. You don’t have to look very far to see that there is significant opportunity for improvement. Successful organizations, whether it’s an IT organization, a sports team, or a charity organization all have at least one thing in common – a winning attitude. Developing a winning attitude and culture while you are filling technical gaps should be a major goal. An organization’s attitude starts with the leader of the organization. People are watching their managers and looking for indicators that tell them how they should conduct themselves. Sound far fetched ? It really isn’t, you better believe it. That’s not to say that every employee will perform poorly if the leadership is poor, but you should expect that strong people will typically leave an organization that cannot perform well. Have you ever heard the analogy, “Birds of a feather flock together.” ? Successful people and successful organizations attract other successful people. Successful managers are especially adept at attracting ‘the right sort’ to the team. Winning reinforces itself. Even when the team loses on occasion, the winners draw from a losing experience to determine what they need to do differently or better to win the next time. Did I really say that ? You bet. Winning organizations will take a losing situation and energize themselves to be that much stronger in the future. Winning or performing successfully is a habit that you want to instill in every organization you have the opportunity to manage. Winning also creates peer pressure that tends to push poor performers out. That’s a good thing. It’s up to the IT Manager to set the tone for the organization. Whether consciously or unconsciously, the tone of the culture is being established all the time. Taking the time to understand this dynamic can help ensure you establish a winning discipline within your group.


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Several non-technical traits that reinforce winning organizations are: - commitment - follow-up - anticipation of problem issues - trust in one another - giving extra effort - proactive action - supporting one another - organization - maturity - teamwork - positive leadership - “I can” mentality

As you develop your team, you want to develop the character of the team as well as the technical capabilities. Let me put it this way. You can always find technical skills. Finding technical skills in resources that have character and substance in the non-technical areas will bring winning traits to the group. This is big and a very important aspect of building a successful organization. Have you ever thought about why successful baseball managers that are hired by a losing club almost always bring in a veteran player or two from other ball clubs ? The reason is that these players know how to win and their attitude toward winning is contagious. Players with the best baseball skills in the world don’t necessarily know how to win games. Managers, coaches, and experienced players usually have much more to do with creating teams with winning attitudes. It’s the same in technology organizations. I would always prefer to have seasoned technical resources who know how to implement projects and that understand client service than having the team that is the best technically but is weak in communication and client service skills. I’ll always get more done and will have more fun along the way. Both of these things should be important to all of us. As a manager, you should always strive to build an organization that can run on its own. Developing a self managed team requires maturity and discipline within the team to stay focused without management supervision. Not all employees are capable of self discipline. Your first obligation to your company is to build teams that can manage effectively after you have been promoted to bigger and better things. Building an organization that can work successfully without you does not put you at risk; it usually creates a greater need for your organizational development skills in the company. The first rule of any manager is to find your replacement. Take this seriously. It’s hard to gain additional responsibility in a company when your organization is highly dependent upon you to manage it.


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Or, put it another way. Would you want to add to a manager’s responsibilities when his organization is always struggling ? Probably not. When managing a particular IT organization, you can decide what kind of team you want to have. Over time, you can create such a team, but to get there you most certainly have to quantify what is needed for your ideal organization. You should also know that there is no such thing as having to just manage with what you have. As the manager you are challenged to produce results for your company. Decide what you need to do the job and go about building the organization that will succeed. Most managers have more flexibility in this aspect than they think. I’m not suggesting that you have a blank check, but you certainly will have the ability to create an appropriate organization for the job if you go about it the right way.

Let’s see, where were we ? Oh yeah, assess your organization needs. To do this effectively, you should break your organizational needs into logical chunks. There is no standard model that works in all cases that I know of. Every company is different and IT organizations within a company will also have unique dynamics. For our working example, lets approach it from a CIO perspective of being responsible for all of a company’s technology resources. The same approach will work for you if your responsibilities are smaller or for a single IT department within the IT organization. Call it whatever you like , , , chunks , , , skill sets , , , technology experience , , , leadership experience , , , etc. For our exercise, I’ll break it down into areas that have been effective for me over the years. As you look at a company’s IT organizational needs, there are five primary areas of need:

- Functional requirements - Technical skill requirements - Industry experience - Leadership - Depth in critical positions


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Let’s discuss each area in more depth: Functional Requirements An IT organization has to manage many technical functions that support the business day to day as well as help the company achieve greater accomplishments. Functional IT requirements are: A. Business Applications

- Support programming - New development programming - Business analysis - Applications Support Desk - Technical writing - Training

B. Infrastructure

- LAN/WAN and desktop support - Data Center operations - Voice communications - Infrastructure Support Desk - Applications Server support - E-mail - Intranet support - Internet support

C. Special Projects

- Project management - Programming - Business analysis - Network specialists - Training

D. Acquisitions and Assimilations

- Due diligence - Assimilation project management - Programming - Business analysis - Infrastructure Specialist - Training

One easy way to look at your functional needs is to develop an organization chart. On the next page, I have created a sample organization template that includes positions for each of the functional requirements just listed. There is also one provided in the Appendix for your use.


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With each functional requirement, you must determine how many positions are needed based upon the considerations such as skill depth and the amount of work you have to cover. For our purpose here, I include a very simple organization. The organization will vary considerably based upon company size and mission. A software company would include a software installation organization and might not have an assimilation team as we have in our example.

Sample IT Organization – Functional Requirements

CIO

InfrastructureManager

AcquisitionAssimilations

Manager

BusinessApplications

Manager

SpecialProjectsManager

Data Center

LAN / WAN

InfrastructureSupport Desk

VoiceCommunications

ApplicationServer Support

E-Mail

InternetSupport

IntranetSupport

ProjectManagement

ProgrammingNew

Development

Training

NetworkSpecialist

BusinessAnalysis

Programming

Training

TechnicalWriting

ApplicationsSupport Desk

BusinessAnalysis

ProgrammingSupport

AdministrativeSupport

ProgrammingSupport

InfrastructureSpecialist

Training

Programming

AssimilationsProject

Management

Due Diligence


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It will also help to break each major functional area down into individual organization charts. The next several pages do that for you and include staffing positions for each function within each technical discipline. As we look at each discipline, several of the functions may be large enough to require a manager or supervisor so keep that in mind as you are quantifying your technical needs.

Sample Infrastructure Organization Functional Requirements

Variations of this organization will be appropriate based upon your company size and needs. The Intranet and Internet Support areas may be handled by the same few resources or they may require large organizations depending upon the extent of company involvement in these areas.


Data Center LAN / WAN& Desktop


VoiceCommunications

ApplicationServer Support E-Mail

InternetSupport

IntranetSupport

NameDay Operator

NameDesktop E-Mail

Service Specialist

NameE-Mail Server

Specialist

NameWindows/ NT

Specialist

NameServer O/SSpecialist

NamePhone/PBXSpecialist

NameTechnical HelpDesk Specialist


NameSupport Coordinator

NameWAN/Router

Specialist

NameTelecommSpecialist

NamePC DesktopSpecialist

NameNT Administrator

NameNovell Administrator

NameNight Operator

NameNight Operator

NameDay Operator

NameWebmaster

NameWebmaster

NameWeb Technical

Specialist

NameWeb Technical

Specialist


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Sample Special Projects Organization Functional Requirements

Many dynamics affect your approach with special projects as well. Your company may be able to do special projects within the other organizations (Business Applications and Infrastructure Organizations) through teams or you may need to carve out an entirely separate organization to achieve your objectives.


Team 1 Team 2 Team 3

NameProject Manager

NameNetwork Specialist

NameProgrammer Analyst

NameBusiness Analyst

NameProject Manager




NameProject Manager




NameTraining

NameTraining

NameTraining


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Even if you are of a size to justify separate teams, you may be able to leverage training for all three projects shown in our example by a single training resource. Likewise, depending upon the size and nature of the projects, a single project manager may be able to run more than one project at a time.

Sample Business Applications Organization Functional Requirements

The size of the organization may require multiple managers or supervisor/leaders. Notice that programming support functions are broken apart from new applications development programming. In a small company, they won’t necessarily be in separate functional groups, but in larger organizations they will tend to be because the focus can be very different. Within the programming groups, the need to have someone responsible for putting new code into production exists. This is usually managed by one of your senior programmers. This is an obvious requirement that needs to be tightly controlled by a very capable resource that pays great attention to the details..


Manager

ProgrammingNew

DevelopmentTrainingTechnical

WritingApplications

Support DeskBusinessAnalysis

ProgrammingSupport

NameProgramming

Leader

NameProgrammer

NameProgrammer

NameSr. Programmer


NameQuality Assurance

NameApplicationSpecialist


NameSupport DeskCoordinator

NameProgramming

Support



NameProgrammer

NameProgramming

Leader

NameProgrammer

NameProgrammer

NameSr. Programmer

NameProgrammer

NameTechnical Writer


NameTraining Coordinator

NameTraining Specialist



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Sample Acquisition & Assimilations Organization Functional Requirements

Companies approach acquisitions differently. Having been involved in over 35 acquisitions and assimilation projects, I always took the responsibility as the CIO for conducting the technology due diligence of an acquisition. The main reason for that is that I ultimately became responsible for any of the new technology organizations. Therefore, it was my responsibility to understand the challenges of the acquired technology, the risks, and where the leverage opportunities were. Two books in the IT Manager Development Series focus on the acquisition and assimilation process. The first, titled Acquisition – IT Due Diligence, discusses the purpose of due diligence and provides an approach that I have used in over 35 acquisition events. There are also many tools included that I developed over the years to help you organize due diligence efforts. The second publication, titled Acquisition – IT Assimilations focuses on assimilating the new company’s technologies into the main company. More than a technical approach, the dynamics of culture transition, reducing risk with acquired employees, and other insights are provided to help you manage an assimilation project for positive results.


Manager

Due Diligence Assimilations

NameAssimilation

Project Manager

NameSr. Programmer


NameIT Due Diligence

Specialist


NameInfrastructureCoordinator


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Technical Skill Requirements OK, we have essentially created organization charts that identify the needed positions to run the technology business for the company by identifying the functional requirements. Now, it’s time to take a look at important technical skills that you need. To do this, you can look at positions that require specific technical skills for today’s needs, but it’s also important to anticipate skills that are going to be needed down the road. If you have been doing some strategic planning, Publication #3 – Building a Strategic IT Plan, or if you have done a proper assessment of your needs, Publication #2 – IT Management-101, you have an understanding of future strategic projects. These projects may require technical skills that you don’t currently have. While defining the technical skills needed, start a list in priority order. One way to prioritize the needs is to list each technical skill as a high, medium, or low priority based upon your assessment of the position being:

- critical position for current business needs - required position for current business needs - critical position for future needs

Every time you hire a new resource you have the opportunity to eliminate a need. Do a good job of defining all of your needs and you will have opportunities to eliminate multiple needs with a single hire. You can also increase depth in certain skills that you might need backup skills in. That’s called leverage and hiring leverage adds real strength to an organization. By defining your needs well in the beginning of working with a new organization you take a proactive approach to what you want the organization to become. All of the organizational development will not come as a result of hiring, but hiring offers you significant ability to plug gaps quickly. Hiring is like any other project. Develop a targeted objective and build a plan and you will create a much stronger organization. Industry experience Every IT organization benefits by having industry experience. It’s not such a requirement in your Infrastructure Organizations but it certainly makes a difference in the Business Applications Organization and in an Acquisition Assimilation Organization. Having industry expertise within your senior staff helps develop the business knowledge within the ranks that helps your technical resources understand the reasoning for certain approaches. If you are in manufacturing, it certainly benefits that you have programmers and business analysts on staff that understand how Materials Requirements Planning (MRP) works if that’s a


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significant application the company depends upon. It’s just a bit tougher to develop business applications to help the company when your resources do not understand how manufacturing processes work. The same is true for healthcare, construction, distribution, retail, etc. Every industry has it’s own special processes and terminology that’s important to understand to be an effective IT organization. When you hire a new resource you have an option of selecting a candidate that has your industry knowledge or not. I have usually found that the learning curve for a new programmer hire is quicker if he already knows the industry. In some cases, I have seen the learning curve go faster when they did not know the programming language but had a solid foundation of industry knowledge. When I hire, I usually opt for a resource that already knows the industry when possible. My opinion is that a good programmer can typically learn the tool or new programming language much quicker than he can learn the industry and the associated business applications. If you have no industry expertise in your current staff, you have to incorporate it as you hire if you are to build a truly strong IT organization for the company. Leadership Identifying positions that need leadership skills is important for you to develop the organization into one that can run in “auto-pilot”. Maybe there really isn’t such a thing, but you can guarantee that seeding leadership skills in particular parts of the organization will improve the quality of life in you IT Manager role. As you are looking at leadership positions, take measure of the type of leadership traits you want. It might be a manager that can ultimately fill your position. It might be one that has excellent project management skills and has experience that can help you build a culture of delivering projects on time and within budget. You may need additional people skills to boost your client service initiatives or you may want to simply seed your support desk with a young talent that you believe has potential to manage the Support Desk Organization one day. The point to all of this is that every hiring opportunity is an opportunity to do a whole lot more than simply fill a position. It’s a recruiting opportunity to bring in real strength to the team.


