Besides the small introduction, subscribers and consulting clients within this management domain have access to:
Our dynamic, flexible, and embedded approach to governance will help drive organizational success. The three-phase methodology will help you identify your governance needs, select and refine your governance model, and embed and automate governance decisions.
Use these templates and workbook to identify the criteria and design factors for your organization and the design triggers to maintain fit. Upon completion this will be your new governance framework model.
Upon completion you will have a finalized implementation plan and a visual roadmap.
Customize these templates to create the committee charters or terms of reference for the committees developed in your governance model.
The checklist is a starting point for confirming which activities and decisions should be considered for automation or embedding. Use the worksheet to develop decision logic by defining the steps and information inputs involved in making decisions.
Workshops offer an easy way to accelerate your project. If you are unable to do the project yourself, and a Guided Implementation isn't enough, we offer low-cost delivery of our project workshops. We take you through every phase of your project and ensure that you have a roadmap in place to complete your project successfully.
Establish the context for your governance model.
Core understanding of the context that will enable us to build an optimal model
1.1 Confirm mission, vision, and goals.
1.2 Define scope and principles.
1.3 Adjust for culture and finalize context.
Governance principles
Governance context and goals
To select and adapt a governance model based on your context.
A selected and optimized governance model
2.1 Select and refine governance model.
2.2 Confirm and adjust the structure.
2.3 Review and adapt governance responsibilities and activities.
2.4 Validate governance mandates and membership.
IT governance model and adjustment triggers
IT governance structure, responsibilities, membership, and cadence
Governance committee charters
Refine your governance practices and associate policies properly.
A completed governance model that can be implemented with clear update triggers and review timing
Policy alignment with the right levels of authority
3.1 Update your governance process.
3.2 Align policies to mandate.
3.3 Adjust and confirm your model.
3.4 Identify and document update triggers and embed into review cycle.
IT governance process and information flow
IT governance policies
Finalized governance model
Identify options to automate and embed governance activities and decisions.
Simply more consistent governance activities and automate them to enhance speed and support governance delegation and empowerment
4.1 Identify decisions and standards that can be automated. Develop decision logic.
4.2 Plan verification and validation approach.
4.3 Build implementation plan.
4.4 Develop communication strategy and messaging.
Selected automation options, decision logic, and business rules
Implementation and communication plan
54 Phase 2: Select and Refine Your Governance Model 76 Phase 3: Embed and Automate 97 Contributors 98 Bibliography |
Far too often, the purpose of information and technology (I&T) governance is misunderstood. Instead of being seen as a way to align the organization’s vision to its investment in information and technology, it has become so synonymous with compliance and control that even mentioning the word “governance” elicits a negative reaction.
Success in modern digital organizations depends on their ability to adjust for velocity and uncertainty, requiring a dynamic and responsive approach to governance – one that is embedded and automated in your organization to enable new ways of working, innovation, and change.
Evolutionary theory describes adaptability as the way an organism adjusts to fit a new environment, or changes to its existing environment, to survive. Applied to organizations, adaptable governance is critical to the ability to survive and succeed.
If your governance doesn’t adjust to enable your changing business environment and customer needs, it will quickly become misaligned with your goals and drive you to failure.
It is critical that people build an approach to governance that is effective and relevant today while building in adaptability to keep it relevant tomorrow.
Valence Howden
Principal Research Director, Info-Tech Research Group
IT governance must be embedded and automated, where possible, to effectively meet the needs and velocity of digital organizations and modern practices and to drive success and value.
IT governance is a critical and embedded practice that ensures that information and technology investments, risks, and resources are aligned in the best interests of the organization and produce business value.
Effective governance ensures that the right technology investments are made at the right time to support and enable your organization’s mission, vision, and goals.
5 KEY OUTCOMES OF GOOD GOVERNANCE |
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STRATEGIC ALIGNMENT
Technology investments and portfolios are aligned with the organization's strategic objectives. |
RISK OPTIMIZATION
Organizational risks are understood and addressed to minimize impact and optimize opportunities. |
VALUE DELIVERY
IT investments and initiatives deliver their expected benefits. |
RESOURCE OPTIMIZATION
Resources (people, finances, time) are appropriately allocated across the organization to optimal organizational benefit. |
PERFORMANCE MEASUREMENT
The performance of technology investments is monitored and used to determine future courses of action and to confirm achievement of success. |
‹–EVALUATE–DIRECT–MONITOR–› |
Build an optimal model quickly and implement the core elements using an iterative approach to ensure the changes provide the most value.
