Using the same information technology the same way as everyone else gives you no competitive advantage. You know your business best and as such are uniquely positioned to figure out how to make your information technology make you better at what you do, and hence create competitive advantage.
For many needs off-the-shelf solutions work great! Examples are bountiful; word processing, spreadsheets, e-mail list management, event sign-up and presentation software — all of these are mature and commoditized types of software where you will definitely choose to go with an off-the-shelf solution. However, for many critical enterprise management needs the picture is different. You need to customize it to make it fit your needs, culture and style. Here are my principles for how to succeed with what I call Lean Customization.
1. Be A Pioneer
Using the same information technology the same way as everyone else gives you no competitive advantage. You know your business best, which means you are uniquely positioned to know what you need. Dare to go where others haven’t gone.
2. Assemble a SEAL Team
Skin in the Game: Ensure everyone has their skin in the successful implementation. This will drives engagement, which in turns drives success.
Expert: Use teams of Multi-Discipline Talent fit for the purpose at hand. Your team should preferably have better functional understanding than the best in-house functional expert, as well as the technical competencies to make the information technology deliver your results.
Adaptable: Be able to change at a moment’s notice with no remorse.
Likable: Your team must have the enthusiasm, capabilities and willingness to accomplish what you set out to do.
3. Be Tangible
Focus on delivering working prototypes and real-life demos as opposed to dead documents and strangling Powerpoint presentations.
4. Never Stop
Change will happen — embrace it and find ways to deal with it no matter when the need arises. A Change Freeze is as useful as a Brain Freeze. Why? You need to review changes no matter how inconvenient the timing might be — if it makes sense to change, you need to allow change at any time. Avoid boxing yourself in, and build so that you are prepared for it when it comes. Ensure that your platform, application and team are flexible to meet changing needs. Also remember to keep expanding the frontier and always look for ways to improve further.
5. Deliver Continuously
Don’t try to tackle too much at one time. Ensure you can do the work in small iterations that can be completed. You’d rather have many phases or iterations of your project than large number of features being deployed at the same time. Two things to keep in mind: First, why should your target audience have to wait for a feature because you happened to lump it into a grand “Phase II of Project”? Second, there are limits for how much your target audience can assimilate at a time, so you are better off keeping the batches small.
6. Be Lean
Always look for ways to trim fat and cut bureaucracy. Use fit for purpose processes, not copy and paste master pieces that has 90% fluff and 10% content. Keep your work processes lean — for example use testing requirements that take into account the actual level of risk, as opposed to boiler plate processes. Reduce Powerpoint fluff, document only what matters (good documentation is not measured in pages) and remember to empower your team members and hold them responsible and accountable.
Vik Bulletin 