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Depth in critical positions As you define your “dream team”, you focus on key technical skills, industry experience, and leadership skills that you want. It’s also important to define the few key areas where you must have bench strength, or depth. Baseball teams have to have extra pitchers if they are going to win consistently. Your organization may need more than one heavy NT Administrator or training specialist. It all depends upon what your critical business requirements are. A smart IT manager looks at the organization needed and identifies the staff roles where backup is needed. You just never know when your best employee becomes unavailable to help you to accomplish your mission so plan and organize accordingly. A few key areas you should assess are:

- network support - data center operation - business application programmer - business analyst - training - server support - help desk

In essence, you are looking for the critical areas of the IT organization that the company is dependent upon. There is no set guideline here. Every company will have different critical IT needs. For example, a manufacturing plant that depends upon computer systems and networks to keep the plant operational will need strong depth in the computer center and their infrastructure network support areas. A software company that relies on the sale of software will need solid depth in the applications programming area. Take a close look at the major dependencies your company has in IT and develop a strategy in your organizational planning that includes adding resource depth in critical areas. As you hire, you may need to hire for a position that adds appropriate depth into the organization before you fill a gap where you have no expertise at all. Only you can look at your situation and make that determination. Building an effective IT organization has a lot to do with anticipating turnover and building an organization that can withstand any staff turnover with minimal disruption or loss of productivity. Granted, losing your very best senior applications programmer will cause a “hit” to the team’s productivity, but if you have added depth and trained effectively over time, your other resources will be positioned to rise to the challenge.


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As is consistent with my management philosophy, we have spent time on determining “what we want” in an IT organization first. If you have not completed an effective assessment of the company’s needs, coming up with a “dream team” that fits the need will be difficult, if not impossible. If you need additional insight into how to conduct an assessment, refer to the sections on assessment in the publication IT Management-101. There are sections and tools describing the assessment of company, departments, clients, and the IT organization that will be helpful. Now that you know what is needed, , , the target, , , you need to determine where you’re starting from. A good topic for the next chapter, don’t you think ?


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II. Quantify What You Have

Time to do a quick inventory of your IT organization. If you are new to the organization, be a little careful with this. First impressions are not always right. As you get to know people, their value and capabilities are usually better understood. The same is true for understanding their challenges. It’s also a good idea to separate the effort you just went through in determining what you need in an organization from this task. You want to approach your evaluation as objectively as you can. It won’t hurt to mentally place resources into certain slots on your organization chart as you move through your evaluation. Just be aware that it doesn’t really help you to simply fill the organization with names. The objective is to build an excellent team capable of doing great things for your company. How many times have you been in an organization and found people with certain titles or job descriptions that are really not performing effectively in that role ? It may be that they have excellent skills that are not being used effectively or it may be that they aren’t very capable. Either way, your focus right now is to establish as objectively as you can the capabilities that exist in your organization today. The point is that going through an exercise of simply filling in organization slots with names because they have a title today is not going to be very effective in building a successful IT organization. So, you are urged to conduct an objective evaluation of what you have with the knowledge you have of your existing organization at this point. To determine what you have today, look at your organization in three ways:

A. Quality B. Quantity C. Processes

We will create a path that helps you quantify what you have in each of these sections. As you go through this phase, keep in mind what you’ve identified as needs because you always want to fill staff positions from within if possible. Better to train a known commodity than to risk a new hire. Stay objective and be honest with yourself as you quantify each area.


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A. Quality Quality of an existing organization includes many aspects to look for, such as:

- technical expertise and experience - industry knowledge and experience - project management expertise and experience - leadership, management skills and experience - client service skills and experience - employee and organization maturity - communication skills

Several of these issues relate specifically to individual resource skills and capability. Ultimately, you could say that each issue ties back to individual capability in one form or another. As you look at an individual, look for more than just technical capability or potential in the organization. There is so much more required for an IT organization to be effective as we discussed earlier. An approach that works to quantify the quality of your organization is to create an assessment matrix similar to the one shown below. As you fill in the blocks, rate the quality or strength level of each person. Keep it simple and use 1=Strong, 2=Average, and 3=Weak or whatever rating works for you. Rate each person in every skill category column that is appropriate. This worksheet can be a valuable reference to you later on if you have to find a backup resource.

Current Organization Capabilities

Name

Responsibility

Man

agem

ent

Lea

der/

Supe

r.

Clie

nt S

ervi

ce

Com

mun

icat

ion

Proj

ect M

gmt.

Indu

stry

Kno

wle

dge

Bus

ines

s Ana

lysi

s

App

licat

ion

Des

ign

Prog

ram

min

g

Impl

emen

tatio

n

Tra

inin

g

Doc

umen

tatio

n

Hel

p D

esk

Net

wor

k

Tel

ecom

PC/D

eskt

op

Serv

ers

Inte

rnet

/Int

rane

t

Com

pute

r op

erat

ions

You can modify a table like this any way you want and you can be as specific as you would like. The important issue will be to include all the skills and attributes that you are trying to inventory so you can see what you have when you finish filling out the form. You can also use a tool like this to focus on a single IT business unit such as the IT Infrastructure Organization to get very specific.


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B. Quantity When you look at quantity, or capacity, you are identifying the number of resources that are available to do certain jobs, or that have desirable non-technical organization skills. An example is that if you determined a need for 6 application programmers to sufficiently staff the software development and support programming requirements of the company, getting to the number of qualified programmers on staff will help you determine the capacity gap. Sidebar: One rule of thumb that has worked well for me in determining programming capacity is to use an average of 100 productive programming hours per month per programmer. A standard number of workable hours per year is 2080 hours. That’s about 173 hours per month on average. With training, meetings, vacations, holidays, etc. a programmer will not program a full 173 hours per month. Likewise, they should be able to do more than 100 hours. As you figure in rework and outside issues that have an impact on productive time, 100 to 120 hours is a good conservative number to use to determine your effective programming output capacity.

You can use the same matrix from the previous section to create a count of your existing resources. Because you are considering more than technical capability, a staff member may have checkmarks in multiple categories on the spreadsheet such as programmer, leader/supervisor, applications design, etc. depending upon his/her skill. Getting a full picture of the quality, capacity, and the options you have within these two areas will help you determine best fits for roles of your staff members as you build the organization plan. It also helps you know the options to backup key positions in the event you have to. In the spreadsheet, you may prefer to pull out the columns dealing with non-technical skills when you are quantifying capacity. Feel free to. The most important thing here is to quantify your production capacity in terms of technical skill. As you do this, pay attention to where you believe a person’s primary position or responsibility needs to be. You can’t have someone playing third base and second base at the same time. An example of a modified chart that lists only technical skill is shown below:

Technical Skills Capacity

Name

Responsibility

AS/

400

O/S

UN

IX

RPG

-III

,IV

NT

Adm

inis

trat

ion

Nov

ell

Adm

in.

CIS

CO

Rou

ters

WA

N

SQL

HT

ML

M/S

Out

look

M/S

Exc

hang

e


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C. Processes Determine the processes that are in place to achieve a high level of support. Depending upon what is already in place, you may need additional leadership resources that can help you implement new processes that improve the organization’s capabilities. IT processes that you want to have in place include:

- Change Management - Programming - Infrastructure

- Employee adds, changes, deletions - Project Management - Disaster Recovery - Problem escalation - Help desk tracking and reporting - Backup and recovery - Employee performance planning and review - Network monitoring and problem resolution

The mission here is to assess how much has to be developed and whether you can develop the missing processes with existing staff or whether you need to look for certain skills as you have opportunity to hire. Each of these process disciplines is important for maintaining a highly reliable and responsive IT organization.


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III. Do We Understand 'Client Service' ?

Understanding client service means that you are practicing it every day. So, what is client service, you ask ? Effective client service means different things to different people. To some, it means answering the phone when a client calls. To others, it’s much more than that. In my experience it is the aspect of a company that can truly set you apart from your competition or counterparts. Excellent client service does not mean that you always do everything the client wants and when they want it. It does mean that you manage your client’s expectations effectively and have a responsive delivery of your products and services that meet your client’s needs. Traits of excellent client service organizations include:

- positioning to respond quickly to critical business issues - delivering products and services with no surprises - over-communicating - telling the client ‘no’ when appropriate and explains why that’s the answer and

providing alternatives when possible - escalating key problem situations to IT management - following up consistently and proactively so the client does not have to guess - listening to the client before giving the answer (understands the problem) - managing the client’s expectations proactively, not reactively - accomplishing what you say you will - being available when called for help - being polite and friendly in delivering support services - being honest - being professional

Clients, whether they are external clients or internal department clients, want to work with an IT organization that conducts their business this way. Building an effective organization has as much to do with “delivery” of your services as it does with your technical capabilities. Don’t take for granted that the organization understands how to provide excellent client service. Many have a good idea of what the term means but don’t have much of a clue on how you go about it. Excellent client service is a culture that you build within IT. The manager has to reinforce the successful client service traits every day.


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The manner in which you deliver your service has a significant impact on how the client views the quality of your work. Think about that and you know it’s true. Don’t you get an impression of how strong your car dealership is based upon the sales force or the mechanics in the service center ? You don’t see the maintenance work being performed so you develop an impression on how well your car has been taken care of based upon the lack of problems afterwards (hopefully) and the professionalism of those you come into contact with. The same principle holds true for IT organizations. The main contact an external client may talk to could be a support desk resource. You hope that every employee that talks to your client has professional communication and troubleshooting skills when working with that client over the phone. It’s guaranteed that the client is building an impression of your whole company based upon how well those calls go. How does a manager instill a strong client service mentality ? Several ways:

- Reward the behavior that you want. - Reinforce the importance of key client service attributes in every meeting. - Provide them examples of success stories. - Show them by example that you believe it, not just talk it. - Critique individual performances to reinforce excellent client service delivery. - Provide more examples of successes from positive client service

Creating excellent client service culture is not something that you throw out in a meeting and expect that it will happen. It takes constant attention to the details of support delivery. Personal Note: One of the best examples of a manager that understands the importance of client service is a friend of mine, George Ippolito. George owns and operates several Italian restaurants in Atlanta. My family and I have enjoyed countless meals and evenings at Ippolito’s over the years. For a long time, the business was a single restaurant. George has had phenomenal growth in the last 6 years or so because of 2 things. He has an excellent product that is always consistent, and he emphasizes excellent client service with his employees and managers all the time. I have seen him many times coach an employee in a constructive and understanding way on the actions or behavior needed provide the customer a quality dining experience. His attention to client service detail has instilled a tremendous “repeat” business. I’ve also seen George take immediate “corrective action” when needed. George wouldn’t be as successful with just good food. Paying attention to how you deliver your product is very important.


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The message here is that George instills a client service culture by reinforcing it every day as he walks through his restaurants. People follow leadership examples, especially the manager’s. It works the same way in an IT organization. Little things go a long way as you support your clients. For example:

- Let the client know in advance when systems will be down to perform upgrades. - Identify issues that create critical situations and establish automatic escalation

procedures to minimize negative impact for the client. - Reinforce with your staff that the client should never have to call and ask about the

status of an outstanding issue when you “over-communicate”. - If reaching a support desk person is vital for client service, place responsibility on one

of your staff to ensure the phone always gets answered when someone calls for help. Sounds simple but it takes discipline and reinforcing the accountability.

- Call the client after solving a problem to verify that the solution is working properly. Support organizations don’t call when they expect to hear bad news. If you do receive negative input, you have an opportunity. If the input is positive, you raised the bar in client service. You win either way.

- Ask the client how you can improve support. Be prepared to respond if you do this !! - Say “Thank You” for the business.

You can identify dozens of ways to create a pleasant experience when dealing with the IT organization; just put yourself in the client’s shoes and define the traits that would improve your experience when dealing with your IT organization.


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IV. Identify Gaps and Prioritize New Hires

At this point, we have quantified the organization needed to do the job effectively and we have assessed what we have. In addition, we know where we stand relative to an organization that understands client service. By knowing these three things, we can identify the gaps we have in creating a very effective IT organization. You don’t have to hire new staff to create a client service culture. If you don’t have one already, start today. Excellent client service starts with the manager. You can lead by example and reinforce what you want immediately. The first part of defining your gaps is to quantify missing skills, determine the additional capacity needed for certain skill sets, or identify processes that must be implemented that lead to having an effective IT organization. Simply listing these on paper will start giving you a sense of knowing exactly what you need to do to accomplish your mission. Remember, no one has a “blank check” to create a “blue sky” organization. You efforts have to be practical and make sense financially. If the company had a preference, it would have a very small, inexpensive IT organization. Every dollar spent on IT reduces earnings. STOP right there !! Yes, it’s true that every dollar spent on IT decreases earnings from a purely accounting calculation. It’s also very practical that every IT dollar expense improves earnings. An IT organization that works on true company objectives and needs has very high value. Those objectives may be projects that help the company increase earnings from 12% to 15%. That’s a big deal ! There aren’t too many CEO’s that won’t spend an additional 1-2% of revenue in IT if it helps attain a 4-6% increase in EBITDA (Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization).. The point to all of this is that to create an IT organization, you have to cost justify all of it. Not to do so is financially irresponsible for the CIO, the CFO, and the CEO. After all, you are running a business that is supposed to earn an income. IT has to help accomplish the financial goals just as every other department must. As you compare what you need with what you have, list the gaps. Include in your list the gaps in technical skill, quantity of resources, and processes. Group the gaps into each of these major areas; it’s easier to view them in similar groups. You can use the same spreadsheet matrix we have been using to list your gaps. A blank template is included in Appendix F.


