Flexibility Through Governance

Governance is one of the most critical elements of a successful IT partnership, and an area where the biggest gaps in value between potential partners and transactional vendors can be found.

Any managed services provider will showcase a variety of charts, graphs, and data points, but this is only one part of the governance equation. Reviewing data is or some importance, but if that is all that governance consists of, it is tedious, and only provides the Stakeholders with a “look backwards and see what happened” view.

Working together with technology leaders from across our customer community, WBM has seen the role of governance evolve tremendously.

Effective governance in a true partnership means that not only will there be reports that present the past and provide insight, there will also be clear opportunities for process improvement, and as we uncover areas that represent advancement, there must also be the commitment from WBM to invest in bringing these advancements forward if we are truly in pursuit of a World Class status program.

We believe that governance can be so much more impactful and engaging than just being a point of diligence and reporting requirement on past performance to fulfill. We believe that it can be at the very core of understanding and alignment, and a catalyst for forward looking outcomes, value, and directing partner investment.

In working together as partners, we expect to develop personal relationships at various point of engagement across both organizations, and as such, while there is always a consistent rhythm to specific governance sessions, we have also learned that governance is an every day thing, as any informal conversation has the potential to hatch an idea or opportunity to explore together.

The DIKW Knowledge Pyramid Applied

The WBM Governance model as it has evolved can be charted using the DIKW Pyramid. While reporting and scheduled sit downs may represent components of an exciting and impactful governance model, they must be combined with the other elements, in particular the decision making authority and desire of your partner to make investments, engineer customized processes, and take action to move forward with you to generate the results that emerge as possible.

• The ability to understand data and information both overall, and from an individual or departmental perspective. The desired outcomes, as they are achieved, and then if properly documented, can be shared as a very significant. This is a key consideration in achieving the level of success that is possible, and in building adoption, momentum, and true end user enablement across a wide organization.
• The presence of local and committed decision making on both sides. With knowledge, excellent decisions can be made, and clear paths can be charted with confidence. A critical component of effective governance is not graphs delivered by the sales team, it also is the ability and enthusiasm of your partner to participate at an executive level, actually make decisions, especially decisions that require change, or investment in order to move forward.

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A demonstrated ability to move from data and ‘oversight’ to opportunities for outcomes and advanced business ‘insight’.

As an effectively governed environment, the stakeholders should not only feel like you have access to information, you should have a clear understanding of where we are at, what the outcomes being pursued are, and what the roadmap is with regard to future outcomes.

A forum for continuously establishing and revising already set SLA’s to enable evolving outcomes.

It is important to understand that outcomes will change and evolve over time, and a collaborative relationship means that both organizations are always working to understand the key priorities and best point of value as new opportunities to generate outcomes arise.

Improvement, Innovation, and Value can be driven through consistent programs, but can be specific to each individual departmental requirements.

While every participant will of course be part of a consistent global solution and service delivery program, they will each be in different situations, have different current technology, face different challenges, and be interested in achieving different priorities. This should be facilitated, understood, and thus every department can gain new value with every step forward.

Governance is a critical element of a successful outcome based partnership.

It represents one of the most significant and time consuming elements, but it is also driven by relationships, and a level of personal commitments to each other that make it a lot of fun to achieve what we set out to. A successful governance program will provide you with clear line of sight into what opportunities exist for outcomes to be achieved as they emerge, and WBM brings a commitment to the investment and the decision making that is necessary for effective outcome based governance over time.