All three elements of the Technology Value Trinity work in harmony to deliver business value and meet strategic needs. As one changes, the others need to change as well.
Too often strategy, operating model and organizational design, and governance are considered separate practices. As a result, “strategic documents” end up being wish lists, and projects continue to be prioritized based on who shouts the loudest rather than on what is in the best interest of the organization.
Governance is the means by which IT ensures that information and technology delivery and spend is aligned to business goals and delivers business outcomes. However, most CEOs continue to perceive IT as being poorly aligned to the business’ strategic goals, which indicates that governance is not implemented or executed properly.
For I&T governance to be effective you need a clear understanding of the things that drive your organization and its success. This understanding becomes your guiding star, which is critical for effective governance. It also requires participation by all parts of the organization, not just IT.
43% of CEOs believe that business goals are going unsupported by IT.
60% of CEOs believe that improvement is required around IT’s understanding of business goals.
80% of CIOs/CEOs are misaligned on the target role for IT.
30% of business stakeholders are supporters (N=32,536) of their IT departments
Organizations should look to progress in their governance stages. Ad hoc and controlled governance practices tend to be more rigid, making these a poor fit for organizations requiring higher velocity delivery or using more agile and adaptive practices.
The goal as you progress through these stages is to delegate governance and empower teams based on your fit and culture, enabling teams where needed to make optimal decisions in real time, ensuring that they are aligned with the best interests of the organization.
Automate governance for optimal velocity while mitigating risks and driving value.
This puts your organization in the best position to be adaptive, able to react effectively to volatility and uncertainty.
Adaptive Data-Centric ˆ ˆ ˆ ˆ ˆ Traditional (People- and Document-Centric) |
4 |
Automated Governance
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3 |
Agile Governance
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2 |
Controlled Governance
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Ad Hoc Governance
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Governance adaptiveness ensures the success of digital organizations and modern practice implementation.
Define and establish the guiding principle that drive your organization toward success.
Use Info-Tech's IT Governance Models to identify a base model similar to the way you are organized. Confirm your current and future placement in governance execution.
Adjust the model based on industry needs, your principles, regulatory requirements, and future direction.
Identify where to embed or automate decision making and compliance and what is required to do so effectively.
Governance must actively adapt to changes in your organization, environment, and practices or it will drive you to failure.
Governance principles support the move from controlled to automated governance by providing guardrails that guide your decisions. They provide the ethical boundaries and cultural perspectives that contextualize your decisions and keep you in line with organizational values. Determining principles are global in nature.
CONTROLLED | CHANGE ACTIONS AND RATIONALE | AUTOMATED |
Disentangle governance and management | Move from governance focused on evaluating, directing, and monitoring strategic decisions around information and technology toward defining and automating rules and principles for decision making into processes and practices, empowering the organization and driving adaptiveness. | Delegate and empower |
Govern toward value | Move from identifying the organization’s mission, goals, and key drivers toward orienting IT to align with those value outcomes and embedding value outcomes into design and delivery practices. | Deliver to defined outcomes |
Make risk-informed decisions | Move from governance bodies using risk information to manually make informed decisions based on their defined risk tolerance toward having risk information and attestation baked into decision making across all aspects and layers of the IT organization – from design to sustainment. | Embed risk decision making into processes and practices |
Measure to drive improvement | Move from static lagging metrics that validate that the work being done is meeting the organization’s needs and guide future decision making toward automated governance with more transparency driven by data-based decision making and real-time data insights. | Trust through real-time reporting |
Enforce standards and behavior | Move from enforcing standards and behavior and managing exceptions to ensure that there are consistent outcomes and quality toward automating standards and behavioral policies and embedding adherence and changes in behavior into the organization’s natural way of working. | Automate standards through automated decision rules, verification, and validation |
MISSION AND VISION –› | GOALS AND OBJECTIVES –› | GUIDING PRINCIPLES –› |
VALUE |
Why your organization exists and what value it aims to provide. The purpose you build a strategy to achieve. | What your organization needs be successful at to fulfill its mission. | Key propositions and guardrails that define and guide expected organizational behavior and beliefs. |
Your mission and vision define your goals and objectives. These are reinforced by your guiding principles, including ethical considerations, your culture, and expected behaviors. They provide the boundaries and guardrails for enabling adaptive governance, ensuring you continue to move in the right direction for organizational success.
