I contribute in making ICS a world-class IT organization that sets the standard for the industry.
How good does the Church I.T. department really need to be, anyway?
We have to be the best--the absolute best. The Lord and the Church deserve the best computer systems and solutions possible. And our group is focused on adapting our people, processes & systems to enable that to happen. My predecssor (Eric Denna) made a big deal out of stating that we wanted to be a "World Class I.T. Organization." So why state that? How obvious can a goal be?
It's suprising how many people both in our department and among our customers don't have that expectation of us. "You're improving," say many. "You don't need to be the best. You just need to be 'good enough,'" say others.
That didn't sit well with Eric, and it doesn't sit well with me. I visit other countries occasionally in the course of my job. I always try to meet local members of the Church. These are wonderful people. They're faithful, smart, spiritual people. And they pay tithing, just like people in the U.S. do. I consider it a sacred duty to spend that money carefully.
Which is why we have to be world class. We need to spend every I.T. dollar as efficiently and effectively possible. We need to be wise in using a thorough "business case" analysis for each solution we consider. We need to be efficient in creating, implementing, running and retiring systems. We need to pay enough to engage the kinds of people we need, but not so much as to be wasteful or to attract people who are just coming here for the money. We need to have rock-hard security and mature ITIL operational processes. We need to create solutions which solve real customer needs.
We can't get by with "good enough." "Good enough" is wasteful. "Good enough" isn't good enough.
We need to be and we CAN be World Class.
Amen Brother Dehlin. Efficiency and being best-of-breed are important in the industry but far more important to an organization trying to do the absolute most with its IT expenditures. Your thoughts on IT governance?
ReplyDeleteI've enjoyed the blog and look forward to your future posts.
ReplyDeleteMy reaction to this post is that I agree with your goal for more reasons than those you discuss. I am not privy to the direction you get in running your department, but it seems to me that your department will play an ever increasing role in the Church's efforts to accomplish our three missions. While the resources you bring to bear are provided by tithing contributions, and should be treated as sacred, the work you are doing is sacred as well. To the extent that you support the temples, family history, the missionary program, local units, and even the Church's public face on the web and in other places, your people affect the manner and the quality of the introduction many receive to the gospel and provide strength and nourishment to those already within the fold. I appreciate it that those I know who work on North Temple seem to understand this. (Well, most of them.)
Michael, thank you. We want to be partners with the business in creating solutions to move the work forward. This is as or more important than saving costs. But we can't create a "sucker's choice" here. We need to do both.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your feedback.
P.S. ("most of them?" hmmm.)
Good post. I was pointed to your site by NorthTemple. And enjoy this new community of LDS digital professionals.
ReplyDeleteThe "best" I think will be hard to define and measure for you and your team. Especially because it is measured in saving souls, not dollars.
I enjoyed reading (and heartily agree with) your perspective on the importance of the Church IT department.
ReplyDeleteRelatedly, to what extent should the Church IT department be innovative, and what forms should the innovation take? Should Church IT be involved in research for or development of new technologies, or only implementation of existing technologies? Should Church IT direct any effort toward consideration of questions such as "What kind of technology will we need to enable the Millennial work?", or uniquely focus on present needs? I am interested in reading your thoughts on the kind and magnitude of future you would try to create for the Church IT department.
. . . just noticed Michael's comments and would like to express agreement.
ReplyDeleteVery well written. I share your perspectives on the Church's IT caliber.
ReplyDeleteI would full-heartedly support the use of my tithing funds to make a wholesale switch to Macs for all departments within the Church. :)
I'm not naming names. (:>) Nobody from your organization, though.
ReplyDeleteWhen you think about it, lines of digital information flow through every building and, therefore, almost all aspects of the church: clerks' offices, temples, mission offices, not to mention the desks of the countless offices in the various headquarters. It's a little like the circulatory system, but instead of carrying oxygen, it carries information.
ReplyDeleteTo keep the chruch healthy as an organization-ism and able to function such that it can meet its threefold mission in a world of ever increasing realtime information needs, that infrastructure must be maintained at a 'world-class' level, and I'm glad to know that you see that.
Naiah: "organization-ism"
ReplyDeletei love it!