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Generally, the priority will be to fill gaps of skill, but it’s not always the case. If you have inherited an organization with no industry knowledge, you may want to place that as your top priority. Likewise, adding depth to a particularly vulnerable technical position might take priority over adding a missing skill. It all depends upon the situation and how aggressively you can hire. Another point on that. You may find yourself in an IT organization that is already spending more than it should but is getting low results. If that’s the case, you need to redefine the organization using the same method used when determining what is needed. In a situation like this, you will either have staff that you don’t need or staff that is not productive. Assessing what you have and making decisions on how you will transform the organization plays into this part of quantifying the gaps. It’s perfectly all right to redefine roles in organizational situations that need transforming. The key is to get the results, not to make friends. That doesn’t mean you should be a “bull in a China closet” either. How you go about transforming an organization sets the tone of how you manage. A manager that breaks everything as he moves along isn’t the style you want to exhibit. Making tough decisions and stepping up to problems is definitely an example that you want to set. After you have all the gaps listed, start prioritizing them. As you do, look for opportunities that allow you to knock off multiple needs with one hire. An example of that might be in hiring a business analyst to fill a skill gap and finding one that has excellent industry knowledge and expertise that also fills an industry knowledge gap that you have. By having your gaps/needs listed in groups of skill, capacity, and process you can more easily determine what is going to take priority. It might also help to put dollars on each item. Remember, you’ve got to manage to a budget. Unless your company gives you a “green light” to go “full speed ahead”, you have to deliver your changes within the financial objectives of the company. That’s why it’s called “management” ! That’s also part of the fun in being the manager, as difficult as it might be. Issues that have to be balanced as you prioritize your plan.

- Cost (salary, benefits, and recruiting) - critical positions - turnover - client satisfaction - company plans - immediate risks/challenges - poor performers - training


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There isn’t a cookie cutter approach to prioritizing your steps. The worst decision you can make is to make no decision at all. There are many approaches to solving your organization development plan. All roads will lead to Rome, as they say. If needed, ask for insight from others in the company to help you decide on the best approach in selecting certain priorities. Just be sure they really have insight and can look at the situation objectively. A simple way to identify the gaps is to place names on the organization chart you created when you assessed what you need. When all your existing staff names are used up, highlight the open positions and start prioritizing the openings on your organization chart. This obviously takes some time and thought but you will find that a well thought out plan will pay dividends. By following a logical process of defining the need, quantifying what you have, and prioritizing the gaps that you have, you will begin making real progress quickly.

1. Define your need. 2. Quantify what you have.

3. List your gaps. 4. Prioritize your gaps.

V. Funding New Staff and Managing Expectations


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Developing a concise plan for what you need to build the IT organization that solves all of your company challenges is no good if you can’t pay for it. A big part of any plan has to include the costs and when you expect to incur those costs. Most CEO’s are open minded to the fact that to improve a situation generally means spending money. They are also savvy enough to expect a real return on any investment. Building a successful IT organization is a project just as any other technical project that the company might fund. So, in one sense, you might look at this project as competing for funds against other IT projects and company initiatives. Many managers are intimidated by that, but there is no need to be. As you look at your IT organization, part of your challenge is to assess the best means of shaping the organization to support the company’s plans and objectives. You can be assured that a strategic objective of the company is not going to be to develop a great IT organization. However, to achieve the company’s objectives, a stellar IT organization may be required. It’s difficult to go into your CEO and ask for an additional $500,000 to fund your dream team. In fact, it could be suicidal if you don’t have sufficient justification. A typical guide to step you through a process of getting the funds and managing senior management’s expectations would include:

1. Validate technology requirements as it relates to company plans and needs. 2. Build a baseline organizational plan to support the existing business. 3. Develop incremental organization plans to support company initiatives.

The baseline organization needed to support the current business may cost more than the company is spending today. If that’s true, don’t apologize for it but be certain to have answers as to why that’s the case. A good CEO or CIO will always want tangible justification so expect to provide it. Let’s say that the company has three major initiatives that require IT resources. Put yourself into an owner position as you look at your options. There are essentially 4 options:

1. Do nothing. 2. Use existing IT resources by borrowing from normal support. 3. Add new staff to focus on the initiatives. 4. Outsource the projects.

An owner, represented here as the CEO, has the ability to focus on initiatives fast, slow, or not at all. Business life is a series of tradeoffs and making decisions that are deemed as the most important. Sometimes, short term needs must override long term strategies.


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As an IT manager presenting your case, an important issue is to be very objective about the discussion and look for ways to help your CEO with the challenge of balancing cash flow and earnings needs with strategic initiative needs. And always remember that your pitch must always be for things that the company truly needs. Personal Note: In one of my former companies a meeting was scheduled with the CEO, President, and me (the CIO) to discuss a strategic initiative and to develop a strategy that would address it. The initiative was to position the IT organization to assimilate technologies of acquired companies. At the time, we had not yet acquired any companies. I had been with the company for about three months. There were several points made in the meeting that were key in hindsight. First, the CEO wanted to know if we could assimilate technologies with our existing IT staff. My answer was ‘no’ because we were going through an organization consolidation and a refocus to improve client satisfaction. If anything, I was going to have to add an additional resource or two to shore up the organization. Second, I was asked if assimilation projects could be out-sourced. My answer was ‘yes’, but I advised against it due to the risk of business interruption and the fact that our past discussions indicated we would need assimilation capability as a core competency due to inherent risk in the ongoing operations to acquired businesses. Third, I was asked how long it would take to establish a “swat team” to conduct assimilation projects. My answer was 30 days based upon the fact that I would seed the team with two existing staff members replacing them with new hires. Fourth, I was asked if we could go faster by creating multiple teams or if one team could work on multiple projects. My answer was we could go faster by having multiple teams but a team could not do multiple projects although some overlap of projects was feasible. Fifth, we decided upon leaving the meeting for me to prepare to staff a team but to hold off on hiring anyone until I received the “go ahead”. Because of the uncertainty of timing with an acquisition we wanted to ensure we had one in the bag before we funded additional resources. The lesson from this is that we all knew where we were headed but we could not execute until certain events took place that positioned the company to absorb the additional cash flow hit and the P&L impact. I would have probably preferred to staff the team earlier to have more time for training and preparation. In hindsight, we didn’t really need it. This example is one that reinforces the benefit of anticipating and planning as well as taking an objective approach to establishing the real requirements of a company initiative versus jumping on board to try to do what you think others want. I could have easily said we can do the job with our existing resources, but when resources are borrowed from other initiatives and you don’t complete your commitments, you lose. So many managers make that mistake.


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Being honest and forthcoming with your boss is always the best approach and one that is respected. Let’s take another example and an approach that can help position senior management for increasing IT costs. Personal Note: In several companies, I have inherited IT organizations that were not capable of delivering the required level of IT support for the company. In almost every case the consensus of the IT resources were that the organization was insufficient because the company could not afford any more. In every case, that was wrong. It’s easier for a CIO to cut or limit costs than it is to build a plan and develop a sufficient cost justification case to staff the organization properly. It takes work and an in-depth understanding of the business needs. That’s why many CIO’s or IT managers use the excuse that the company doesn’t have the money. In many cases, I delivered a message after completing my assessment of the needs and the organization required to meet them that IT expenses, as a per cent of revenue, would temporarily increase. As the company grew we would expect to ultimately spend less as a per cent of revenue than where we were currently. The following graph is an example that I’ve drawn and presented many, many times in my career. You see, you can’t state this one time; it has to be reinforced often.

This graph basically shows senior management that in order to achieve the agreed upon initiatives, IT will need to increase spending from around 2.5% of revenue to just over 5% for a period of time. Generally, this was needed to address past sins and to take corrective action or to staff in areas that have been overlooked for some time. It is also something that happens in a high growth company when you have to position the IT organization to do much more in a short period of time.


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Another way to use the graph is to add two lines to the graph – a revenue trend line and a company operating income line. Because of the differences in values of all three, the Y-axis isn’t meaningful so leave it blank. The X-axis is still a timeline.

- Company revenue trend is shown as millions of dollars. - EBITDA (Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortization) is shown as a per cent of revenue. - IT Expense is shown as a per cent of revenue.

What you are trying to show is that revenues and earnings will grow over time. Initially, earnings will take a hit to fund an investment in IT so the company positions itself to grow earnings even more by going after specific strategic projects. Over time, IT dollar expenses actually increase, but the cost of IT as a per cent of revenue will actually decline. It’s what I call the “bubble effect”. When showing this to senior management, your objective is to create a visual picture that while a short term IT expense increase is needed to support the company, the long term view is one that is healthier and a more appropriate level for IT expenditures. The trends on the graph do work out as shown as long as you’re paying attention and managing your IT business closely. The tradeoff that senior management will look at is whether to fund now or to postpone certain initiatives until key issues are in better shape such as cash flow. It is your job as the IT manager to develop an appropriate plan that identifies the required staff and costs to support the company effectively. It is the CEO and CFO’s job to determine how to fund your plan or to work through alternatives with you to determine an appropriate strategy to implement.


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The graphs are general indicators that you can use. In order to get an organization plan approved, you should prepare a project plan similar to other projects. Develop an organization chart that shows the baseline organization to support the current business and highlight the incremental resources needed for strategic initiatives. Develop a budget that shows the timing of adding new resources and incurring additional costs. You should also develop a set of cost justification bullets that present the reasons to add staff shown in the plan including tangible benefits to the company. As long as you can show your management team that you have a well thought out plan and that you aren’t adding fat to the organization, you have an excellent chance of it being fully funded. If cash is really tight, it presents an opportunity for you to work with the management team to help make the management decisions and improve upon a negative situation. Worst case is that you will probably leave the meeting with an agreement to start preparing for a partial implementation of your plan. The journey of a thousand miles begins with a first step.

Another way of funding growth is when you develop your operating budget every year. If you have done a good job of assessing and anticipating company needs, you should budget for incremental staff hires over the course of the year. Build as much as you think will be needed into your budget for the next year and you have essentially positioned management for those costs already. Be certain that you understand that what is being suggested is that you are building an appropriate organizational plan that meets the company’s true needs and not creating a plan that could be called “an IT agenda”. The only reason you have a job as an IT manager is because your company needs IT support. Build plans that miss the real needs of the company and you risk more than simply not getting the funds. There are only a few expense categories that cause IT to miss a budget. The main reason usually lies with personnel costs so work through this area closely and anticipate what you are going to need. Management hates it when a manager keeps coming back to request another new hire or two. It says that you don’t plan and anticipate well if you have to do that. The IT Manager Development Series publication titled Developing an IT Business Plan goes into depth on how to budget and create a realistic and achievable IT business plan.


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VI. Recruiting and Interviewing

You have developed an organizational vision. Management has approved your plan. Now what ? The real work has just begun. Before you go out and hire someone, prepare yourself and your organization. Review your hiring priorities again. Most likely, a few weeks have passed since you created the priority hiring list and your situation might have changed. Sometimes, unexpected changes happen quickly in technology organizations. Let’s talk about preparing for new hires. First, prepare yourself by creating job descriptions that define the positions that you are hiring. A lot of managers hate to do this but it will help you articulate the position to candidates that are interviewed and it helps you share the role and responsibilities with your existing staff. Secondly, share your plan with key members of your staff. There is no need to keep it a secret and employees have a need to understand change, especially if it affects them. You don’t have to go into detail about costs and timing, but you should give them a general idea of where you are headed and why. Informed people tend to be better performers. Third, determine how you want to hire new staff. You actually should have already done this because it affects the cost. There are several ways to go about hiring new staff:

- hire through advertising - hire from references - search the internet - use recruiting firms

- contract to hire - immediate hire

- use consultant contracts

Depending upon how fast or how many new hires you need, you may have to use multiple methods to find your candidates. The important thing is to determine how you want to proceed with each new hire – a straight hire, contract to hire, or contract out the work. I have had good experiences in every area, and I’ve also made my share of mistakes. Hiring new people has a certain amount of risk for both the employer and the employee. You don’t always get it right as hard as you might try. There are pros and cons to each method of hiring. Advertising will get you plenty of interviews, but you will have to spend more time screening the candidates for quality interviews. Recruiting firms are vendors. Develop a partnership with one that consistently brings you quality candidates and you will save time and money. Many companies like the contract to hire approach because it gives the employee candidate and the company an opportunity to evaluate the fit.


