In the first Advisor in this series, we examined three governmental IT systems from the US states of Michigan, Washington, and Rhode Island. Each experienced operational failures that caused needless harm to their respective state’s citizens. In this Advisor, we argue that a strong case can be made that these failures can rise to a level of administrative evil.

If you start changing an organization toward an Agile mindset, there’s no real end. Agile is about creating an organization of continuous learning and the transformation is done when there is nothing new to learn, which will probably be never. This puts an enormous challenge on middle management.

A corporation has various business goals, many of which involve profit expectations and ROI. Lapses in the development of a corporate architecture and security risks to data storage and processing can stifle business profit goals. Although there are a few industry and government regulations intended to strengthen a corporation’s information security posture, no regulation should be considered a one-size-fits-all solution.

The articles in this issue present perspectives and ideas on business transformation in the digital age. We hope they will inspire and encourage you to visualize the likely future of business in your domain and to explore the opportunities it presents. Finally, we hope their insights will help you identify suitable transformation strategies and plans and, if needed, choose viable collaboration models for partnering with startups and other firms in your digital business efforts.

We are constantly reminded via media coverage of data breaches and other hacking incidents just how important it is for organizations to protect their sensitive data. Naturally, this brings up the key question: where do organizations see the biggest threats to their sensitive data emanating from? A Cutter Consortium survey that asked 50 organizations about their data-centric security and protection practices helps shed some light on this question.

As an executive coach, I continuously hear new clients say, "All I want are results. Is it too much to expect people to deliver on their commitments?" After a few minutes of additional dialogue, we typically discover several organizational, technical, and managerial challenges that have culminated in some noticeable and negative result. In other words, I'm being asked to fix a problem that has escalated to a level that is no longer tolerable to those in leadership.

This is the first in a series of three Advisors on poorly managed and executed government IT systems and their effects on citizens.

Implementation of Agile methodologies within the enterprise can be difficult and poses significant challenges. While there is widespread agreement that the benefits are necessary, implementing Agile requires organizational change. The change is of a type that will appear risky to senior management, particularly on the apparent loss of control and by introducing a system of metrics based on satisfactory delivered code rather than on reaching established project objectives.

Business people judge services by making sense of what they experience relative to their needs. Most business decisions about IT are, and will continue to be, made in this way. This is in contrast to the current IT delivery model and the product-centric process of “define, build, and operate,” which will become less relevant as future technology and increased complexity make defining and testing product requirements difficult, if not impossible, except at runtime.

The information dysfunction endemic to politics does not stop or start with politics. It is deeply rooted in our human behavior. It is present in every aspect of our lives, starting with our own inner monologues that make up our consciousness, and extends to our families, our friends, our social networks, our organizations, our countries, and yes, to our global village.

The search for the ideal instantaneous speed to transmit information is well underway; it is already influencing the way we build computers and promises to revolutionize computing speed in both processing and information transmittal. This achievement has been in the making since the beginning of the 21st century: it is called quantum ­computing and is based on the principles of the most impacting and yet least understood branch of science, quantum mechanics, more broadly referred to as quantum physics.

The guiding Lean principle is a focus on consumer value. This compels everyone to clearly understand how (or if!) their efforts contribute to consumer value. This can be a challenge, since many functions interact only with internal customers or intermediaries, having little or no line of sight to the consumer.

With today’s enormous amount of data sharing being a relatively new battleground for smart device manufacturers, the industry appears to be more about lowering costs and introducing highly marketable features. Consequently, introducing strong security is very rarely a priority — and is also a technological challenge due to relatively limited processing, energy, and network resources for wearables.

IT is often highly complex and difficult for nonspecialists to understand, yet it is crucial for business executives to understand enough about IT to make far-reaching strategic decisions. IT portfolio management (ITPM) forges a critical link between the strategic planning process and the PM process, enabling management to reach consensus on the best use of resources by focusing on projects strategically aligned with the goals of the business.

Today, big data platform providers and third-party security vendors offer enterprise-grade security solutions designed specifically for protecting and securing data maintained in Hadoop and other big data environments.

The impact that providing a capability catalog and roadmap for the portfolio would have on Agile leaders is significant. Linking this portfolio catalog and roadmap to other efforts and capabilities across the enterprise ensures that there is continued alignment to the enterprise’s strategic direction and that teams are not recreating redundant capabilities but rather leveraging and reusing current capabilities in new, innovative ways.

Beyond buzzwords, what we are seeing is a seismic shift in the role of technology in organizations. Technology is more and more embedded in everything we do as we move into an increasingly hyper-connected digital world, a world in which technology is driving significant social, organizational, and industry change.

The discipline of business architecture, which sits between strategy and execution, interprets the strategy to identify tangible changes to the business and guide design that will realize the desired future.

Because of its capabilities in security, privacy, and data management, blockchain has captured the interest and resources of the financial industry as well as numerous other major sectors — from music to healthcare and even governments — around the globe.

It is evident that traditional process- and workflow-oriented leadership styles are not enough to make organizations successful in their digital transformation journey. Digital leaders should have an entrepreneurial mindset, believe in collaboration, and exhibit the qualities of an adventurer. Below are the key differentiating qualities that digital leadership should have to carry out digital transformation and operations successfully.

Organizational change management is about changing the way that people think and behave — in that order. Unfortunately, change management programs that are begun after the digital transformation has been designed focus primarily on behavioral change. They neglect to engage people in changing their mindset and way of thinking. Any behavioral change that is not preceded by a change in thinking will not last. As soon as the pressure is off, as soon as managers turn their backs, people will revert to the way they’ve always done things. And the way they’ve always done things is ­continually reinforced by the organizational culture.

In this issue of Cutter Business Technology Journal, we have asked our authors to share their thoughts related to two concepts: information superiority and digital capital. Our assumption was that these concepts are particularly relevant to business leaders, who are right to believe that “digital” and “hypercompetition” are the “new normal” in business. 

Digital transformation is a journey of creating and combining specific business capabilities so that they give organizations a competitive advantage in the digital excellence domains in a way that reflects their chosen mix of strategic options. This journey is shaped also by the availability of critical resources — data, analytical skills, technology proficiency. It is very often seriously affected by the state of business and IT architecture, the style of integration, and data quality. It seems wise to focus on domains of excellence where the resources are available or can be relatively easily developed or acquired.

Data-centric protection and security focuses on the organization's sensitive data as opposed to its overall computer networks and applications, as is the case with the more traditional IT security models that typically operate by implementing a well-defended security perimeter designed to keep bad actors out. This is accomplished by locating, identifying, and cataloging sensitive data as well as by applying encryption, data masking, and policy-based data access controls (and end-user monitoring) to protect data residing across multiple enterprise environments. But to what extent are organizations adopting, or planning to adopt, data-centric protection and security practices?

Traditional banks, big tech firms, and new fintech startup ventures are the three major players that together will help shape the new financial services landscape. Are they all going to compete? Not necessarily! We are already seeing the first forms of collaboration between these different players materialize.