To paraphrase Lewis Carroll, “If you don't know where you want to get to, it doesn't much matter which way you go.” Once you know what matters, where value resides, and which considerations are necessary to make decisions, you have consistent directional alignment that allows you to delegate empowered governance throughout the organization, taking you to the places you want to go.
GovernanceI&T governance defines WHAT should be done and sets direction through prioritization and decision making, monitoring overall IT performance. Governance aligns with the mission and vision of the organization to guide IT. |
ManagementManagement focuses on HOW to do things to achieve the WHAT. It is responsible for executing on, operating, and monitoring activities as determined by I&T governance. Management makes decisions for implementation based on governance direction. |
Documents and subjective/non-transparent decisions do not create sufficient structure to allow for the true automation of governance. Data related to decisions and aggregated risk allow you to define decision logic and rules and algorithmically embed them into your organization.
Governance drives activities through specific actors (individuals/committees) and unstructured data in processes and documents that are manually executed, assessed, and revised. There are often constraints caused by gaps or lack of adequate and integrated information in support of good decisions.
Governance actors provide principles, parameters, and decision logic that enable the creation of code, rulesets, and algorithms that leverage organizational data. Attestation is automatic – validated and managed within the process, product, or service.
Define and establish the guiding principle that drive your organization toward success.
Use Info-Tech's IT Governance Models to identify a base model similar to the way you are organized. Confirm your current and future placement in governance execution.
Adjust the model based on industry needs, your principles, regulatory requirements, and future direction.
Identify where to embed or automate decision making and compliance and what is required to do so effectively.
MY GOVERNANCE IS AD HOC AND WE’RE STARTING FROM SCRATCH | I NEED TO BUILD A NEW GOVERNANCE STRUCTURE | OUR GOVERNANCE APPROACH IS INEFFECTIVE AND NEEDS IMPROVEMENT | I NEED TO LOOK AT OPTIONS FOR AUTOMATING GOVERNANCE PRACTICES |
Step 1.1: Define Your Governance Context | Step 1.2: Structure Your IT Governance | Phase 2: Select and Refine Your Model | Phase 3: Embed and Automate |
IT governance is about ensuring that the investment decisions made around information and technology drive the optimal organizational value, not about governing the IT department. In this section we will clarify your organizational context for governance and define your guiding star to orient your governance design and inform your structure. |
There is no need to start from scratch! Start with Info-Tech’s best-practice IT governance models and customize them based on your organizational context. The research in this section will help you to select the right base model to work from and provide guidance on how to refine it. |
Governance practices eventually stop being a good fit for a changing organization, and things that worked before become bottlenecks. Governing roles and committees don’t adjust well, don’t have consistent practices, and lack the right information to make good decisions. The research in this section will help you improve and realign your governance practices. |
Once your governance is controlled and optimized you are ready to investigate opportunities to automate. This phase of the blueprint will help you determine where it’s feasible to automate and embed governance, understand key governance automation practices, and develop governing business rules to move your journey forward. |
If you are looking for details on specific associated practices, please see our related research:
1. Identify Your Governance Needs | 2. Select and Refine Your Governance Model | 3. Embed and Automate | |
Phase Steps |
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Phase Outcomes |
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To remain valuable, I&T governance must actively adapt to changes in your organization, environment, and practices, or it will drive you to failure instead of success.
I&T governance does not focus on the IT department. Rather, its intent is to ensure your organization makes sound decisions around investment in and use of information and technology.
Your governance approach progresses in stages from ad hoc to automated as your organization matures. Your stage depends on your organizational needs and ways of working.
Good governance does not equate to control and does not stifle innovation.
Automating governance must be done in stages, based on your capabilities, level of maturity, and amount of usable data.
Establish the least amount of governance required to allow you to achieve your goals.
If you don’t establish a guiding star to align the different stakeholders in your organization, governance practices will create conflict and confusion.
