Tips for leading IT amid corporate change

The best of today's new-generation IT executives have learned to devote as many resources to communications as they do to servers, software and the network.

Erv Blythe is a perfect example. In leading a mainframe-migration project, the vice president for IT at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Va., threw out his old way of thinking and ushered in a leadership strategy that revolved around communicating with business constituents.

"That project had two starts; the first I didn't think was very good," he recalls. "It was managed like any project in the old mainframe perspective - you know: 'We're from IT, and we're here to help you.' I had to stop that way of thinking."

Realizing the project was too big to succeed on the basis of IT service agreements alone, he requested the participation of specific top-level businesspeople on the project team. When the university provost balked at giving up senior personnel to work on the project, Blythe responded, "If it doesn't hurt, then I named the wrong person."

Eventually, the human-resources and finance personnel he requested for the migration project took leaves of absence to work full time on the transition. Having business-unit leaders on the project team helped keep expectations in line with the realities of what the new technology infrastructure could provide, Blythe says.

Savvy IT leaders such as Blythe also understand it's important to attend to politics and perceptions, too. A project is really 80% driven by politics, 15% by the budget and only 5% by the technology, Blythe says, admitting to his previous belief that technology accounted for 90% of project decisions.