The Elusive Executive Sponsor

Computerworld - One of the biggest predictors of project and program success is having an effective executive sponsor. This is the senior executive who "owns" the program and is responsible for making sure it's successful. The executive sponsor is typically the one who proposed the program and whose business unit or organization will receive the majority of the program's benefits. To be effective, he must have enough clout to make any business process or organizational changes the program requires. If your program has a missing, weak or superficially involved executive sponsor, failure is almost inevitable.
If it's difficult to identify who the executive sponsor should be, something about the proposed program may need to change. For example, when a major program crosses several organizational boundaries, it may be advantageous to break it into individual programs, each with its own executive sponsor.
Alternatively, the problem may be a flawed organizational structure. One client of mine recognized that its worldwide distribution system was ineffective and overly expensive. Since each region controlled its own logistics, no one owned the entire process. The client had to pull logistics out of the business units and create a corporate worldwide logistics organization in order to revamp its distribution system successfully.
Even after an appropriate executive sponsor has been identified, he may still resist taking responsibility for the program. An executive may be reluctant to serve as sponsor for a number of reasons:
? He is skeptical about the business case. Make sure you both have done your homework and all the data is correct. Then work with the executive sponsor to revise the business case data until you both agree. If the executive sponsor can't be convinced of the program's viability, you'll get lukewarm support at best. Be prepared to walk away from the program.
• He doesn't feel sufficient pain. If the executive sponsor's business unit is meeting all of its targets, he may not believe that the new program will be worth the disruption it will cause. Determine whether the program will contribute to some personal win for the executive sponsor. If the personal win is large enough, the executive sponsor may be enticed to sign up.
• He believes it's an IT program. Even today, some executives believe that any program involving computers is the responsibility of IT. Try to educate your targeted sponsor so that he sees the effort as a business program that is IT-enabled. I have recently seen a number of IT organizations respond to this problem by attempting to sponsor major