Each step of this blueprint is accompanied by supporting deliverables to help you accomplish your goals:
Key Deliverable:
Governance Framework ModelThe governance framework model provides the design of your new governance model and the organizational context to retain stakeholder alignment and organizational satisfaction with governance. The model includes the structures, practices, and responsibilities to drive effective governance in your organization.
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Governance Implementation PlanThis roadmap lays out the changes required to implement the governance model, the cultural items that need to be addressed, and anticipated timing.
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Governance Committee ChartersDevelop a detail governance charter or term of reference for each governing body. Outline the mandate, responsibilities, membership, process, and associated policies for each.
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Improving the governance approach and delegating decision making to support a change in business operation
The large, multi-national organization has locations across the world but has two primary headquarters, in Europe and the United States.
Market shifts drove an organizational shift in strategy, leading to a change in operating models, a product focus, and new work approaches across the organization.
Much of the implementation and execution was done in isolation, and effectiveness was slowed by poor integration and conflicting activities that worked against each other.
The product owner role was not well defined.
After reviewing the organization’s challenges and governance approach, we redefined and realigned its organizational and regional goals and identified outcomes that needed to be driven into their strategies.
We also reviewed their span of control and integration requirements and properly defined decisions that could be made regionally versus globally, so that decisions could be made to support new work practices.
We defined the product and service owner roles and the decisions each needed to make.
We saw an improvement in the alignment of organizational activities and the right people and bodies making decisions.
Work and practices were aimed at the same key outcomes and alignment between teams toward organizational goal improved.
Within one year, the success rate of the organization’s initiatives increased by 22%, and the percentage of product-related decisions made by product owners increased by 50%.
DIY Toolkit |
Guided Implementation |
Workshop |
Consulting |
"Our team has already made this critical project a priority, and we have the time and capability, but some guidance along the way would be helpful." | "Our team knows that we need to fix a process, but we need assistance to determine where to focus. Some check-ins along the way would help keep us on track." | "We need to hit the ground running and get this project kicked off immediately. Our team has the ability to take this over once we get a framework and strategy in place." | "Our team does not have the time or the knowledge to take this project on. We need assistance through the entirety of this project." |
A Guided Implementation (GI) is a series of calls with an Info-Tech analyst to help implement our best practices in your organization.
A typical GI is between 5 and 8 calls over the course of 2 to 3 months.
What does a typical GI on this topic look like?
Contact your account representative for more information.
workshops@infotech.com1-888-670-8889
Session 1 | Session 2 | Session 3 | Session 4 | Session 5 | |
Activities |
Develop Your Guiding Star1.1 Confirm mission, vision, and goals 1.2 Define scope and principles 1.3 Adjust for culture and finalize context |
Define the Governance Model2.1 Select and refine governance model 2.2 Confirm and adjust the structure 2.3 Review and adapt governance responsibilities and activities 2.4 Validate governance mandates and membership |
Build Governance Process and Policy3.1 Update your governance process 3.2 Align policies to mandate 3.3 Adjust and confirm your governance model 3.4 Identify and document your update triggers 3.5 Embed triggers into review cycle |
Embed and Automate Governance4.1 Identify decisions and standards to automate 4.2 Plan verification and validation approach 4.3 Build implementation plan 4.4 Develop communication strategy and messaging |
Next Steps and Wrap-Up5.1 Complete in-progress outputs from previous four sessions 5.2 Set up review time for workshop outputs and to discuss next steps |
Outcomes |
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Phase 1
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Phase 2
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Phase 3
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Identify the organization’s goals, mission, and vision that will guide governance.
Define the scope of your governance model and the principles that will guide how it works.
Account for organizational attitudes, behaviors, and culture related to governance and finalize your context.
Review your business and IT strategy, mission, and vision to ensure understanding of organizational direction.
Identify the business and IT goals that governance needs to align.
Confirm your operating model and any work practices that need to be accounted for in your model.
Identified guiding star outcomes to align governance outcomes with
Defined operating model type and work style that impact governance design
Identify Your Governance Needs
Step 1.1 – Define your Guiding Star | Step 1.2 – Define Scope and Principles | Step 1.3 – Adjust for Culture and Finalize Context |
Organic governance occurs during the formation of an organization and shifts with challenges, but it is rarely transparent and understood. It changes your culture in uncontrolled ways. | Intentional governance is triggered by changes in organizational needs, working approaches, goals, and structures. It is deliberate and changes your culture to enable success. |
Your approach to governance needs to be designed, even if your execution of governance is adaptable and delegated.