So I have to say that I agree whole-heartedly with your efforts to create a world class IT organization and I also like all the "fluffy" comments that are posted here. I was wondering how you were going to handle the issue of accountability?
ReplyDeleteIT has historically been viewed as a result of a need and not a planned strategic goal. How are you addressing this with the church and the use of sacred funds?
I love to hear about this vision, and I agree with it wholeheartedly. I do think it will be difficult to measure, though, especially given what someone said above with the unique mission of the Church. I'd also think it might be hard to get everyone to catch the vision, since there are varying levels of excitement about the use of technology within the Church at large, and, I would imagine, within the organization(-ism). I'm one of our ward website administrators and I wish somehow we could get more people to catch the vision of how technology can help us in our callings and in the work in general if we just learn to use it effectively (or use it at all!) :) If you ever have some questions for those of us in the trenches, I'm a willing brainstormer!
ReplyDeleteAs a side-note, is it out of line to ask what your predecessor is up to now? (If it is, just ignore me.... I had the opportunity to learn from and work with him while in grad school and I have been interested to know what he is up to.)
Michelle, Eric still works at the Church (not in the I.T. department). He also does some consulting. I sent your comments to him. If we're lucky he'll show up and give some more details. Regarding the vision, it's extraordinarily difficult to measure business value in a Church context. What is the demoninator. A soul? How much is a soul worth? It's a difficult equation we have to just struggle through. Another difficulty is creating technology for a global Church. I know of a ward in California where the Bishopric meets every week with their wireless computers and manage the entire ward. There are many wards where the bishopric don't even own computers. How do we create solutions applicable to both types of individuals?
ReplyDeleteHow do we create solutions applicable to both types of individuals?
ReplyDeleteHow, indeed! What a fun challenge you have with this work!
I also wanted to repeat a question someone asked above, "to what extent should the Church IT department be innovative, and what forms should the innovation take? Should Church IT be involved in research for or development of new technologies, or only implementation of existing technologies?" I think this is a really interesting question...one you may not be able to answer here, but one that is fun to wonder about nonetheless.
Thanks for letting me know about Eric. Tell him hello from a former student (one who helped with a process paper he and Lee did). The class I took from Eric actually played an important role in the shaping of my future, as I ended up working as a business process consultant and have kept my toe in that puddle even as a SAHM. :)
The Church needs technology innovation. The process of getting a missionary through the missinoary application on through interviews and medical stuff and then into the MTC is a giant workflow application. There are hundreds of other examples where innovative business processes and innovative technology solutions mesh to form solutions which help propel the work forward.
ReplyDeleteAnother difficulty is creating technology for a global Church. I know of a ward in California where the Bishopric meets every week with their wireless computers and manage the entire ward. There are many wards where the bishopric don’t even own computers. How do we create solutions applicable to both types of individuals?
ReplyDeleteThis is an interesting question. I served as Executive Secretary to the previous Bishop of our ward and he didn't do email. Our current Bishop has been working with computers for many years and does email quite a bit. Both men are/were great Bishops, so this question has made me stop and think more about the challenges that the church IT is facing. Traditionally IT can more or less assume that their audience is technical (to varying degrees).
Just last Sunday I had a brief conversation about how the stake could use a technology secretary. In that case it was about keeping the expanding family history computers and network going, but I could see how it would also be helpful to stake and ward leaders who aren't familiar with the web and the church resources online.
Measuring "the best" in IT, like many other fields, is pretty challenging. That doesn't mean it isn't important to strive for, but still hard to pin down. Expectations is an important part of that though.
I'm curious though, do the IT groups start meetings with prayer? Being able to ask for revelation as a group would be a powerful way to find solutions to IT problems.
I've really been enjoying the church IT tech blogs, ldswebguy.com (the post Why Use The Internet was particularly good), northtemple and now here. Keep it up.
Joel, you asked how we create solutions for both individuals with and without computers. The answer is that the latter need computers. What can the Church do to provide more computers, particularly to leaders? There are several initiatives from various players in the IT industry to provide low-cost portable computers. Can the Church participate in such initiatives?
ReplyDelete. . . you know, so that we may each one day receive a white computer, secured by a new name that is the key word. ;-)
Joseph. Yes, many start with prayer. See the post on Receiving Revelation.
