August 22, 2005 (Computerworld) --
The IT project was a success. It was on time and on budget, and it did what it was supposed to. The only problem: The customer wasn't happy. The project manager had provided written weekly status reports, just as the customer had requested, but he had missed the crucial second step: asking for feedback. The project manager learned too late that you can never assume you know what a customer is thinking -- you have to ask. Because he failed to do that, the customer was resentful, says Naomi Karten, a principal at Randolph, Mass.-based training and consulting firm Karten Associates. "The information [the customer] was given didn't mesh with what he was looking for, [but] he didn't take any steps to ask for what he really wanted," she observes. Welcome to a world where even successful IT projects can be deemed failures if the customer expected something other than what IT delivered. To survive and prosper, you have to learn how to manage what customers expect. First, it's important to understand how skewed expectations arise. "Unreasonable expectations almost always come from a misunderstanding," says Dan Bent, director of claims technology at The Nyhart Co., a financial services firm in Indianapolis. The sources of these misunderstandings are varied. Some are based on incorrect assumptions. "The expectation is that IT is like the power company," says Garrett Granger, CIO of office supply manufacturer Dixon Ticonderoga Co. in Heathrow, Fla. "[Users] expect the lights to go on," he says, "and the only time you hear from them is when the lights don't go on." History often raises false expectations, says Rick Giese, e-commerce development manager at Great Lakes Educational Loan Services Inc. in Madison, Wis. If a previous project didn't go well, the customer's expectations may be negative, he says, and no matter how well IT performs, it may not be able to overcome them. A directive from the top can create expectations that IT will have trouble meeting, says Nate Root, an analyst at Forrester Research Inc. Consider the sales executive who decrees that his department needs a new system to track customers. Because the executive thinks he knows what's needed, he does no research, nor does he want IT to spend the time and money to develop good user requirements. IT is left having to fulfill expectations that have never really been vetted. Sometimes customers aren't sure what they expect. Especially with a large project that takes time to complete, expectations may evolve. "The technology doesn't change as quickly as people's minds change," says Karten. Unattainable expectations may arise from outside the company, says Anita Leto, director of IT transformation at
"This pilot fish works at a telco that provides DSL hardware access to ISPs. Total number of users: in the..."
Read more...
"User stops at the desk of this pilot fish and informs him that the mouse and keyboard on the user's..."
Read more... Read more Management posts or See all Blogs
If you're like our 7,000 survey respondents, your paycheck this year has been flattened and your bonus obliterated. We offer 12 ways to plump up your paycheck.
By helping Intel with loosened 'Vista Capable' requirements, Microsoft 'severely damaged' its credibility, said an HP exec in a newly unsealed Feb. 2006 e-mail.
Quick Sizing Guide for SAS Grid Running on HP BladeSystems and EVA Storage
Download this white paper today! (Source: HP) Designed for CIOs, IT managers, data center managers and grid computing architects seeking to improve performance, SAS Grid Computing on the HP BladeSystem c-Class helps accelerate growth and mitigate risks with a simplified, consolidated infrastructure that's agile enough to efficiently handle change. SAS Grid Manager on HP BladeSystem can lower costs through automation, virtualization and improved IT efficiency. Download this white paper
Google's Universal Search for Business
Google's Universal Search for Business View this exclusive webcast, free, compliments of Google! Go to the webcast
Computerworld Technology Briefing: Meetings @ the Speed of Business
Download this Technology Briefing now, compliments of Microsoft! (Source: Microsoft) For large organizations, Web conferencing gives a major boost to collaboration among far-flung offices. For smaller companies, experts say Web conferencing is no longer a luxury but a necessity for everything from webinars to customer presentations. But the real value lies in saving soft costs and in increases in productivity. Download this executive briefing
White Papers
Read up on the latest ideas and technologies from companies that sell hardware, software and services.
With an estimated 40% of the world's information now residing behind a firewall, employee productivity is driven by the ability to quickly find key information no matter where it's stored across your organization. At Google, we believe in a simple premise: all of the information you need to be productive at work should be available through one search box, giving users real-time access to content across the enterprise and delivering a single, integrated, secure set of search results.
Putting the Right Model in Place to Better Balance IT Supply and Business Demand
IT leaders manage business demands and IT resources in many ways, but which methods are most effective? Tom Welsh, senior consultant of Cutter Consortium, compares two approaches and outlines their pros and cons in this Compuware-commissioned white paper. Get objective appraisals and real-world examples for both.
CIO best practices: Optimizing your Project Portfolio Management solution for greater business value
A Project Portfolio Management discipline goes beyond ordinary project management to link IT with the business and help IT leaders better understand the benefits, cost, risks and value of all projects. Download this Compuware white paper and learn how to boost the business value of your IT organization.
Exclusive eBook: Six Project Metrics Every CIO Should Know for Application Delivery Success
Most IT organizations spend their time measuring whether projects are on time or on budget. Read this IT executive guide to learn what key data tells you the degree of quality, client satisfaction and how well requirements were met. Make these metrics part of your overall application delivery management process - and your software can't fail.
IT Planning and Control: Unveiling the Interrelationships between ALM and PPM
Listen in as Gartner Analyst Matt Light discusses two hot topics-- Project Portfolio Management and Application Life-cycle Management--and how you can bring these disciplines together to improve application quality and delivery. Get recommendations on merging the two methods and learn what type of results you can expect.