Page 122 - Performance Leadership

Chapter 7 Business Interfaces Drive Collaboration • 111

be managed by continuously mapping the detailed project plan to the
completed implementation activities.
The IT operations department typically works differently. The daily
activities are less structured than projects, and they are managed
through the hierarchy of the IT operations department. A certain
amount of rigidity is needed, as the transactions of an organization often
have contractual value and need to be protected. One of the main con-
trol mechanisms for the IT operations department is the service level
agreement, which specifies the needed performance and capacity
(speed and number of transactions) of systems, stability of systems
(planning and unplanned downtime), or the quality of support. In order
to make sure the service levels are reached, there are many internal
performance indicators, such as tracking surplus capacity in terms of
computer memory; processor cycles, and network bandwidth; and, with
certain regularity, exercises in disaster recovery are conducted and
monitored. From a financial point of view, the majority of system costs
are usually incurred during the operational phase, not the implemen-
tation phase. Managing the total cost of ownership (TCO) is an impor-
tant overall objective for IT operations.
The business interface between IT development and operations
mostly consists of taking new developments into production. Those can
be new systems or modifications to existing systems. There is typically
a strict process that needs to be followed for development, testing,
acceptance, and production (DTAP). In a classic situation this is a
process where the IT operations department has rules about accept-
ance, informs IT development about those rules, and tests compliance
of those rules ex post. The process often leads to frustrating, long, and
difficult implementation processes. A more collaborative approach is
needed. See Figure 7.6.
Business interface metrics for this process could include the moni-
toring of handover time per function points and the number of full-time
employees (FTEs) involved in the handover process and establishing a
risk factor for acceptance. The larger and more complex a system is, the
more function points it will have and the longer handover will take. It
might be a good idea to also introduce a risk factor for acceptance.
Acceptance here means the success of taking new developments into
production. At the beginning of the implementation project and at all