A senior technology manager at a major US law firm recently shared with me a conversation he had with the partners about the firm’s IT budget. While he thought the IT group had made great strides in telling the firm what they were doing, the partners were complaining about the lack of transparency of the IT budget. In particular, the partners were venting their increasing frustration at the amount of money spent year after year and were starting to talk about dramatic cutbacks.
Exasperated, he explained that all it would take would be to get all the partners together for two full days’ of briefings and they would all understand. Then they would appreciate that in fact his team were great managers – that they were actually saving the firm money by managing investment cycles and by negotiating hard with suppliers and vendors. The chances of that occurring, he was sad to say, was about the same as his helpdesk receiving no calls for a week. It was never going to happen.
