A time for transformation – Chuck Hollis – EMC Global Marketing CTO.
New technologies and technological principles like cloud computing, virtualization, and IT as a Service are reshaping the way enterprises think of information technology. Business and IT are seeking a new balance to make their collaboration work better for the good of the company. EMC.com/CIO caught up with EMC’s Global Marketing CTO, Chuck Hollis, for a chat about what these exciting times have in store for the IT industry.
Everyone is talking about IT transformation and IT as a service. Why is this happening now?
Great question. Let’s see if I can make this simple.
I think the best starting point is to look at the IT function as standing between “supply” (various technologies and services available to the organization) and “demand” (what the business needs from IT).
If we look at the supply-side of IT, the landscape is very different than just a few years ago. The Infrastructure is very different, management is very different, and applications are very different. In addition, there are dizzying new sets of external consumption options that did not exist a few years ago.
The more important shift is on the demand-side of the business. Virtually every new initiative these days has a strong IT component to it. Internal IT either has to have the ability to respond quickly or smart business people will immediately consider those attractive external consumption options I mentioned before. If internal IT teams are bypassed frequently, they lose control and relevance. That’s not good.
The more the business people depend on IT to achieve goals, the more they need their IT functions to act as a competitive internal service provider, and less as a traditional IT function.
The real challenge falls to IT leadership. They are now under enormous pressure to transform their organizations along these lines as quickly as possible. That’s a sharp departure from previous years.
