Selling IT to the CEO: Keep It Simple

By Matt Hamblen

September 18, 2006 12:00 PM ET

Recommended

(5)

Digg

Twitter

Share/Email

Computerworld - SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. -- How many bullet points in a PowerPoint presentation does it take to kill an audience?

That was a question one CIO asked of the IT leaders at Infrastructure Management World here, who have the somewhat delicate job of selling the CEO on increasing annual spending for IT infrastructure.

Riazi: Infrastructure is a tough sell for IT managers

Because of its technical nature, IT infrastructure -- which includes hardware such as servers for data centers and advanced core networks -- can be a tough sell for managers in IT, explained Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide CIO Atefeh Riazi.

Riazi got laughs for her talk lampooning the common practice of "killing" a top-level management audience with a PowerPoint slide presentation that goes on too long or falls short on compelling art, pictures or humor. But she was serious as she explained that IT managers will lose funding if they can't figure out how to effectively communicate the business value of infrastructure spending.

"Every time we talk to top executives, we talk about where is the growth, where is the profit, where is our competition going to be. ... But there is zero discussion of infrastructure," Riazi said. "We lose them if we start talking about MPLS networks."

Fred Modruson, CIO at Accenture Ltd., agreed about the need to avoid technical talk when meeting with business-side executives. "You have to show benefits and costs" behind new infrastructure, he told audience members.

"It's a matter of knowing your audience and of putting things in context," Modruson said in an interview. "If you want to provide MPLS, don't start right off talking about, say, hardware and refresh rates. Instead, start by talking about how telecom costs will go down with MPLS, perhaps. Position IT as a benefit."

Read more about management in Computerworld's Management Knowledge Center.

Recommend Digg Twitter ShareThis

Email Print Send Feedback Reprints

Jump to comments

business value of infrastructure spending

Additional Resources

WHITE PAPER

EFD vs. HDD - What You Need to Know

Enterprise flash drives provide a new Tier 0 storage layer capable of delivering high I/O performance at a very low latency. Proper use of EFDs in an Oracle environment can deliver increased performance compared to fibre channel drives. Read the recommendations for identification of the best DB components for EFDs.

WHITE PAPER

Gartner Research Report: Magic Quadrant for Application Delivery Controllers, 2009

The market for products to improve the delivery of application software over networks remains dynamic and innovative. Vendors focused on solving enterprises' most-pressing application problems have become the top players.

WHITE PAPER

Eight Criteria for Server Load Balancing

Server load balancers are a simple yet highly effective means to scale an application environment while ensuring its availability. Today's solutions should also address application performance and security. Read about the top eight criteria you should consider when choosing a server load balancer and how Citrix NetScaler meets those requirements.