Your guiding star is a combination of your organization’s mission, vision, and strategy and the goals that have been defined to meet them.
It provides you with a consistent focal point around which I&T-related activities and projects orbit, like planets around a star.
It generates the gravity that governance uses to keep things from straying too far away from the goal of achieving relevant value.
Input: Business strategy, IT strategy, Mission and vision statements
Output: Updated Governance Workbook, Documented strategic outcomes and organizational aims that governance needs to achieve
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts, Governance Workbook
Participants: IT senior leadership
Download the Governance Workbook
60 minutes
Input: Business strategy, Business and IT goals and related initiatives
Output: Required success outcomes for goals, Links between IT and business goals that governance needs to align
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts
Participants: IT senior leadership
An IT operating model is a visual representation of the way your IT organization needs to be designed and the capabilities it requires to deliver on the business mission, strategic objectives, and technological ambitions.
The model is critical in the optimization and alignment of the IT organization’s structure in order to deliver the capabilities required to achieve business goals. It is a key determinant of how governance needs to be designed and where it is implemented.
60 minutes
Input: Organizational structure, Operating model (if available)
Output: Confirmed operating approach, Defined work practices
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts
Participants: IT senior leadership
Identify what is included and excluded within the scope of your governance.
Develop the determining and specific principles that provide guardrails for governance activities and decisions.
Documented governance scope and principles to apply
Identify Your Governance Needs
Step 1.1 – Define your Guiding Star | Step 1.2 – Define Scope and Principles | Step 1.3 – Adjust for Culture and Finalize Context |
Based on the goals and principles you defined and the operating model you selected, confirm where oversight will be necessary and at what level. Focus on the necessity to expedite and clear barriers to the achievement of goals and on the ownership of risks and compliance. Some key considerations:
Your governance scope helps you define the boundaries of what your governance model and practices will cover. This includes key characteristics of your organization that impact what governance needs to address.
60 minutes
Input: Context information from Activity 1.1, Scoping areas
Output: Defined scope and span of control
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts
Participants: IT senior leadership
Organizations often have too many governance bodies, creating friction without value. Where that isn’t the case, the bodies are often inefficient, with gaps or overlaps in accountability and authority. Structure your governance to optimize its effectiveness, designing with the intent to have the fewest number of governing bodies to be effective, but no less than is necessary.
Start with your operating model.
Determine whether your governance should be controlled or adaptive.
Your approach to governance needs to be designed and structured, even if your execution of governance is adaptable and delegated.
Confirm your defining principles based on your selection of controlled or adaptive governance. Create specific principles to clarify boundaries or provide specific guidance for teams within the organization.
Controlled | Adaptive |
Disentangle governance and management | Delegate and empower |
Govern toward value | Deliver to defined outcomes |
Make risk-informed decisions | Embed risk into decision making |
Measure to drive improvement | Trust though real-time reporting |
Enforce standards and behavior | Automate decision making though established standards |
Determining Principle: Delegate and empower.
Specific Principle: Decisions should be made at the lowest reasonable level of the organization with clarity.
Rationale: To govern effectively with the velocity required to address business needs, governance needs to be executed deeper into the organization and organizational goals need to be clearly understood everywhere.
Implication: Decision making needs to be delegated throughout the organization, so information and data requirements need to be identified, decision-making approach and principles need to be shared, and authority needs to be delegated clearly.
30-45 minutes
Input: Governance Framework Model– Governance Principles
Output: Governance workbook - Finalized list of determining principles
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts, Governance Workbook
Participants: IT senior leadership
Specific governing principles are refined principles derived from a determining principle, when additional specificity and detail is necessary. It allows you to define an approach for specific behaviors and activities. Multiple specific principles may underpin the determining one.
Specific Principles – Related principles that may be required to ensure the implications of the determining principal are addressed within the organization. They may be specific to individual areas and may be addressed in policies. Implications – The implications of this principle on the organization, specific to how and where governance is executed and the level of information and authority that would be necessary. Rationale – The reason(s) driving the determining principle. Determining Principle – A core overarching principle – a defining aspect of your governance model. |
30 minutes
Input: Updated determining principles
Output: List of specific principles linked to determining principles
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts, Governance Workbook
Participants: IT senior leadership
Download the Governance Workbook
Identify your organizational attitude, behavior, and culture related to governance.
