Delivering Business Value with It at Hefty Hardware

. Create a plan for how IT and the business can work collaboratively to deliver the Savvy Store program successfully.

Answer:

1 Collaboration: Business should define the objective of the Savvy store program. Involve IT department to analyze the current situation by planning a field trip in order to understand the exact store operation. Once this is done, IT and Business should plan a meeting to discuss ways to reach the ultimate goal. Each department might have a different solutions to implement the program so discussing the pros and cons of each approach would enable them to figure out the best way to move forward. The methods and processes that would be used must also be discussed in this meeting.

2 Agreement: A written document of the approved plan where every department agrees on what was discussed in the meeting must be signed. This step would help to avoid conflicts if any that would occur during the course of the project and also establishes accountability.

3 Communications intranet: There must be a portal for discussions about the ongoing projects. One way it could help would be if an employee faces difficulty on a certain issue, others who have had the issue in past or may have the experience about the issue, could help him in resolving it quickly rather than delaying the process and missing deadlines. This feedback process would help to build strong social networks within the organization. Other benefits include cost savings, ease of information access (people and technology), etc.

4 Change management: If the IT department feels a need for change while working on the project, it must be immediately communicated to the other departments so that everyone is on the same page and the business should analyze its impact on the end result. If there is a positive impact and if the change is helping the business goal, only then should IT be given a green signal to proceed with it (saves rework for IT in case of negative impact on the business goal).

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