What Enterprise IT Managers desparately need?

'Where there is no vision people perish'

Today I salute successful business managers, because but for them the wheels of employment and national economy would not run. I am referring to managers and leaders in the business world who see before others, make sense and then drive pursuits. Those who bring out profits as opposed to those who have 'only' have the gift of gab.

Managers in IT departments are also in this category. Some of them make decisions involving huge amounts of money - such as what technology or IT products does the enterprise need this year. They are the ones who support the continous improvement in technology. Most of them can never afford the luxury of 100% knowledge decisions but finally have to rely on their judgement which draws from their wisdom and experience.

Alas, there are managers who just cannot make judgements and are being taken all around the world for rides and site visits. Most often these end up as prey in the hands of sales people from IT Vendor.

The simple fact is Enterprise IT Managers can never rely on the judgement of Microsoft, IBM or Oracle. They have to just look at what direction business is heading and make sense of technoloy directions and then get their best in-house minds to draw up a plan.

There is no such thins as a common blueprint for enterprises IT- if there is, it's meant for those enterprises who are nowhere in the forefront of profits and leadership. Its basically discarded garbage from the real thinkers that IT Vendors sales have picked up.

While it may appear that I am against IT vendors I am not - not at all. They work in thier context and Enterprise IT Managers have a different context. The major difference is the reality of the domain instance that EIT mansgers must reconcile all theoritical concepts.

I must mention qualities what I learnt from a person whom I have known as one of the best IT Managers.

1. He is surrounded by brilliant minds - minds that are most often better then him in tech capabilities. I am referring to experts in whether is App development, Project Management, Distributed Computing , High Availability , Security ......
He constantly wants to hear these experts make sense of issues, new products and problems with his current Infrastructure.

2. Though his listens without ego to all his experts.He finally makes decisions and then refines them based on real progress.He takes full responsibility and drives the point home with Executive Management.