Identify positives that can be leveraged and develop means to address negatives.
Finalize the context that your model will leverage and align to.
Downloaded tool ready to select the base governance model for your organization
Identify Your Governance Needs
Step 1.1 – Define your Guiding Star | Step 1.2 – Define Scope and Principles | Step 1.3 – Adjust for Culture and Finalize Context |
A |
ttitude |
What people think and feel. It can be seen in their demeanor and how they react to change initiatives, colleagues, and users. This manifests in the belief that governance is a constraint that needs to be avoided or ignored – often with unintended consequences.
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Any form of organizational change involves adjusting people’s attitudes to create buy-in and commitment.
You need to identify and address attitudes that can lead to negative behaviors and actions or that are counter-productive.
B |
ehavior |
What people do. This is influenced by attitude and the culture of the organization. In governance, this manifests as people’s willingness to be governed, who pushes back, and who tries to bypass it.
To implement change within IT, especially at a tactical and strategic level, organizational behavior needs to change.
This is relevant because people gravitate toward stability and will resist change in an active or passive way unless you can sell the need, value, and benefit of changing their behavior and way of working.
C |
ulture |
The accepted and understood ways of working in an organization. The values and standards that people find normal and what would be tacitly identified to new resources. In governance terms, this is how decisions are really made and where responsibility really exists rather than what is identified formally.
The impact of the organizational or corporate “attitude” on employee behavior and attitude is often not fully understood.
Culture is an invisible element, which makes it difficult to identify, but it has a strong impact and must be addressed to successfully embed governance models. In the case of automating governance, cultural readiness for automation is a critical success factor.
45 minutes
Input: Senior leadership knowledge
Output: Updated Governance Workbook
Materials: Governance Workbook
Participants: IT senior leadership
Download the Governance Workbook
Evaluate the organization across the three contexts. The positive items represent opportunities for leveraging these characteristics with the implementation of the governance model, while the negative items must be considered and/or mitigated.
Attitude | Behavior | Culture | |
Positive | |||
Negative | |||
Mitigation |
30 minutes
Input: Documented governance principles and scope from previous exercises
Output: Finalized governance context in the Governance Workbook
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts, Governance Workbook
Participants: IT senior leadership
Download the Governance Workbook
Phase 1
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Select a base governance model and refine it to suit your organization.
Identify scenarios and changes that will trigger updates to your governance model.
Build your implementation plan.
Review and selecting your base governance model.
Adjust the structure, responsibilities, policies, mandate, and membership to best support your organization.
Downloaded tool ready to select the base governance model for your organization
Select and Refine Your Governance Model
Step 2.1 – Choose and Adapt Your Model | Step 2.2 – Identify and Document Your Governance Triggers | Step 2.3 – Build Implementation Approach |
RESPONSIBILITIES AND TYPICAL MEMBERSHIP | |
ENTERPRISE | Defines organizational goals. Directs or regulates the performance and behavior of the enterprise, ensuring it has the structure and capabilities to achieve its goals.
Membership: Business executives, Board |
STRATEGIC | Ensures IT initiatives, products, and services are aligned to organizational goals and strategy and provide expected value. Ensure adherence to key principles.
Membership: Business executives, CIO, CDO |
TACTICAL | Ensures key activities and planning are in place to execute strategic initiatives.
Membership: Authorized division leadership, related IT leadership |
OPERATIONAL | Ensures effective execution of day-to-day functions and practices to meet their key objectives.
Membership: Service/product owners, process owners, architecture leadership, directors, managers |
30 minutes
Input: Governance models templates
Output: Selected governance model
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts
Participants: IT senior leadership
30-45 minutes
Input: Selected base governance model, Governance context/scope
Output: Updated governance bodies and relationships
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts
Participants: IT senior leadership
STRATEGIC ALIGNMENT
VALUE DELIVERY
RISK MANAGEMENT
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RESOURCE MANAGEMENT
PERFORMANCE MEASUREMENT
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45-60 minutes
Input: Selected governance base model, Governance context
Output: Updated responsibilities and activities, Updated activities for selected governance bodies, New or removed governing bodies
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts
Participants: IT senior leadership
30 minutes
Input: Selected governance base model, Updated structure and responsibilities
Output: Adjusted mandates and refined committee membership
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts
Participants: IT senior leadership
One of the biggest benefits of governance committees is the perspective provided by people from various parts of the organization, which helps to ensure technology investments are aligned with strategic goals. However, having too many people – or the wrong people – involved prevents the committee from being effective. Avoid this by following these principles.
