The Role of Is

Introduction

I believe that the primary goal of any IS department should be to manage the information of the company, rather than to manage the technology of the company. Companies need to communicate within the company and in order to do that they must have effective and efficient means of communication. If there is no way to share data internally, the company will more than likely fail. Technology management, in my opinion, refers more to one off problem solving, whereas information management should be an ongoing goal and process. However, this is not to say that technology management is not still an important function of the IS department. The department must maintain the current technology, but I view this as more a means to the end.

In order to counteract the negative view of outsourcing within the IS department as CIO, I would show my employees the benefits of such a measure. It would be hard for employees to continue to harbor such emotions when shown how much more efficient and manageable the department would become because of the reduction of workload as well as the increase in specialization. The outsourced company would potentially be much better at whatever function was outsourced, because they would have to in order to stay competitive. Also, with a smaller pool of responsibilities, the IS department as a whole could increase specialization as their focus would narrow. This could have nothing but positive effects on the company.

Summary

The primary goal of any IS department should be to manage the company’s information. Managing technology should be viewed more as a support function to achieve this goal. Additionally, and IS manager must strive to counteract the prevailing opinion on outsourcing within the IS culture by preaching the potential benefits of such a service, such as decreased workload and increased efficiency.