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Outsourcing the work to a consulting company is a personal preference. My approach was to use consultants only when we needed resource expertise that was not needed as a core competency or when we needed additional bench strength for an interim period of time. Typically, you will pay more but you can get faster results because of the experience they bring to a project. Probably the most reliable means of hiring quality staff is to hire people that you have worked with in the past or that are referenced by your stronger people. Good people like to work with others that pull their weight and perform in a quality manner. You can find some very strong candidates from past associates of your strongest people. As with any new hire, an interview essentially determines whether the candidate will be hired. Just because a candidate was referenced by someone on your staff does not mean that the candidate is an automatic hire. It just means that you have an opportunity to gain inside knowledge about the candidate that can help you make an informed decision as to how well a candidate might fit the position you are trying to fill. There are three tools that you need to arm yourself with in order to hire well. They include: A. Job description B. Interview skill C. Offer letter Each of these tools will help you hire what you need as well as to help you set the stage for the new employee as to the exact role and responsibility expected. A. Job Descriptions

Not many people like to develop job descriptions. It seems like such a waste of time, but it is not. There are several important reasons why a job description will help you. The main benefit is they help you organize responsibilities for each position and ensure you have all areas covered. They also help you evaluate each candidate as to their capability for filling the position. You don’t necessarily have to initiate a massive project to develop 25 job descriptions. Focus in on the roles, or staff positions, that you need to fill and simply develop those to start with. Over time, you can have all positions defined to the level needed to support your particular business. The reasons a job description helps you includes:

- defines what you are looking for - helps you clarify your needs to recruiters or other reference sources - gives you a reference document to assist in your interviews - gives you a document to reinforce the role and responsibilities of a newly hired

employee


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There are many sources for job descriptions on the Internet. You can find many sources easily by doing a search on www.Yahoo.com or other search engines such as www.dogpile.com using a search that includes the phrase “IT+job+description”. Key in the entire phrase as is including the quote (“) marks and you will get many nice references. You can find what you want and cut and paste to create your own job description. Another approach, and one that I prefer, is to create your own job description that is unique to the position you are trying to fill. It’s pretty simple and quick using the following guide:

Information Technology Job Description

Title / Position: ____________________________________ Reports to: ____________________________________ Salary Range: ____________________

I. Technical Skills: 1. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______ 2. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______ 3. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______ 4. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______ 5. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______ 6. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______

II. Experience: 1. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______ 2. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______ 3. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______

III. Essential Functions: (Keys to Success) 1. ___________________________________________________________________

2. ___________________________________________________________________ 3. ___________________________________________________________________ 4. ___________________________________________________________________

IV. Qualifications: (Certifications, education, etc.) 1. ___________________________________________________________________ 2. ___________________________________________________________________ 3. ___________________________________________________________________

V. Problems / Challenges: 1. ___________________________________________________________________ 2. ___________________________________________________________________ 3. ___________________________________________________________________

VI. Other: __________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________


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You can add, change, or delete sections of this form to meet your own needs. You might want to eliminate the salary range information for copies that are provided to employees. This form helps quantify the specifics you are looking for in a particular staff position. Once you have taken the time to complete it for a position, you will be much better prepared to discuss the role and responsibility with your company management, recruiters, or prospective employees. Taking the time to quantify your needs is always recommended so you maximize your opportunity of finding the right resource to help your team. More insight into the sections of the form follows:

I. Technical Skills - list the specific skills you need and the minimum amount of experience you want. Examples might be:

- IBM AS/400 RPG-III/IV Programming (3 years) - NT Administrator (2 years) - Technical writing using M/S WORD (2 years)

II. Experience - list specific experience you want. This may include industry experience, past performance in certain jobs, etc. Examples include:

- Healthcare reimbursement applications (3 years) - Manufacturing MRP design (3 years)

III. Essential Functions - list key functions of the job that are critical for success. This might include responsibilities, key skill traits, etc. Examples include:

- Excellent communication skills – both verbal and written - Ability to supervise others and lead by example - Troubleshooting skills - Strong client service skills

IV. Qualifications - list specific education, certification, or other qualifications that are important, or required for the position. Examples include:

- Microsoft MCSE certification - B.S. Degree - Speaks Spanish fluently

V. Problems / Challenges - list specific challenges that this resource will need to focus on to help achieve an objective of the team. Examples are:

- This Support Desk Coordinator role will have to log and track all calls and communicate daily to team leaders in a manner to improve our response and follow-up capabilities. Additionally, daily and weekly reports must be defined and created to provide management information to certain key managers. - This programming position will need to help provide leadership in the department by reinforcing our change management processes and increasing productivity by instilling quality improvement measures.

VI. Other - list any other items that help you define the position requirements.


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B. Interview Next step is the interview. If you have done a thorough job of describing the job for yourself and others, you have the basis for conducting a solid interview. Many managers put too little into this step. Don’t underestimate the value of a sound interview. You are trying to add an asset to your team. Just as you would look at particular computer hardware options to insure that you buy an asset that is functional, reliable, and has some guarantee of a return on your investment, you should also look at hiring a new employee in much the same way. Hiring a new employee is equivalent to making a million-dollar decision. You can spend that or more over the lifetime of a person’s employment. The first rule in hiring that will help you create a successful IT organization is to always hire self-starters. You can build your organization in a number of ways. My preference and recommendation is to be willing to pay a bit more for strong individuals that can run on their own as opposed to simply filling vacancies with cheaper employees. Most managers don’t try to hire less capable employees but as they look at the cost of an individual, they sometimes balk at the higher priced resource. It’s easy for a manager to be a bit nervous about hiring someone that costs a lot, especially if the person’s salary is close to, or more than the manager’s salary. The bottom line is that you are looking for results. Individual results are not as important as team results, but individuals make up the team. The most important result you can achieve is to create a team that can achieve excellent results at a reasonable cost. I can tell you that I’ve had many exceptional IT organizations that were smaller in number but probably cost the same as a staff that was 20% larger in numbers. Their production capacity was always greater because they were predominately self-sufficient people that had excellent backgrounds and experience and were highly motivated to do a great job. Sidebar: I would always prefer to manage a small IT team full of “thoroughbreds” than to manage a larger team that needs a lot of management attention. I will always accomplish more for the same dollar investment and this type of team is much easier to manage. High salary requirements do not automatically mean the individual is capable. That should be obvious. Regardless of the salary requirement, part of the interview and reference checking responsibility is to validate that you have a resource capable of doing what the person says they can. There are many ways to validate this information as we expand below on the interview process. Take resumes with a grain of salt. Most resumes sound good, but the validation should come from probing questions in the interview and through reference checks.


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An interview is a means of getting to know the candidate and to ask questions that move you both closer to a decision on whether this person is a good candidate for your team. A properly conducted interview does several things:

1. Develops insight into the resource’s capabilities, wants, and desires. 2. Validates certain skill information and fit for job function needs. 3. Shares information about the position and its responsibilities. 4. Shares information about your company and future opportunities. 5. Provides the candidate a means of gathering insight into the company and the

position. There are many reference sources available to help you conduct quality interviews. The Internet has more than you can imagine. On the next page is a guide to help gather the information that will assist in your selection efforts. Used effectively, it will help you better understand the candidates goals and capabilities. Using open ended questions gives the employee the opportunity to explain his/her answers. From these explanations you can learn a lot about a person’s insight, knowledge, and how they handle pressure situations. Always conduct most of your questioning before you spend a lot of time explaining the job you have. There are two reasons for this:

1. Use questions to determine skills and experiences first. Those skilled in interviewing can tell you what you want to hear and if they know your “hot buttons” early on, you will hear a lot that automatically matches up to your needs.

2. If the interview is not going well, you may not want to spend the time to explain the position and to provide more information on your company. If the candidate is definitely not a fit for your needs, don’t waste his time or yours.

As you see in the outline on the next page, the questions are grouped into six categories that help keep the interview moving along in a logical manner. You can add or change the set of questions that make sense for your own personal use.


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Technology Resource Interview Guide

I. General Information

A. How did you find out about our open position ? B. What do you know about our company ? C. Why did you leave your last company ? D. What did you like/dislike about your previous position ? E. What did you like/dislike about your previous company ?

II. Personal Goals and Wants

A. What’s important to you in a company ? B. What’s important in your manager ? C. What are you looking for ? D. What are your goals for 3 to 5 years into the future ? E. What is your understanding of the position we are trying to fill ? F. Why do you feel that you are a good candidate for this position ?

III. Skills & Experience

A. Tell me about your technical skills. (point out specific skills on the resume that you want to better understand)

B. Give me examples of past experiences that describe your abilities to be successful. (point toward specific job functions or skills that you want the candidate to address)

C. How would you approach _______________ ? (Give a specific problem situation and ask for the approach, or how the candidate would solve the problem. The answers may surprise you and will definitely provide insight.)

D. Give me two examples that describe your effectiveness in a team environment. IV. Company Overview and Opportunity (Optional section to give the candidate information)

A. Describe your company mission, it’s challenges, and opportunities for the candidate. B. Discuss briefly the management approach used in running the IT organization.

V. Job Description & Challenges

A. Describe for the candidate the Job Description and identify the challenges and responsibilities associated with the position.

B. Identify key functions and attributes necessary for success in the position. VI. Wrap-up

A. Ask for work references. B. Ask the candidate if he/she has questions about the position or the company. C. Outline the actions for follow-up and the expected timing.


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There are a few tips that you should look for as you add someone to your team. Keep in mind that there should never be any discrimination. However, there are skills, attributes, and experiences that all make up a candidate into the quality, or lack of quality, that will help your team accomplish its goals. You should be very selfish when you are hiring into your team. A few thoughts:

- hire stars, not problems - hire self-starters, not those that have to be pulled every step of the way - hire those who take pride in their work, not those that simply do the work - hire team players - hire those with potential; not those that have peaked already - hire industry experience when possible

Easier said than done but concentrating on these principles will help you achieve success. Let’s emphasize the comment that was used earlier, “when hiring, you should be very selfish”. Building any team means that you have the opportunity to manage that team. Hiring those that are more self-sufficient and that can perform with minimal supervision makes it easier for everyone. The more you manage people the more you learn how to detect those that will be great resources versus those that need a lot of coaching. Everyone can’t be a superstar but the more you have on the team in key spots, the easier it is to create successes. Seed your key positions with proven performers and you will be a happier manager because the team will perform at a higher level with less coaching. When coordinating interviews, have key staff members or other managers interview the candidate if you value their input. Do not have the candidate interview with everyone on the staff. It’s helpful to position other interviewers for specific skills you are trying to validate or attributes that you are looking for. Let them know what types of questions you will be asking so the candidate does not spend all his time rehashing the same information. For example, a senior staff member might focus more on specific technical questions to better assess the candidate’s skills. Sidebar: One method I’ve employed is to position key employees or other managers to interview with a candidate but that I might abort their interview if the candidate was a clear misfit for what I needed. It’s not good to waste people’s time if it’s already a clear ‘no’ decision on a candidate. Use the interview to learn about the candidates interpersonal and other non-technical skills as much as to validate the technical skills. It’s worth repeating that both are equally important. It’s also nice when you can make the interview fun, so relax and enjoy the process.


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Keep in mind that your goal is to earn the right of refusal. By this, I mean that interviewing is a two-way street and you are recruiting the candidate as much as you are trying to determine if they are a fit for your organization. Good candidates can be lost because of your manner, presentation of the position or their perception about the company. Your excitement and goals for the positions should excite the candidate. The goal is to have three good candidates that want the job rather than having three good candidates that prefer to look somewhere else. When you know that a candidate is a great fit, have key managers in the organization or company meet with the candidate. This might especially be true for a senior resource that you have worked with before. In this case, you may be selling more than interviewing.


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C. Offer Letter Ready to make an offer ? If you are, put some thought into it and do it professionally. It’s the first official act that the individual sees from his potential employer and manager. Anyone worth hiring should have an offer letter from you, especially if you are building a professional IT organization. Remember, you lead by example. When you hire a new employee, you want to eliminate as many questions as you can as quickly as you can. The offer letter begins the process. An offer letter should include:

- position and title - starting salary - bonus terms, if any - other compensation terms, if any - stock option provisions, if any - start date - who the employee will report to - brief description of employee benefits eligibility including 401k - vacation and sick provisions

A professional offer letter on your company letterhead goes a long way in creating a professional image of you and your organization. Below is an sample for your review.