20 minutes
Input: Selected governance base model, Updated structure and responsibilities
Output: Updated committee processes
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts
Participants: IT senior leadership
20 minutes
Input: Selected governance base model, Updated structure and responsibilities
Output: Adjusted mandates and refined committee membership
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts
Participants: IT senior leadership
Identify scenarios that will create a need to review or change your governance model.
Update your review/update approach to receiving trigger notifications.
Downloaded tool ready to select the base governance model for your organization
Select and Refine Your Governance Model
Step 2.1 – Choose and Adapt Your Model | Step 2.2 – Identify and Document Your Governance Triggers | Step 2.3 – Build Implementation Approach |
Governance triggers are organizational or environmental changes within or around an organization that are inflection points that start the review and revision of governance models to maintain their fit with the organization. This is the key to adaptive governance design.
30 minutes
Input: Governance Workbook
Output: Updated workbook with defined and documented governance triggers, points of origin, and integration
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts
Participants: IT senior leadership
30 minutes
Input: Governance model
Output: Review cycle update
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts
Participants: IT senior leadership
Transfer changes to the Governance Implementation Plan Template.
Determine the timing for the implementation phases.
Implementation plan for adaptive governance framework model
Select and Refine Your Governance ModelStep 2.1 – Choose and Adapt Your Model | Step 2.2 – Identify and Document Your Governance Triggers | Step 2.3 – Build Implementation Approach |
60 minutes
Input: Governance model, Guiding principles, Update triggers, Cultural factors and mitigations
Output: Implementation roadmap
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts
Participants: IT senior leadership
Download the Governance Implementation Plan
Gantt Chart This type of roadmap depicts themes, related initiatives, the associated goals, and exact start and end dates for each initiative. This diagram is useful for outlining a larger number of activities and initiatives and has an easily digestible and repeatable format. |
Sunshine Diagram This type of roadmap depicts themes and their associated initiatives. The start and end dates for the initiatives are approximated based on years or phases. This diagram is useful for highlighting key initiatives on one page. |
Input: Governance themes and initiatives
Output: roadmap visual
Materials: Governance Roadmap Workbook, Governance Workbook
Participants: CIO, IT senior leadership
Develop your Gantt chart in the Governance Roadmap Workbook
30 minutes
Input: Governance themes and initiatives
Output: Sunshine diagram visual
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts, Markers, Governance Implementation Plan
Participants: CIO, IT senior leadership
Customize your sunshine diagram in the Governance Implementation Plan
Phase 1
| Phase 2
| Phase 3
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Identify which decisions you are ready to automate.
Identify standards and policies that can be embedded and automated.
Identify integration points.
Confirm data requirements to enable success.
Identify your key decisions.
Develop your decision logic.
Confirm decisions that could be automated.
Identify and address constraints.
Develop decision rules and principles.
Developed decision rules, rulesets, and principles that can be leveraged to automate governance
Defined integration points
Embed and Automate
Step 3.1 – Identify Decisions to Embed and Automate | Step 3.2 – Plan Validation and Verification | Step 3.3 – Update Implementation Plan |
Decision automation is the codifying of rules that connect the logic of how decisions are made with the data required to make those decisions. This is then embedded and automated into processes and the design of products and services.
Decision complexity impacts the type of rule(s) you create and the amount of data required. It also helps define where or if decisions can be automated.
The Governance Automation Criteria Checklist provides a view of key considerations for determining whether a governing activity or decision is a good candidate for automation.
The criteria identify key qualifiers/disqualifiers to make it easier to identify eligibility.
Download the Governance Automation Criteria Checklist
The Governance Automation Worksheet provides a way to document your governance and systematically identify information about the decisions to help determine if automation is possible.
From there, decision rules, logic, and rulesets can be designed in support of building a structure flow to allow for automation.
