IT in The Boardroom

It's not that common for IT to be discussed in the Boardroom - you know, it's one of those technical issues that remains for the COO or CFO to handle in the light of other "major" corporate level issues.

But IT is really becoming the brain of an organization. And as the brain, it's pretty logical that it should be one of the key issues to be reported on at each board meeting

Various IT expense disasters have been well reported on - usually stemming from major ERP project overruns, sometimes driving organizations into bankruptcy. I doubt project management techniques were discussed at Board meetings in these organizations but it should have been - after all, it killed the company - more than health care costs, more than sales, more than international tax issues.

Less reported, is where IT has been the major strategic issue in determining the organization's future. For example, take Blockbuster, the video rental company. Blockbuster was eclipsed by NetFlix, a company that is highly systems driven. NetFlix has continually sponsored a major $1,000,000 dollar prize to programmers who can develop artificial intelligence algorithms that dramatically increase efficiency. I doubt the Netflix programming challenge was either brought to the attention of the Blockbuster Board, much less, discussed at a Board meeting, since it is one of those geeky things in the IT world. But again, this IT geeky issue was a major strategic threat to Blockbuster. And today Blockbuster is in bankruptcy and NetFlix is gaining strength. Which company would you rather be holding stock options in?