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SAMPLE

3 January 2001 Mr. John Smith 101 Oak Street Atlanta, GA 30070 Dear John, It is my pleasure to offer you the position of Senior Programmer Analyst at MDE Enterprises with an effective date of 2/1/01. The start ing salary is $ 75,000 with an annual bonus of 10% of your annual salary. In this position you will report to me. As an employee of MDE you are eligible for medical and dental benefits as well as group life insurance. The company also offers a 401k program that you are eligible for after one year of employment. Vacation and sick benefits are included in the employee benefits summary attached. Your first year vacation benefit is two weeks. John, we look forward to the opportunity of working with you and believe that you will make an excellent addition to our team. Please call me at 770-555-1111 if you have additional questions. Sincerely, Mike Brown Applications Development Manager MDE Software Solutions

MDE Soft ware Solutions 2900 Elm St reet

Atlanta, GA 30022 770-555-1111 770-555-2222 (fax)

[email protected] om

MDE Software Solutions


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VII. Starting Out Right

Whether you are introducing a new employee to the organization or whether you are beginning to direct a new organization that you have just joined, the early actions that you take are very important. The team is looking for the manager to establish the pace and the manner in which to do business. Employees are looking for your leadership every day and your actions tell them how you want to conduct business and what is important. You have the opportunity to define the objectives and how you want to achieve them. To do so, you must take the time to define each objective and communicate them to your employees. With a new hire, that’s especially important to get off to a fast start that is focused on your needs. There are three primary areas that you want to have covered on the employee’s first day.

A. Comprehensive orientation agenda B. Benefits enrollment C. Equipment setup and orientation

A. Orientation The first day the employee joins the organization is generally a nervous one for your new staff member. Take a few steps to make him/her comfortable and you will gain a great deal of early respect. It’s also a very reasonable thing for anyone new to the company to expect from their new manager. The more that you provide in an orientation that answers new employee questions, the better you come across as a manager that is organized, knowledgeable, and that cares about his employees. More importantly, it sends a strong message of how you want your employees to conduct themselves – organized, knowledgeable, and that anticipates user needs.

Lead by example !!! Include as many of your key people in the agenda as you feel is needed to deliver an effective orientation, but ensure that you spend a considerable amount of time with every new employee that you hire in their first several days. No one can convey your vision of the organization and the importance of everyone’s role as well as you can so don’t delegate this responsibility. A sample New Employee Orientation agenda is included on the next page.


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New Employee Orientation

A. Quick tour and introductions B. The Company C. Company Mission D. The company’s business E. Organization F. Key departments relative to IT support G. Strategic plans H. Clients

- Their needs for IT services - Key clients - The best and the worst, , ,and why - Key needs - Plans

I. Company Departments - Key departments and their key people - Department needs - Plans

J. IT Organization - Mission - Organization chart and major focus areas - Job description and responsibilities of the new hire - Role within the IT organization - Key focus areas of the new position - Keys to success - Overview of other key IT staff and their responsibilities - Challenges - Opportunities

K. IT Vision and plan for the future L. Key projects and status M. IT Procedures/Processes that affect the new employee N. Performance planning and performance review guidelines O. Career planning approach and guidelines P. Training guidelines Q. Miscellaneous

- Phone list - After hours IT phone list - Expense reporting - Timesheets (if required) - Security codes, cards, etc. - User-ID & passwords to systems

R. Training plans for the new employee


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B. Benefits A major part of making a new employee feel a part of the company is to complete their benefits enrollment. Prior to their first day, you should have given the employee an employee benefits package that includes the material they need to understand their benefits and any options they might have. Schedule a time with the appropriate person in your company to conduct the enrollment process with the new employee on their first day. Getting this behind you will help you begin focusing the new employee’s efforts quickly. Benefits discussions should include the following at a minimum:

- Medical/dental insurance - Life insurance - 401k - W4 - Vacation/holiday/sick day policy - Employee Handbook - Confidentiality agreement - Non-solicitation agreement

C. Equipment Don’t forget to prepare your new employee’s desk and setup the equipment and software that he or she needs to perform their job. Having everything in place on the first day will set you apart from most managers. You would be surprised as to how many managers fail to take care of this until after the employee shows up. Nothing is less professional than having a new employee show up for work and there is no place for them to sit. Important items to take care of include:

A. Identify cube/office location B. Phone setup C. PC/workstation setup D. Printer configuration setup E. USER-ID and password setup F. Office supplies G. Building, facility, parking access cards H. Business card order


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VIII. Performance Plans Let’s recap where we are at this point. So far, you have:

- Defined what you need in your organization - Determined what you have in place today - Identified your gaps and developed a hiring strategy - Hired new employees - Oriented new employees to your company and organization

The team is pretty much in place, and you are implementing your plan to staff the right skills, experience, and attributes needed in the team. Building a team that is capable of achieving great successes is just the beginning. Now, you have to provide focus. How do you focus your team effectively ? There are several ways, actually. First, give each employee a performance plan that reinforces your objectives. Second, communicate and reinforce your objectives in every opportunity possible. Third, reward the behavior and successes that you are striving for in your team members. In this section we will focus on the importance of effective performance planning. A manager has multiple tools available to motivate and direct employee actions. One of those tools is in the form of individual performance plans that focus the individual on certain achievements and behavior that helps the team succeed. Performance planning and employee reviews are probably the most effective tools that you have to create the environment that you want and to achieve your mission. Personal Note: In my first year with IBM I learned a valuable lesson that has stuck with me for more than 25 years. I received my first review after 6 months of being with the company. I had done well in my IBM classes and I had been fortunate to work on two new software installations with a senior Systems Engineer, something that was above and beyond what my Performance Plan required. Going into the review, I was pretty confident that I would do well, even though this was going to be a new experience. My Systems Engineering Manager, a manager that I still respect a great deal today, conducted the review and while I had high marks in a few areas, the overall grade was a Meets Requirements. I was a bit shocked and disappointed.


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After two days of analyzing this outcome, I went back to my manager and asked for a better explanation and expressed that it did not seem to me that he gave enough credit on the extra items that I had contributed to the organization. He couldn’t go through it right then so we set up an early meeting for the next day. At 8:00 a.m., we met to assess both of our positions. It might also help you to understand that I was 28 years old and had managed other technical resources for a couple of years in the Marine Corps so I wasn’t a typical new employee fresh out of college. The lesson was short and sweet ! My manager explained that while I had achieved excellent results in areas that were not included in the Performance Plan, those items were not really that important for the team. He mentioned that I had not signed up for a Client Accounting software class that the branch office needed to have a focus on, and that I had been picked because of my accounting degree. Because I had not taken care of that part of my Performance Plan, the branch had no real focus on this strategic market, and he had given me a ‘Needs Improvement’. The weighting factor he had placed on this section of the plan kept me from receiving an Exceeds Requirements overall measurement. The lesson that I learned very quickly is that the manager puts items into your Performance Plan for a very real reason. He is also in a much better position to see and understand the overall objectives of the team than the employee. It was also clear to me that the Performance Plan I had been given indicated what needed to be accomplished and clearly marked the items that had the greatest priority. In my next review, I received an Outstanding rating because I paid attention.

Before you develop and communicate individual performance plans, you should be communicating your vision of the organization and the level of performance that you expect. An individual’s performance plan reinforces the manager’s overall plan. Each component of the organization has to play a successful role in order for the organization to achieve success as a whole. Do an outstanding job in this area and the sum of the parts will equal more than the whole. Excellent employees with solid skills and direction will achieve more than you initially plan. In reality, it is not always the case that every employee must achieve success for the team to succeed. You can achieve levels of success with individual failures but part of what you want to emphasize is achieving all that you can as a team. Sidebar: One of the messages I’ve used quite a bit is that, “No one will be successful individually if the team is unsuccessful; we will all achieve success as a team.”


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If you have 25 employees in your particular IT department, it’s a big project to develop 25 individual Performance Plans. Play it smart; you can develop 25 completely unique plans in the time it takes to create 6. Anyone can develop 6 plans in a week if they focus time and energy on the project. You can actually do it in a day. So how do you develop 25 plans in one-fourth the time ? Let’s take an example. Your organization provides business applications support for a set of clients. Your 25 resources consist of the following:

- 10 programmers - 6 applications specialists - 3 support desk resources - 3 computer operators - 1 quality assurance/programming coordinator - 2 network administrators

With this mix of employee types, you only have six to eight unique performance plan models. For example, all the programmers will probably have similar content that is tweaked for each individual’s focus. What this means is that every programmer should have a section on “Processes & Standards”. Individual programmers may have unique comments in that area, but the main part of the section can be the same. Depending on what you want to emphasize with an individual, you can modify the instructions or change the priority weighting. Those that already do a great job in “Processes & Standards” won’t need as much emphasis as those that need to improve in that area. The bottom line is that you can develop one standard Programming Performance Plan that can be tweaked for each of the 10 individual programmers. The result is that the main effort creates one solid programming performance plan that is modified slightly for 10 individuals. You will complete the last 9 plans very quickly and each will ultimately be unique for the particular needs of each individual. A performance plan should include the following elements:

- Major functional categories - Specific performance guides in each category - Performance weighting - Grading scale - Signature and date lines

Major functional categories will include categories such as Production, Quality, Training, Teamwork, Leadership, Client Service, etc. Remember, the information you put in the plan also includes the behavior and the results that you want to achieve at an individual level to support the team’s overall objectives.


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Specific performance guides are instructions within a major functional category. These instructions are the guides that tell the employee exactly what you want in a given area. In the training category, it would include the classes and completion dates that you want completed. Performance Weighting places a level of importance on each line item instruction. Grading scale tells the employee how the employee review is graded. Signature and date lines are there for both the employee and manager signatures upon delivering the plan. Three sample plans are provided and a blank Performance Plan template is included in the Appendix L.


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Sample Programmer Performance Plan

Performance Plan Name: John Smith Position: Senior Programmer Analyst Date: 4/1/00

I. Technical Knowledge & Productivity A. Develop expertise in both AS/400 technology issues as well as the business

applications running on the AS/400 in order to provide productive development and support expertise on these systems for the company. 3

B. Assert yourself in the analysis of programming development at the beginning of a programming request in order to anticipate cause and effect situations that minimize surprises and problems related to program development. 3

C. Develop additional technical skill sets on an as needed basis that assist in the development of identified strategic projects. 1

D. Develop a concise plan that gets both yourself and other programmer new hires up to full capacity in supporting our systems within 3 months. 3

II. Client Service

A. Be responsive to user and internal department requests by proactively communicating the status of projects that reduces their anxiety. Work toward a goal that eliminates the user from having to ask about the status of a project. 3

B. Assess each project and provide input early on that helps to clarify and finalize the design so that once approved by the user the programming can be completed productively. 2

C. Use the IT Business Analysis resource(s) to full advantage as the focal point and interface with the user. Be clear and forthcoming on issues with this resource in regards to project requests and action plans and clearly communicate your plans with them so there are minimal misunderstandings. 3

III. Teamwork/Leadership

A. Provide leadership in seeking out the knowledge required to fully support our applications. Our expectations should be that with an organized approach a new programmer should be able to be up to speed in 3 months. 3

B. Provide leadership within the IT organization by your example of being responsive to new issues and proactive in identifying and working with the team in eliminating issues that cause opportunities for surprise. 2

C. Conduct yourself in a manner with peers and users that causes them to view your efforts as reliable and responsive as you work on projects and support issues. 2

D. Help establish a cooperative and responsive work ethic within the IT organization. 1


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Sample Programmer Performance Plan (page 2)

IV. Processes & Standards A. Be proactive in providing input within the programming staff to define and put into

place the programming standards we should maintain for our business applications. Complete the definition with Dave, Bob, and Gary by 6/1/00. 3

B. Maintain project management standards on all projects of scope greater than 100 hours of programming and testing time. 2

C. Adhere to a standard of having all programming code and data changes tested by our Business Applications Analyst(s) and users (where needed) prior to putting into production. 3

D. Maintain the weekly implementation of new programming release standards developed by the IT organization. 2

V. Communication A. Communicate proactively to peers and users (as required) to keep them up to date on

the status of your work and the direction you are taking on issues to eliminate surprises. 3

B. Participate in weekly conferences with all the programming staff to discuss the following: 2

1. Project goals and objectives. 2. Issues and discussions on how best to solve them. 3. Development, implementation, and inspection of using technical standards. 4. Ongoing training initiatives.