Download the Governance Automation Worksheet
30 minutes
Input: Automation Criteria Checklist, Governance Automation Worksheet, Updated governance model
Output: Documented decisions and related authority, Selected options for automation, Updated Governance Automation Worksheet
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts, Governance Automation Worksheet
Participants: IT senior leadership
Decision rules provide specific instructions and constraints that must be considered in making decisions and are critical for automating governance.
They provide the logical path to assess governance inputs to make effective decisions with positive business outputs.
Inputs would include key information such as known risks, your defined prioritization matrix, portfolio value scoring, and compliance controls.
Individual rules can be leveraged in different places.
Some decision rule types are listed here.
Rulesets are created to make complex decisions. Individual rule types are combined to create rulesets that are applied together to generate effective decisions. One rule will provide contextual information required for additional rules to execute in a Rule-Result-Rule-Result-Rule-Decision flow.
30 minutes
Input: Governance Automation Worksheet
Output: Documented decision logic to support selected decision types and data requirements
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts
Participants: IT senior leadership
1.5-2 hours
Input: Governance Automation Worksheet
Output: Defined decision integration points, Confirmed data availability sets, Decision rules, rulesets, and principles with control indicators
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts, Governance Automation Worksheet
Participants: IT senior leadership
Define how decision outcomes will be measured.
Determine how the effectiveness of automated governance will be reported.
Tested and verified automation of decisions
Embed and Automate
Step 3.1 – Identify Decisions to Embed and Automate | Step 3.2 – Plan Validation and Verification | Step 3.3 – Update Implementation Plan |
1. Rules
Focus on clear decision logicOften represented in simple statement types and supported by data:IF – THEN IF – AND – THEN IF – AND NOT – THEN |
2. Rulesets
Aggregate rules for more complex decisionsIntegrated flows between different required rules:Rule 1: (Output 1) – Rule 2 (Output 2) – Rule 6 Rule 6: (Output 1) – Rule 7 |
3. Rule Attestation
Verify success of automated decisionsAttestation of embedded and automated rules with key control indicators embedded within process and products.Principles embedded into automated software controls. |
60 minutes
Input: Governance rules and rulesets as defined in the Governance Automation Worksheet, Defined decision outcomes
Output: A defined measurement of effective decision outcomes, Approach to automate and/or report the effectiveness of automated governance
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts
Participants: IT senior leadership
60 minutes
Input: Governance rules and rulesets as defined in the Governance Automation Worksheet, Defined decision outcomes
Output: Defined assurance and attestation requirements, Key control indicators that can be automated
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts
Participants: IT senior leadership
Review implications and mitigations to make sure all have been considered.
Finalize the implementation plan and roadmap.
Completed Governance implementation plan and roadmap
Embed and Automate
Step 3.1 – Identify Decisions to Embed and Automate | Step 3.2 – Plan Validation and Verification | Step 3.3 – Update Implementation Plan |
30 minutes
Input: Governance workbook, Updated governance model, Draft implementation plan and roadmap
Output: Finalized implementation plan and roadmap
Materials: Whiteboard/flip charts, Governance Implementation Plan
Participants: IT senior leadership
Through this project we have:
Contact your account representative for more information.
If you would like additional support, have our analysts guide you through other phases as part of an Info-Tech workshop.
Contact your account representative for more information.
To accelerate this project, engage your IT team in an Info-Tech workshop with an Info-Tech analyst team.
Info-Tech analysts will join you and your team at your location or welcome you to Info-Tech’s historic Toronto office to participate in an innovative onsite workshop.
Avoid bureaucracy and achieve alignment with a minimalist approach. Align with your organizational context.
Establish data trust and accountability with strong governance.
Embed value and alignment confirmation into your governance to ensure you optimize IT value achievement for resource spend.
Strengthen the product/service owner role in your organization by focusing on core capabilities and proper alignment.
Sidney Hodgson
Senior Director, Industry Info-Tech Research Group
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David Tomljenovic
Principal Research Advisor, Industry Info-Tech Research Group
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Cole Cioran
Practice Lead, Applications and Agile Development Info-Tech Research Group
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Crystal Singh
Research Director, Applications – Data and Information Management Info-Tech Research Group
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Carlene McCubbin
Practice Lead, CIO Info-Tech Research Group
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Denis Goulet
Senior Workshop Director Info-Tech Research Group
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