ReplyDeleteYour are certainly right that the church needs to improve it's IT and it will be ever more important BUT I tend to grimace when someone users those fluff and nearly meaningless words like "World Class" since there is no standard nor single definition as to what means and there is no such certification. So any one can declare they are World Class no matter what shape their IT is in. So "World Class" is meaningless to all that have business experience.
ReplyDeleteSpending IT dollars is a tricky business. In my business, we spend money on a few individuals who really know what they are doing, AND who can mentor the next generation of decision makers, innovators, producers, and oeprators. We set high standards, then do all we can to meet them. That doesn't always require money.
ReplyDeleteAdmintedly, we have small, intimate team and nowhere near the magnitude of systems and services. However, our company culture is that high quality leads to success, even at the expense of speed, or revenue in our case.
We constantly ask ourselves if our designs and purchases contribute to our company goals and values, to our architectural principles, and to our ethical standards for "the best".
Often we make decisions on limited information, but that is why we prepare for so long beforehand--to ensure our decisions are likely good ones. The metaphor of faith may not apply so well in a strictly business environment with a decidedly worldly purpose, but I think it still holds.
Joel,
ReplyDeleteIf you ever need a process consultant, I know a couple. :)
Alan,
I wouldn't say it's a completely meaningless term, although I know what you mean. It seems to me, though, that Joel is sharing some of the elements of what they think "world class" means.
Perhaps aiming for "world-class" is more of use internally for motivational purposes, rather than for external (comparative, relative) purposes. Is it meaningless if it gets people to think beyond where they are now? Fluff can have a place, IMO, if it can get people fired up to make things happen in non-fluffy ways. :)
I think striving for "world class" also communicates to those of us who are reading the commitment to something beyond the status quo. Even though I don't have a specific standard in mind when I hear that this is what the Church is aiming for, it's gratifying to me to hear that they have a desire to not sit on their laurels.
Sanford - IT Governance is a whole post and then some. We've made great strides there and at some point I'll share more.
ReplyDeleteMichael - if they post at northtemple then they're in our organization. :)
Rolf - accountability? Accountability in I.T. is a hard thing for any organization. It's particularly difficult with a organization where the demonitator isn't necessarily $$. We're taking baby steps and holding ourselves accountable for budget, schedule and scope committments. Next we're trying to do better at holding ourselves accountable for having the business/technical solution actually deliver on the original business proposition. It's very tough, but we're trying to find better ways.
Lincoln - Not all people even want computers. Some find them a hindrance. You see the difficulty in the I.T. challenge.
Michelle - As a matter fact, we do hire process consultants! :) Send your information through our jobs web site... In particular we're looking for someone to manage our team of process designers.
How do we create solutions applicable to both types of individuals?
ReplyDeleteI must admit I smiled at this question because it just shows the magnitude of the church and the challenge Br. Dehlin has when having to decide on what to do next.
We are many IT pro's who can see the huge benefits of using IT but it is no good to go all the way with it when so many people in the world still dont see the benefit of them.
I like the example of the Californian Bishopric because I too created and used a system where my counsellors and I could run the branch on our computers but a few years later I received new counsellors and the comment "I didnt get those email updates" became too frequent and so it was back to drawing board to find another way that would fit my new counsellors better. They served so well and got much done. They just weren't uptodate with computers even though they tried hard.
In work life you will have to demonstrate IT skills if the job requires it or you wont keep the job but in the church the requirements for membership and serving in callings are (thankfully) different and for that reason I can imagine Br. Dehlin's task to be so much more complicated.
I do enjoy reading the blog and also the many comments as we can all learn so much more no matter how much we already know.
Excellent blog. I look forward to reading all about your adventures as CIO of the church.
ReplyDeleteMy only comment on this post is that some things don't require world class dollars. I wish you the best of luck in managing accountability for IT spending.
Michael, regarding your request for video clips of more than just conference:
ReplyDeleteThe Church is digitizing more video and establishing standards and getting intellectual property clearances so we can post more on Church sites. You'll see a lot more video over the next few months.
Later this year, we hope to have authentication in place so we can provide more video to specific audiences, like leadership training broadcasts.