C. Monitor your intra-company E-mail often and use E-mail as an effective communication vehicle within the company. 1

D. Document standards and processes that are needed to maintain an organization that is reliable, of high quality, and supportive of our business. 2

VI. Education/Training A. Work with Bob and Dave to develop a proactive plan of training targeted to transfer

the knowledge needed to become able to fully support our business applications. Complete a detailed plan that covers transfer of knowledge in all areas of our AS/400 business application by 5/1/00. 3

B. Identify with your manager within the next 30 days the training you should pursue over the next 12 months to develop additional skills needed within the organization to support our business applications development. 2

C. Take at least one course in web based programming such as Microsoft FrontPage. 1

Weighting factors are: 1 – low; 2 – medium; 3 - high Grading Scale: 1 – low; 2 – medium; 3 - high

Scheduled Review Date: April 2001

Manager Signature: _________________________ Date: ________________ Employee Signature: ________________________ Date: ________________


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Sample Business Applications Analyst Performance Plan

Performance Plan Name: Jane Smith Position: Business Applications Analyst Date: 4/1/00

I. Technical Knowledge & Productivity A. Maintain expertise in both AS/400 technology issues as well as the business applications running on the AS/400 in order to provide leadership in the ongoing development and maintenance of those systems for the company. 3 B. Assert yourself in the analysis of programming development at the beginning of a

programming request in order to anticipate cause and effect situations in order to minimize surprises and problems related to program development. 3

C. Develop additional technical skill sets on an as needed basis that assist in the development of identified strategic projects. 1

D. Document and share your business application knowledge with the programming staff and appropriate departments to expand the base of knowledge of our business applications. 2 E. Work closely with Revenue Management to understand their business objectives and

challenges in order to assist in providing guidance to them in the best means of accomplishing their desired results with our technologies. 2

II. Client Service A. Be responsive to user and internal department requests by proactively communicating

the status of projects that reduces their anxiety. Work toward a goal that eliminates the user or our IT staff from having to ask about the status of a project. Be proactive in communicating information by establishing an efficient process by which to review, update, and distribute updates to appropriate managers in a consistent and timely manner. 3

B. Assess each project and provide input early on that helps clarify and finalize the design so that programming may be completed without redesign issues. 2

C. Take ownership in becoming the focal point and interface with the user on their programming requests and business needs. Be clear and forthcoming on issues with your manager and the appropriate users in regards to project requests and action plans and clearly communicate your plans so there are minimal misunderstandings. 3

D. Take responsibility for creation and distribution of the Monthly Operations Reports. 1


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Sample Business Applications Analyst Performance Plan (Page 2)

III. Teamwork/Leadership A. Provide leadership in establishing plans that educate others on our systems and

applications in a highly productive manner. This should include both IT resources as well as users. 2

B. Provide leadership within the IT organization by your example of being responsive to new issues and proactive in identifying and working with the team in eliminating issues that cause opportunities for surprise. 3

C. Conduct yourself in a manner with peers and users that causes them to view your efforts as reliable and responsive as you work on projects and support issues. 1

D. Help establish a cooperative and responsive work ethic within the IT organization. 2

IV. Processes & Standards A. Provide the leadership to define and put into place the standards we should maintain

for our business applications. Complete the definition by 5/1/00. 2 B. Maintain project management standards on all projects of scope greater than 100

hours of programming and testing time. 3 C. Develop with your manager a tracking system that assists in monitoring both

productivity and quality of our programming efforts. Report on this monthly so that we may understand the dynamics and trends of our efforts and where to focus improvements. The goal is 0 errors at “live”. 1

V. Communication A. Communicate proactively to peers and users to keep them up to date on the status of

the IT organization’s programming backlog work. 3 B. Monitor your intra-company E-mail often and use E-mail as an effective

communication vehicle within the company. 1 C. Keep your manager updated on the status of all issues that affect user uptime. 2

VI. Education/Training A. Identify with your manager within 30 days the training you should pursue over the

next 12 months to develop additional skills needed within the organization to support our business applications development. 3

B. Take at least one course in Project Management by 12/31/01. 3 C. Participate in new programmer training to develop their business application

knowledge. 2 D. Position yourself to provide technical training to users after 6/1/00. 2

Weighting factors are: 1 – low; 2 – medium; 3 – high

Grading Scale: 1 – low; 2 – medium; 3 - high




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Sample IT Systems Infrastructure Manager Performance Plan

Performance Plan Name: Bill James Position: IT Systems Infrastructure Manager Date: 4/1/00

I. Technical Knowledge & Productivity A. Insure that all components of the company’s infrastructure has appropriate skill and

knowledge in place (either through employees or outside vendor support) to adequately support the business operation. Infrastructure includes all systems (file and application servers and desktop computers), peripherals, phone systems, network architecture, and telecommunications environments. 3

B. Identify key areas of technical knowledge that gaps exist and devise a plan on how to best address eliminating exposure and risk to the company by 5/31/00. 3

C. Insure that key areas of knowledge and skill are being developed in more than one employee. 2

D. Anticipate needs of the business by understanding growth potential and identifying the critical points of having to invest in additional computer technology to absorb the volume and/or to add flexibility. 1

II. Client Service A. System availability is critical to our users. Create a support organization that clearly

understands this and that implements action plans that work to prevent support issues from happening as much as being able to recover from support problems. 2

B. Establish clear guidelines for communicating and escalating critical issues to management in order to minimize business disruption due to support issues. 2

C. Establish and inspect follow-up guidelines that are responsive to users in resolving their technical problems and closing out trouble tickets. 3

D. Always provide users with advance notice of system downtime as well as a forecast of when systems will return to normal operation when possible. 2


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Sample IT Systems Infrastructure Manager Performance Plan (Page 2)

III. Teamwork/Leadership A. Create an environment that promotes teamwork among all employees and that

encourages their proactive involvement in solving technical issues proactively while maintaining focus on areas of responsibility. 2

B. Develop Performance Plans for your staff by 6/1/00 to document your expectations of them and that identifies their key responsibilities. 3

C. Empower your technical staff to take ownership of their key functional area responsibilities by working with them in the following areas: 3

1. Defining key issues of each functional areas (goals, problems, gaps, etc.) 2. Having the “owner” develop a plan that makes him/her an expert in each of

their functional areas. 3. Having the “owner” identify his/her backup resource and developing a plan

that develops that resource’s skill and knowledge to be able to support that particular functional area.

4. Developing measurement criteria that establishes “Meets Requirements” and “Exceeds Requirements” levels of support for each functional area.

IV. Processes & Standards

A. Establish standards of supporting the company’s infrastructure including: 2 1. Expected initial response time to new issues. 2. Average resolution times for key support areas. 3. Documentation of call support issues, actions, resolutions, and user

communication. 4. Backup and recovery of servers and desktops. 5. User security. 6. Systems security 7. Project Plans for key initiatives. 8. Maintaining the Network Diagram 9. Others you deem appropriate.

B. Inspect and reinforce processes and standards that you have implemented. 2 C. Identify areas of importance that need standards as the company evolves. 1 D. Establish a standard in maintaining pertinent information on computer equipment and

software. 2 E. Establish and document support maintenance contact information for all technical

support aspects of the company. 3


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Sample IT Systems Infrastructure Manager Performance Plan (Page 3)

V. Communication A. Provide your manager with a Infrastructure Summary Report on a monthly basis to

include: 2 1. Past month’s accomplishments. 2. Current month’s goals and objectives. 3. Support trends you see and recommendations on how to prevent the problem. 4. Issues and concerns related to accomplishing your objectives.

B. Establish an organization culture that over-communicates status of the problem to the user that issued a technical request. Be very proactive with communicating “where we are”, “forecast of fixing the problem”, “preventive measures that avoid this problem in the future”, etc. to keep the user aware of their issue. Prevent the user from having to ask us where we are on resolving his/her problem. 3

C. Provide your manager with early “heads up” on significant expenses over $2500. 3 D. Conduct regular scheduled employee meetings to share information with your staff

and to update all on status of key issues. 2

VI. Education/Training A. Identify training with your manager that you need in the coming year to develop your

skill/knowledge in key areas of your responsibilities including: 2 1. Management/Supervisory Skills 2. Technical Skills 3. Project Management Skills

B. Define with your staff an education plan that enhances our knowledge base in key areas and, where appropriate (i.e. critical), develops bench strength. Provide this plan to your manager by 6/1/00. 3

C. Identify user training needs and a plan on how to deliver it in areas of user support that work toward preventing problems before they happen. 1

Weighting factors are: 1 – low; 2 – medium; 3 – high Grading Scale: 1 – low; 2 – medium; 3 - high




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The three Performance Plan samples provided above are real examples used in a small company from the past. You will notice that there are specific items relating to the technical environment such as the AS/400 systems. You should also notice that all three plans included the same main categories of:

- Technical Knowledge & Productivity - Client Service - Teamwork / Leadership - Process & Standards - Communication - Education / Training

Each skill type has different issues related to each of the 6 main categories, but it was important in this “turnaround” situation to have everyone focused on common performance themes. If you were to look at all of the individual programming plans, you would have seen quite a bit of the same direction, but certain categories such as Education / Training are individualized for the specific need of the employee. Try to be as specific as you can so there is little room for interpretation. When delivering the plan to each of your employees, you should emphasize a few points about the performance planning and review process:

1. The employee owns the plan. After delivering the plan, it’s up to the employee to be proactive in achieving the results.

2. The review will go through the plan and will evaluate the employee on his/her performance as well as to consider the weighting factors of each item.

3. Weighting factors are included to define where the manager places the highest priority.

4. If there is any lack of understanding by the employee on any part of the plan, it’s up to the employee to ask a question. Upon leaving this meeting, the manager’s assumption will be that the plan is clearly understood.

5. A preliminary review, or status check, can be conducted at any time upon request. The Appendix includes a blank template for your use in developing performance plans. Performance planning and reviews give the manager an excellent opportunity to spend quality time with each employee. If you are one of those that doesn’t automatically use plans and reviews to help you achieve positive results, you should reconsider. If it’s hard to get to it, schedule a review session with employees and that will help you pay attention to this important aspect of managing a technical staff. Most technology resources are highly detail oriented people. They want and need all the guidelines you can provide that helps them achieve success. If you spend the time and energy to develop and deliver great plans for your staff, you might be amazed at the positive results, especially if you have been able to create an excellent team.


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IX. Communication is Key

Everyone wants to know what’s going on and where the company is headed. Your employees also want to have a sense that there is a vision for their IT organization and that their efforts are being appreciated. Communicating these things is crucial for success. As a manager, a major part of your responsibility is to communicate with others including employees, clients, and senior managers. In this section we will concentrate on the communication vehicles that are important for your team. Effective communication is a key means of “rallying the troops” and motivating them to go above and beyond normal effort when needed. There are many ways to communicate your message. Use all of these and other means that you find beneficial.

A. Monthly staff meetings - Some managers don’t like to have meetings. Don’t overlook the opportunity that you have here. A consistent monthly staff meeting gives you the opportunity to do many things with your team such as:

- Update the staff on significant company news - Reinforce company changes and help the staff understand the reasons - Announce key initiatives and plans that affect the organization - Reinforce behavior improvement that improves client service, etc. - Reward excellent performance - Acknowledge achievements - Provide an opportunity to answer employee questions - Have fun

You may think that this is a waste of time; it isn’t. One of the major frustrations of people is when they aren’t kept up to date on issues that affect them. It’s also one of the best means you can use to ensure the “right hand” of your team knows what the “left hand” is doing.

B. Weekly project status meetings - Keeping a project on track takes dedication and

frequent communication. Every project of major significance should have regularly scheduled status update meetings of all participants with updated project plans distributed afterwards.

C. Department or company meetings - Your employees need an advocate that tells

others of their successes and challenges. It’s the manager’s responsibility to take the message to other departments and to company managers. When your staff sees you sharing their success with others or working hard to recruit outside help on problematic issues, they will rally behind you. IT employees really appreciate a manager that supports their efforts.


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D. Performance Planning and Performance Reviews - We have already discussed the importance of performance planning and reviews. The manner in which you deliver both of these is key. Place appropriate emphasis on key points that you want accomplished. Just going through the paces will have an opposite effect on your employee. You must truly care about the success of your employee and your delivery approach will tell the employee whether you really care or not.

E. Ad-hoc discussions - You don’t have to be everyone’s best friend but showing your

employees that you are interested in their weekend, or their new baby, and things that are more of a personal nature makes you more human. People like to work for caring human beings. Having these discussions also creates an environment that says that ‘you are approachable’ and open for discussion. It makes it much easier for your employee to initiate discussions concerning problems or challenges when they need your assistance.

F. Team meetings - If you are a senior manager responsible for several technical

organizations, make it a point to sit in on team meetings occasionally or to make short visits to provide additional insight into pertinent issues of the day. It is also a way to reinforce a particularly difficult topic that your team manager might be discussing. Do it frequently enough so that when you do show up it is not a major event.

An informed staff tends to have their “eye on the ball” and will be much more productive than the staff that’s wondering what is going on. You will also have much less turnover because they will be busier focusing on your initiatives and direction than analyzing what’s happening. Another important point about highly detailed people is that they tend to be somewhat paranoid. When someone that needs detail doesn’t receive it, they begin analyzing the situation and they will come up with a negative result most of the time. You can prevent this by communicating effectively and often with your employees. Here is a short routine you can use to prepare for a staff meeting update. It takes only a few minutes, and will allow you to create informative material your employees want to hear.

1. Put yourself in your employee’s shoes and ask yourself what you’d like to know. 2. Ask your key employees what they want to know prior to a meeting. 3. Jot down bullets of significant news:

- Company updates - IT organization updates - Key client updates

4. List an item that acknowledges each of your employees by name. 5. Identify items or issues that need to be reinforced for improvement. 6. Identify failures and discuss opportunities for improvement. 7. Reward at least one individual for a success. 8. Identify key IT initiatives and milestones. 9. Identify an educational topic that benefits your employees.


