Is IT a Building Block or a Roadblock of Digital Transformation

Nowadays technologies make impacts on every vertical industry and information permeates into every corner of the organization. IT is becoming more critical, but still, there are discrepancies between how IT evaluate its own influence & performance and how IT is perceived by business. Sometimes, business partners think IT is lagging behind the change curve, and IT is seen as a drag on innovation. Even IT should be the irreplaceable building block of differentiated business capabilities,  businesses perceive IT as the roadblock. So how can IT turn around these negative perception and build a strong reputation as a change agent, innovation engine and driving force of digital transformation?
IT is the roadblock when IT is the threshold of business capability and unique competency: The role of digital IT is to identify and blend the ways that information and technology can enable and shape the business capability and capacity by linking all digital aspects (goals, objectives, actions, etc.) together to enforce the business competency. These are then mixed with other business ingredients to create products and processes which generate differentiated business capabilities for strategy management and the business’s long-term growth. Organizations acquire the differentiated capability to reshape products, services, and customer engagement, with the help of digital technologies, IT is no doubt the roadblock. However, if IT only took orders from the business, over-promised and under-delivery, IT is seen as the roadblock which drag down the speed of business changes. Those negative IT perceptions shouldn’t be ignored by senior IT management, they need to realign their operation model from insight out operation driven to outside in customer focused, setting prioritization mechanism, so that customer preferences and requirements are reflected throughout the organization, which will be business beneficial in terms to speed up change and delivery.
IT is the building block when business-IT gaps are shrinking; and it would be the roadblock if the gaps are enlarging: The disconnect between business and IT not only causes miscommunication but even worse to decelerate and fail the business. Bridging the gap between IT and the business are really issues of all about change. The steps, processes, tools and products that organizations use to make decisions and effect the transformation from strategy to deployment. To bridge the gap, you  cannot know only one piece of the equation. CIOs have to know both the business and the technology side of things and take an advisory role in communication and coaching. Listen, engage and nurture relationships with customers and build an integrated view of business insight derived from information extracted from different sources.  Business leaders should also have the desire to understand IT better in order to bridge the knowledge gap and capture business insight for managing a holistic and seamless digital transformation.  Running IT as the building block is not just about fixing things, but leveraging tradeoff, integrating IT and business to build a set of crucial business capabilities such as efficiency, flexibility, agility, risk intelligence, and ultimate organizational agility.
IT is the building block if IT can become the business solutionary; IT would turn to be the roadblock if it does not “keep the end” - the strategic business goals in mind: In most of the organizations, IT is setting back and waiting for the request, and no wonder often being perceived as a roadblock; to be the building block of changeability, IT needs to gain a better understanding of the business and show that knowledge by talking business to the business; IT has to be configured in a way to understand the business and set the framework to deliver the business and market need. And IT's ability to execute and communicate. IT needs to transform from an order taker to an order shaker.  IT has to be a strategic advisor to the business to maximize the revenue. IT at all levels needs to understand how the business makes and loses money, and it needs to articulate solutions around this with business language. IT is being not only analytically measured by the business, it is being measured by every customer experience the leadership of the business has with IT deliveries they experienced. That sets a very high standard that internal IT is either a roadblock to slow down the changes or the building block to accelerate digital transformation.
The idea that the IT organization is perceived as the roadblock, overlooked as an innovation driver and is being bypassed by business units comes at an odd time when you consider the robust new technology prospects and pervasive information influence. IT needs to be the building block to develop dynamic digital capabilities and gain the differentiated advantage for the organization’s growth and maturity.

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