The role of Business Relationship Management in Business – IT Alignment

Business - IT Alignment Series

Over the years, the Information Technology (IT) department has acted or been constituted as a regular business department within many corporations. IT department budgets have always been perceived as a cost center or ‘sunk cost’ in economics and business parlance, liabilities rather than assets, always recording losses Year-on-Year. IT has sought relevance and struggled to show value or position itself as a viable contributor or supporter of corporate strategic goals.

Traditionally, IT was viewed as a separate, isolated support function. As such, IT strategy creation often happens in isolation and without a good understanding of the business. That’s no longer an option.

When business partners begin to say that IT does not create and deliver valuable services/solutions that resolve their business pain points, IT does not come to them with innovative solutions to their business problems, challenges or issues, IT blocks their efforts to drive the business forward using innovative technology solutions or that IT does not advocate for their needs with the decision makers in the organization, it is an indication of misalignment between the business and IT.

Similarly, when IT begins to say that they don’t know what their business partners need, hence can’t add as much value as they’d like, that their business clients don’t give them opportunities to provide new ideas to solve their business problems, that business partners listen to third parties before they listen to IT or they are too busy and don’t have the capacity to help their partners, it is indicative of a gap between business and IT.

The longer you are misaligned from IT, the farther to the left you are going - regarding your strategic technology investment and decisions, inefficient technology assets - software and hardware, duplication of resources, wastages, business partners frustrations, lack of value and adequate support to business clients, and so much more.

Enter Business Relationship Management.

Business Relationship Management (BRM) is both a role and a discipline. BRM stimulates, surfaces, and shaped business demand for a provider’s products and services and ensures that the potential business value from those products and services is captured, optimized and recognized.

As business and technology converge, the role of the BRM is critical to fostering alignment between Business and IT departments. We will discuss areas BRMs help to foster alignment between IT and the Business departments.

Deep understanding of the Client’s Business

IT Business Relationship Managers are basically the face of IT to the Business departments or clients under their portfolio. When BRMs embed themselves in the business strategy and operations of their assigned departments or portfolios, they begin to understand not only what the client’s business is about, but how and why they operate. Clear business value is easily noticed through a genuine interest and quest to learn about and develop a deep understanding of the client’s mandates, priorities, processes, operations, sections and their functions, and how they collaborate, interrelate and interact, commitments to their customers, risks, Government Acts or regulations binding their operations, and so on. BRMs understand the main business activities for each department including the IT services that are required to complete each business activity, the business processes and associated business activities for each user group within a department. As the bridge between IT and his client, he/ she can explain the rationale of business requests and interpret them in the ‘appropriate language’ based on the audience.

Tailored Technology Strategy as an offshoot of the Business Strategy

Every business develops a business strategy that guides its key activities and direction for a defined period. This contains the strategic initiatives a business pursues to create value for the organization and its stakeholders to gain a competitive advantage in the market. This strategy is crucial to an organization’s success and is needed before any goods or services are produced or delivered. After understanding the client’s business strategy, IT BRMs develop a technology strategy for the business that aligns with the Client’s strategy. The sole purpose of this technology strategy is to help the business achieve its defined goals and objectives. This technology strategy document will articulate the technology initiatives, technology investments, technology policies, technology resourcing, IT resource(s) commitments, etc. that the IT department must plan for to support the business in achieving its business goals.

Alignment and Focus on the Right Work

You must have heard “IT has done great work, but is it the right work?” IT BRMs help IT and Business departments to focus on the right work. That is, work that the business considers as the right work. The modern IT department is a service organization, and its customer is the business. Gone are the days when IT departments force perceived applications, software or services down the throats of Business departments. No longer do IT departments say “This is the solution we developed, take it!”, or “This is the work we want to do now, and we need to focus on this, even if it's not a priority for the business.” Nowadays, IT BRMs, through effective collaboration, regular engagements, and a deep understanding of the client’s business, facilitate meetings between business and IT stakeholders to discuss, clarify, set and manage expectations, and align on priorities and technology-related topics that impact the business department. With IT BRM, there are no surprises.

Knowledge of the Market

IT support folks often get engrossed in daily tasks and operations and are too busy to monitor industry trends. BRMs understand their client’s industry trends, competition, and future direction. They leverage what others are doing to bring innovative ideas to the organization and finally understand what end customers expect with regards to IT services and bring this intelligence to business leaders and decision-makers.

Value Creation

Furthermore, BRMs understand how services currently offered by IT can be put to best use and create value for the business. They work collaboratively with clients to define and prioritize technology initiatives (new or enhanced services) that will bring the most business benefit. They lead initiatives that help the business achieve or exceed business goals and objectives and because of their knowledge of the client’s business, they lead initiatives that create business value (increased revenue, lower costs, increased efficiency) for the organization.

Innovation

With technology innovation churning out new products daily, BRMs lead initiatives that result in new and better ways of doing business for their clients. They help to identify opportunities for using IT in new and innovative ways to bring value to the business and drive the business forward. They leverage knowledge of the business, knowledge of the industry, and knowledge of leading-edge technological solutions to transform the way the business operates and provides services to its customers.

Get Started

Business - IT alignment is a moving target. While technology strategies and assessments are great as a starting point, business objectives and direction change. Delivering continuous value to the business through business - IT alignment requires ongoing partnership between the business and IT; either as a role, capability or practice.

Virtro provides the framework, practices and tools to ensure IT aligns with the business on an ongoing basis, delivering prioritized services to the business. Contact us to discuss or schedule a free consultation.

As business and technology converges, the role of the BRM is critical to fostering alignment between Business and IT departments. If you are wondering about how well your business and IT are aligned, consider taking Virtro's free, high-level Business - IT Alignment Assessment.

Please share your thoughts and comments below.