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There are hundreds, maybe thousands of ways to make your meetings interesting, upbeat, and interesting. The more you are able to create positive energy and enthusiasm the better. As the manager, your enthusiasm and attitude will transcend the organization. Keep your meetings to an hour or an hour and a half at the most. If you really need to go longer, work lunch into the meeting. After all, you have some level of cost for each hour your employees are not working. Don’t get too hung up on their downtime. Motivated employees produce more and informing employees of direction and taking a little time to “smell the roses” will “pump them up”. Want another tip on getting your employees involved and feeling part of the team ? Assign two employees responsibility for creating the agenda for each meeting and have them work with you on content and ideas. You will get a lot of creativity from your employees. Let them run the meeting and your part will be a normal manager update pitch. Be unique and bring something different to your meetings. It takes some thought but the results will separate you from your peers and have employees wanting to be part of your team. Personal Note: In a past company we had a major reorganization take place and I was asked to manage a regional support group consisting of about 25 people, programmers and business application specialists. I had been with the company for 3 years in management roles in the corporate headquarters office. Leading up to my first day as the new manager, I kept thinking of the need to find a way to get the staff’s attention and how I could “break the ice”. The staff did not know me and the fact that I was coming from corporate headquarters was not necessarily a positive from their standpoint. Several months earlier I had attended a Comdex convention in Las Vegas. On my way home I hit the airport slot machines for $100 , , , twice !! Yes, that’s right - $200 on the positive side. When I checked out, I took $100 in silver dollars. Remember the good old days when they actually used silver dollars ? You don’t see the connection, do you ? Well, I planned my first official staff meeting for the second day I was in my new office. Everyone took their seats at the tables in our regional classroom and you could tell everyone was very interested in what was going to take place. Before saying a word, I passed in front of each employee and dropped a silver dollar on the table in front of them. A silver dollar makes a distinct noise that is unmistakable. There was a bit of a surprise as you might expect, , , along with some confusion, , , and a lot of curiosity. By the time I finished my round, the room was stirring pretty good with quizzical whispers and some light laughter.


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After going back to the front of the room, I opened up my presentation with a few choice remarks, “What many of you think you have in front of you is a silver dollar. It looks like a silver dollar and probably can be spent just like a dollar. But, , , it is much, much more ! For example, it can be used as a great paperweight, It can be flipped and will determine who serves first or who tees off first, It has artistic value as it is a true work of art that will last forever. What it really turns out to be is a gift from me to you, each one individually given. This gift is a token of the importance that I place as a manager to support you, If there is any time that you need to talk to me about an important issue, Come to my office and drop the coin on my desk.

I’ll take whatever time we need to discuss an important issue with you because There is nothing more important for a manager to do at that particular time. And, by the way, you will be able to keep the dollar.”

Was this kind of corny ? Yes Did it break the ice ? Absolutely Was it effective ? You bet In fact, there were other employees outside of my department that dropped by later and asked how they might get into our organization. There was also 1 employee to drop a dollar on my desk the next day because she had decided to leave the company. Reorganizations have unfortunate results like that sometime but I like to think that both the employee and the organization benefited from the change. You don’t have to give everyone a silver dollar to have the same effect. Be a little unique. There are many ways. The point is to create positive energy and show your employees that you care.


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X. Motivating and Rewarding

Motivating and rewarding might be the most fun of all in building a successful IT organization. It doesn’t happen all by itself. Many managers are not that comfortable in motivating. To motivate others means that you have to lead. If you are in a leadership position (i.e. manager), then you must decide to lead. Not to do so is short changing your staff and your company. If you can’t lead or aren’t comfortable leading others, seek a rewarding career as a follower. It’s ok and the company needs both types of people. You and your employees will be happier. One of the greatest motivations takes place when an employee feels empowered to make a difference or to take on a responsibility. Much of the information earlier was focused on assessing what you want, determining what you have, and filling the gaps with self-starters. Additional information focused on defining the roles of each individual and building performance plans that spell out those responsibilities. People like to have responsibility and to feel empowered that they can take a lead role in getting things done. Feed an employee’s desire to be responsible, to have input as to how responsibilities are handled, and an innate desire to be successful and you will have one charged employee working for you. When you assign responsibilities, be certain to put square pegs in square holes. Putting a linebacker in a quarterback position will obviously lead to poor results. You might miss on occasion. We all learn from our mistakes. When that happens, take responsibility as the manager and support your employee as you place him/her into a situation that leads to success. This does not suggest that you keep moving people around until they succeed. More will be discussed in Chapter XII on weeding and feeding. What it does suggest is that there will be times in your management career that you misjudge a person’s capabilities and put the individual into a situation that just does not work out. Be open to the fact that the problem may be a mistake on your part versus a failure on the employee’s part.


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We just discussed the power of communication as a motivator. Communication really has a positive effect on people. Augment your positive energy in your communication opportunities with a few other tools and you will guarantee yourself a motivated staff. A few examples of motivation tools include: 1. Acknowledge successes – people love to hear their name used in a positive way.

2. Give an employee a nice dinner for two when he/she does something great or exemplifies a behavior that you want acknowledged throughout the team.

3. Have an ice cream afternoon. 4. Order pizza for lunch for the entire team. 5. Meet small groups of employees for breakfast to discuss the business. 6. Award a “ rubber chicken” to the dumbest act of the month (You have to have fun

along the way; you can award it to yourself as well). 7. Always give your team credit for successes; always take the hit for failures.

Most of these items cost very little and have big motivational value because of one important item. Every time you do something for your employees it shows that you care. There are other important motivational elements that you can use. The trick is to know what really motivates people. Other motivational influences include:

1. Job flexibility 2. Supportive manager 3. Being empowered to do the job 4. Working for a company that knows where it’s going 5. Ability to learn more

Sidebar: Over the past 25 years I have seen many studies about employee motivation, employee turnover, etc. In all of those studies there has never been one that suggested that people stay with a company because the company pays the highest salaries. Most of the time the major motivations that cause employees to stay with you relates to flexibility, feeling part of a team that has a vision, challenge of the job, or working with a strong management team.


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Personal Note: My organizations have always been recognized as the one that has fun and seems to spend money on things that are fun. It’s true that my organizations will spend money to do things that add value to the business. It’s my strong opinion that you receive back more than you ever spend if you are consistent and sincere in your efforts. Let me give you 2 examples: 1. I took my team to the lake for a day-long meeting and invited the managers of the other

organizations so that my team had an opportunity to build stronger bonds with each other. The meeting was at a large lake and on a houseboat. We were able to access the boat all day for half the price. We had our meeting on the boat but docked in the morning and we took it out on the lake in the afternoon. The staff meeting on the top deck and in the sun was great and everyone learned something as well as had a great time. Others were somewhat jealous of what we were doing but they had the same opportunity to budget and plan an activity for their employees. Plan ahead, , , motivational activities do not happen on their own.

2. Another example is that I used to have client user group meetings at Disney World or in

Sanibel, Florida as opposed to Atlanta. It’s much more fun and cost about the same even when I took 6 or so employees to the meetings. The clients liked it much more and in some cases helped us get a great deal with a hotel. Other managers that had similar responsibilities later jumped onto the bandwagon and we invited clients outside of my region to participate in the sessions.

Plan and budget for fun activities that take care of business. Be creative and learn to enjoy your team and they will do all they can to succeed for you. The real message here is that you can’t afford not to take advantage of opportunities to motivate your employees. It doesn’t always require spending money. You can do any number of things that people like. Give an employee a day off for extra effort. Send an employee to a special class. Put an employee in a lead role to implement a new technology. Be creative and open to the possibilities. The bottom line is that people appreciate the thought more than you know.


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XI. Involve Each Resource

Employees are constantly seeking approval from their manager. This is especially true for technical people. Your ability to reach out to each employee on your team and to find that special niche that allows them to support the team is key. Most employees want to be successful and to be appreciated for what they do. Your ability to involve each employee to the greatest extent possible in helping the team succeed will reinforce the motivation we just talked about. How do you involve each employee ? There are several ways:

1. Identify the employee’s primary responsibilities. 2. Deliver a performance plan that reinforces responsibilities and helps grow the

employee’s skills. 3. Empower the employee to take responsibility by providing direction and inspecting

progress as needed. Give an employee plenty of room but monitor so the major mistakes are prevented.

4. Ask your employee for his/her opinion. 5. Inspect and coach often to help your employee. Discuss their responsibilities and the

approaches they plan to use and coach them through the process of getting to the best solution.

6. Give the employee a project that helps the company or organization and that has visibility, , , then help them succeed.

An employee is generally eager to learn from your experiences. Use real life examples that reinforce a successful outcome of a situation similar to an issue the employee is facing. It’s all right to allow the employee to make mistakes as long as it isn’t a critical mistake. More senior employees obviously are given more slack. Younger, less experienced employees need more supervision and coaching to avoid the big mistake. Involving every employee means that you are observing each employee, monitoring their efforts, and providing both positive and constructive feedback to them.

“Managers that are asleep have employees that are asleep.”


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XII. Weed and Feed - Step Up to Your Problems

Did you know that firing an employee is a powerful motivator for your team ? Employees are always watching their manager. They are looking for you to support their efforts and to step up to the team’s problems. Your employees generally recognize a poor performer in their ranks. It’s up to you as the manager to determine if a weak employee is failing because of skill, motivation, attitude, or circumstance. Let’s start out by saying that not every failing employee should be fired. At the same time, we should recognize that every employee is not capable of succeeding in every organization or technical position. It should take a lot before you finally terminate an employee. I have fired employees that have been with me for a short period of time and employees that I’ve known for many years. Before it gets to a termination action, you have to look yourself in the mirror and comfortably tell yourself that you have done all that you can to resolve the issue before you take the action. Taking time to help an employee and seeing the improvement is a very rewarding experience. I can tell you that having to fire anyone, regardless of who it is and why it is needed is not personally rewarding at all. I’ve seen managers gloat over their ability to fire an individual. That behavior is sickening and really doesn’t belong in a healthy, professional IT environment. When firing someone becomes fun it’s time to look for another profession. If you get to a point that termination is the proper action, the employee should not be surprised. When you have proactively coached the person on the problem, it should be an apparent action that was potentially coming. When you have a bad situation, you have to step up to the problem. A manager will lose more respect quicker for ignoring a problematic employee situation than almost anything else. Again, that does not mean you execute a termination quickly. An approach that should be followed flows something like this:

1. Notify the employee of the problem and gain agreement that it is a problem and that appropriate actions will be taken to improve.

2. If the problem persists, advise the employee again that the problem is continuing and that it is unacceptable. Coach the employee on what the appropriate actions are in order to be successful. Gain a commitment that the behavior changes will take place or the next meeting will be one that forces a termination.

3. If the problem continues, bring the employee in and terminate.


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Document each step and place in the employee file in case you need it later. Depending upon the situation, you may want someone from Human Resources or another department manager to attend the second or third meeting. Stepping up to problem employee situations creates significant credibility with your employees that are striving hard to do a great job. Be very careful that you inspect an accusation from one employee toward another. Crazy things can happen within the dynamics of a large group of people and you owe it to everyone to validate any accusations before taking action. That’s another reason that you should always bring to attention, then warn, and finally terminate. Most of the time you will not have to terminate a problem employee. My experience is that most employees will either leave or will fix the problem after the issue has been brought to their attention. If they make it to a second meeting because the problem still exists, you’re probably going to have to terminate because they just don’t get the message. Those in this group are actually a rare exception. There are other reasons that you might have to terminate an employee. If you pick up an organization that is struggling because of poor past management, there may be employees that are just not capable of doing what is needed. This is a hard one, but if your assessment of the situation tells you that you need 4 linebackers and no running backs but you have 2 running backs, you have three options.

1. Can the running backs be converted into linebackers ? 2. Can the running backs work elsewhere in the company ? 3. Terminate the running backs and find yourself linebackers.

Trying to achieve success with nice people that are incapable of playing the positions does nothing for anyone, so don’t try to achieve the impossible. Just be humane in how you transition through your organizational changes. Another reason that you might have to terminate is when the company consolidates organizations after an acquisition. There are two books in the IT Manager Development Series dedicated to the IT acquisition process. Publication number 10 titled Acquisition – IT Assimilations focuses in on means of handling this situation in a manner that keeps your risk of losing employees prematurely very low.


