* Organizations need someone creating and coordinating a technology strategy for the branch office
If you talk to 100 companies, you’ll hear 100 different organizational structures for their IT departments – some very similar and others quite different from one another.
In my recent assessment of branch office decision-making, one conclusion was shouting out: Organizations need someone creating and coordinating a technology strategy for the branch office.
So far, this hasn’t been standard practice at many companies. After all, the ‘branch office’ isn’t a broad technology area, such as network, applications, security, or infrastructure. And it’s certainly not a sub-technology area, such as VoIP, MPLS, operating systems, or CRM. In each of those cases, an individual or staff creates strategy and buys/maintains products.
But it’s becoming imperative for an individual or a staff to possess a high-level, strategic view of the branch office infrastructure to provide a consistent, predictable experience for employees in those locations.
For now, branch office decision-makers fall into one of the following categories:
* Central IT/networking/telecom staff. Staff member makes branch office decisions based on his/her technology responsibility.
* Distributed staff. Branch decisions are made based on individual’s location.
* Outsourced. Third party makes all product/service decisions for the branch.
* Single person/staff tasked with branch office responsibility. Individual or staff makes companywide decisions for all branch office products. This position is very rare.
In any of these scenarios, except a ‘single person/staff,’ developing a consistent architecture for all branch offices is difficult because no one has a holistic view of the branch office infrastructure, and no one is setting a comprehensive strategy.
For example, the applications team may decide to buy application acceleration products for some branch offices, while at the same time, the infrastructure team is evaluating similar functionality (for the same or different locations) wrapped in a services gateway or WAN optimization device. Meanwhile, a business-unit leader – say, the head of sales – may approve the addition of hosted VoIP for his or her work-at-home sales reps, while at the same time, the director of telecommunications is negotiating a deal with a different service provider.
We all know that even with the best efforts, communications between disciplines often falls apart. To ensure a consistent experience for all branch employees – and to avoid buying duplicate functionality in different products or services – organizations should assign branch office decision making to one person or one staff.
That individual or team would work with the experts in each technology area, but in the end, the branch office infrastructure would be more consistent and the experience more predictable for the large number of employees housed there.
Let me know what’s happening in your organization. Is there a need for a chief branch architect? Write to robin@nemertes.com.