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XIII. Reinforce Focus

Remember the story of the restaurant owner that was discussed earlier in this publication ? A manager’s role is to reinforce your organization’s mission and how you want to conduct your business every day. Remember, employees will follow your lead, especially if it is a positive role model and has a lot of character. A. Organization

You reinforce focus with your entire IT organization by validating your department objectives with senior managers, and consistently reinforcing with your team your vision for the organization. You can also reinforce the focus of your team with clients and company departments that the team is supporting. It is usually necessary to repeat key issues and objectives that your IT organization is trying to achieve. Repeat key items often and with everyone that is impacted so you know that they are in sync with your objectives. For example, if you have positioned senior management with a need to hire additional staff and showed them the “bubble graph” of the short term impact on earnings, you may need to pull the graph out every month to remind them where you are headed. Your organization also needs to hear repeatedly about the target you have set for achieving certain levels of client service excellence. Remind the team of the goal and show them how they are tracking toward getting there. Organizations that consistently hear the objective, that understand the plan, and see actual progress will continue to push for the goal until it is reached. Organizations are dynamic and changing just as the people who make them up. The personality of an organization will change over time as it grows and as the team members and their capabilities change. With any changing organization, it is important to reinforce what it’s mission is and the key objectives that are important to accomplish for success and why. Helping your team visualize where it is in the overall scheme of your IT vision is an important perspective for them. Take the time to analyze it for yourself and convey the information to the organization and to those that are impacted.


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B. Individual

Reinforcing focus for each individual involves individual inspection and coaching for improved performance. Always approach this opportunity in a helpful, constructive manner. You will get a very responsive reaction from your employee if you do. A manager of a baseball team may not be able to play the game any longer, but because of his experience and knowledge of the game he is a valuable asset to the team. The manager is in a unique position to coach younger players and to anticipate situations that have reasonable odds for success. Coaching that is delivered in a helpful style gets positive responses. You have worked through considerable challenges and effort to build a stellar team that is focused on the issues of the company. As a manager, you must inspect every day that your team and individual employees are focused to the challenges at hand. An old management saying is, “What gets inspected gets done.” You better believe it ! It is not that your employees do not want to accomplish all the objectives. For the most part, it is because diversions happen in an IT world that can take your eye off the ball because of a problem here and there. Before you know it, the individual or team is actually working on the wrong priority. Building an organization that can run in auto-pilot is always something you should strive for. Just be cautious because most organizations do not run in that mode for very long so don’t fall asleep at the wheel. Observe your organization and the individuals on the team all the time. Look for potential challenges and anticipate them so you can plan for contingencies if they come up. Always look for ways to improve and to enhance the ability of your organization. When you take this approach, your employees will follow your example.


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XIV. Report Cards and Measurement Tools

One of the best ways to motivate your staff and to help everyone see real progress is to track something that you are trying to improve. Seeing progress and knowing that it is being tracked is powerful motivation. There are several components of an IT business worth tracking. The list that follows is not intended to be a comprehensive list, but it should give you ideas for your own situation. When you have information that shows your trends in these areas, you will have an excellent grasp of your business and tools that will reinforce your objectives for the company, your organization, and individual employees.

- IT expense as a per cent (%) of company revenue - Support call trends

- calls per month - per support resource - by client - by type of call

- Application Programming production - backlog output trend - quality trends

- design problems - programming quality problems - IT QA problems - User QA problems

- Number of users supported per infrastructure support desk employee - Client Accounts Receivable - Billable employee time and dollars - Internet web site hits and click-throughs

Mix and match metrics tools that provide your organization with information that is meaningful and important to track. It might be as simple as tracking the number of interrupted WAN connections per week due to outside forces that you can’t prevent. The benefit is that when employees know that you are measuring something, they will try to improve it, especially if it impacts their performance. Being able to analyze key performance indicators gives you powerful knowledge that most of your peers does not have. Bering able to articulate the dynamics of your support business truly sets you apart from other IT managers. The following sample is a simple idea of what you can do on a single report. It takes very little to capture and calculate the indicator lines highlighted in yellow that you are monitoring


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IT Support – Key Indicators Trend Report

ITEM Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec A Revenues B IT Expense C IT % of Revenue

(B) / (A)

D Support Calls E Number of Help Desk

Resources

F Calls/Resource (D) / (E)

G # Clients H Calls/Client

(D) / (G)

I Programming Backlog Hours J # Programmers K Avg. Monthly Backlog Base

(I) / (J*100)

L Completed Project Hours M Programming Productivity

(L) / (J*100)

N Programming QA Errors O Avg. Errors/Programmer

(N) / (J)

P # Users supported by

Infrastructure Team

Q # Infrastructure Resources R Avg. Users/IT Resource

(P) / (Q)

S Billable Revenue Dollars T # Billable Resources U Avg. Billable Amt./Resource

(S) / (T)

V % Billable Time (Approx.) (S) / (T*120)

W Client Accounts Receivable


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APPENDIX-A Sample Organization Chart – Functional Requirements

CIO



Manager


Manager


Data Center

LAN / WAN


VoiceCommunications

ApplicationServer Support

E-Mail

InternetSupport

IntranetSupport

ProjectManagement

ProgrammingNew

Development

Training

NetworkSpecialist

BusinessAnalysis

Programming

Training

TechnicalWriting

ApplicationsSupport Desk

BusinessAnalysis

ProgrammingSupport

AdministrativeSupport

ProgrammingSupport

InfrastructureSpecialist

Training

Programming

AssimilationsProject

Management

Due Diligence


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APPENDIX-B Sample Organization Chart – Infrastructure


Data Center LAN / WAN& Desktop


VoiceCommunications

ApplicationServer Support E-Mail

InternetSupport

IntranetSupport

NameDay Operator

NameDesktop E-Mail

Service Specialist

NameE-Mail Server

Specialist

NameWindows/ NT

Specialist

NameServer O/SSpecialist

NamePhone/PBXSpecialist



NameSupport Coordinator

NameWAN/Router

Specialist

NameTelecommSpecialist

NamePC DesktopSpecialist

NameNT Administrator

NameNovell Administrator

NameNight Operator

NameNight Operator

NameDay Operator

NameWebmaster

NameWebmaster

NameWeb Technical

Specialist

NameWeb Technical

Specialist


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APPENDIX-C Sample Organization Chart – Special Projects


Team 1 Team 2 Team 3

NameProject Manager




NameProject Manager




NameProject Manager




NameTraining

NameTraining

NameTraining


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APPENDIX-D Sample Organization Chart – Business Applications


Manager

ProgrammingNew

DevelopmentTrainingTechnical

WritingApplications

Support DeskBusinessAnalysis

ProgrammingSupport

NameProgramming

Leader

NameProgrammer

NameProgrammer

NameSr. Programmer


NameQuality Assurance



NameSupport DeskCoordinator

NameProgramming

Support



NameProgrammer

NameProgramming

Leader

NameProgrammer

NameProgrammer

NameSr. Programmer

NameProgrammer



NameTraining Coordinator




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APPENDIX-E Sample Organization Chart – Acquisitions & Assimilations


Manager

Due Diligence Assimilations

NameAssimilation

Project Manager

NameSr. Programmer


NameIT Due Diligence

Specialist


NameInfrastructureCoordinator


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APPENDIX-F Current Employee Skills Matrix

Name

Responsibility

Man

agem

ent

Lea

der/

Supe

r.

Clie

nt S

ervi

ce

Com

mun

icat

ion

Proj

ect M

gmt.

Indu

stry

Kno

wle

dge

Bus

ines

s Ana

lysi

s

App

licat

ion

Des

ign

Prog

ram

min

g

Impl

emen

tatio

n

Tra

inin

g

Doc

umen

tatio

n

Hel

p D

esk

Net

wor

k

Tel

ecom

PC/D

eskt

op

Serv

ers

Inte

rnet

/Int

rane

t

Com

pute

r op

erat

ions


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APPENDIX-G Employee Skills Matrix Template

Name

Responsibility


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APPENDIX-H Technology Resource Interview Guide

I. General Information

F. How did you find out about our open position ? G. What do you know about our company ? H. Why did you leave your last company ? I. What did you like/dislike about your previous position ? J. What did you like/dislike about your previous company ?

II. Personal Goals and Wants

G. What’s important to you in a company ? H. What’s important in your manager ? I. What are you looking for ? J. What are your goals for 3 to 5 years into the future ? K. What is your understanding of the position we are trying to fill ? L. Why do you feel that you are a good candidate for this position ?

III. Skills & Experience

E. Tell me about your technical skills. (point out specific skills on the resume that you want to better understand)

F. Give me examples of past experiences that describe your abilities to be successful. (point toward specific job functions or skills that you want the candidate to address)

G. How would you approach _______________ ? (Give a specific problem situation and ask for the approach, or how the candidate would solve the problem. The answers may surprise you and will definitely provide insight.)

H. Give me two examples that describe your effectiveness in a team environment. IV. Company Overview and Opportunity (Optional section to give the candidate information)

C. Describe your company mission, it’s challenges, and opportunities for the candidate. D. Discuss briefly the management approach used in running the IT organization.

V. Job Description & Challenges

C. Describe for the candidate the Job Description and identify the challenges and responsibilities associated with the position.

D. Identify key functions and attributes necessary for success in the position. VI. Wrap-up

D. Ask for work references. E. Ask the candidate if he/she has questions about the position or the company. F. Outline the actions for follow-up and the expected timing.


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3 January 2001 Mr. John Smith 101 Oak Street Atlanta, GA 30070 Dear John, It is my pleasure to offer you the position of Senior Programmer Analyst at MDE Enterprises with an effective date of 2/1/01. The start ing salary is $ 75,000 with an annual bonus of 10% of your annual salary. In this position you will report to me. As an employee of MDE you are eligible for medical and dental benefits as well as group life insurance. The company also offers a 401k program that you are eligible for after one year of employment. Vacation and sick benefits are included in the employee benefits summary attached. Your first year vacation benefit is two weeks. John, we look forward to the opportunity of working with you and believe that you will make an excellent addition to our team. Please call me at 770-555-1111 if you have additional questions. Sincerely, Mike Brown Applications Development Manager MDE Software Solutions

MDE Soft ware Solutions 2900 Elm St reet

Atlanta, GA 30022 770-555-1111 770-555-2222 (fax)

[email protected] om

MDE Software Solutions

APPENDIX-I Sample Offer Letter


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APPENDIX-J New Employee Orientation

A. Quick tour and introductions B. The Company C. Company Mission D. The company’s business E. Organization F. Key departments relative to IT support G. Strategic plans H. Clients

- Their needs for IT services - Key clients - The best and the worst, , ,and why - Key needs - Plans

I. Company Departments - Key departments and their key people - Department needs - Plans

J. IT Organization - Mission - Organization chart and major focus areas - Job description and responsibilities of the new hire - Role within the IT organization - Key focus areas of the new position - Keys to success - Overview of other key IT staff and their responsibilities - Challenges - Opportunities

K. IT Vision and plan for the future L. Key projects and status M. IT Procedures/Processes that affect the new employee N. Performance planning and performance review guidelines O. Career planning approach and guidelines P. Training guidelines Q. Miscellaneous

- Phone list - After hours IT phone list - Expense reporting - Timesheets (if required) - Security codes, cards, etc. - User-ID & passwords to systems

R. Training plans for the new employee


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APPENDIX-K Sample Job Description Template

Information Technology Job Description

Title / Position: ____________________________________ Reports to: ____________________________________ Salary Range: ____________________

I. Technical Skills: 7. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______ 8. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______ 9. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______ 10. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______ 11. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______ 12. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______

II. Experience: 4. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______ 5. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______ 6. ______________________________________________________ Years: ______

III. Essential Functions: (Keys to Success) 1. ___________________________________________________________________

5. ___________________________________________________________________ 6. ___________________________________________________________________ 7. ___________________________________________________________________

IV. Qualifications: (Certifications, education, etc.) 4. ___________________________________________________________________ 5. ___________________________________________________________________ 6. ___________________________________________________________________

V. Problems / Challenges: 4. ___________________________________________________________________ 5. ___________________________________________________________________ 6. ___________________________________________________________________

VI. Other: __________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________


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APPENDIX-L Sample Performance Plan Template

Performance Plan

Name: ________________________ Position: ________________________ Date: _____________

I. Technical Knowledge & Productivity A. B. C.

II. Client Service A. B. C.

III. Teamwork/Leadership A. B. C.


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Sample Performance Plan Template (Page 2)

IV. Processes & Standards A. B. C.

V. Communication A. B. C.

VI. Education/Training

A. B. C.

VII. Miscellaneous

A. B. C.

Weighting factors are: 1 – low; 2 – medium; 3 - high Grading Scale: 1 – low; 2 – medium; 3 - high

Scheduled Review Date: ____________



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APPENDIX-M IT Support – Key Indicators Trend Report

ITEM Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec

A Revenues B IT Expense C IT % of Revenue

(B) / (A)

D Support Calls E Number of Help Desk

Resources

F Calls/Resource (D) / (E)

G # Clients H Calls/Client

(D) / (G)

I Programming Backlog Hours J # Programmers K Avg. Monthly Backlog Base

(I) / (J*100)

L Completed Project Hours M Programming Productivity

(L) / (J*100)

N Programming QA Errors O Avg. Errors/Programmer

(N) / (J)

P # Users supported by

Infrastructure Team

Q # Infrastructure Resources R Avg. Users/IT Resource

(P) / (Q)

S Billable Revenue Dollars T # Billable Resources U Avg. Billable Amt./Resource

(S) / (T)

V % Billable Time (Approx.) (S) / (T*120)

W Client Accounts Receivable

building successful organization

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