How can companies best knock down the wall that so often exists between the IT department and everybody else? The Wall Street Journal put this question to The Experts, an exclusive group of industry, academic and other thought leaders who engage in in-depth online discussions of topics from the print Report. This question relates to a recent article that discussed the often troubled relationship between IT and business leaders and formed the basis of a discussion in The Experts stream on Wednesday, May 15.

Carl Wiens


Also be sure watch three of The Experts—McKinsey's managing director, Dominic Barton, Harvard Business School's Rosabeth Moss Kanter (@RosabethKanter) and the Wharton School's Karl Ulrich —discuss the implications of new workplace technology and the status of privacy in the professional sphere in a live video chat that aired Monday, May 13.

Rosabeth Moss Kanter: The Best Companies Don't Have Walls

The premise of the question is that companies still have walls. The best companies have been trying to tear down walls, eliminate isolated silos, turn their corporate services (such as IT and HR) into serve-the-internal-customer services, and have chief information officers at the strategic planning table to ensure that IT supports the business (and not vice versa).


Bruce Nolop : The Key Is Communication

The information-technology walls are real, but not inevitable. With good communication, the walls can come tumbling down.

In my prior corporate life, I observed a head of IT who was particularly adept at communicating with the rest of our management team. Here's what he did right.

First, he articulated a long-term strategic plan that was focused less on the nuts and bolts of hardware and software investments and more on the business objectives to be pursued. His plan answered bedrock questions, such as how it would enhance the customer experience, increase revenue, improve efficiencies and better protect customer and employee data.

Second, he presented ways to fund the strategic investments, primarily by achieving greater productivity and curtailing nonessential activities. Unlike an empire-building bureaucrat, he was intensely focused on the results to be accomplished and not on the resources under his control—including openness to staff reductions and outsourcing alternatives.

Third, he avoided using IT jargon and acronyms, communicating in a lexicon that was easily understood by the business leaders. He recognized that IT and other knowledge experts can be off-putting if they emphasize complexity and detailed analysis; keeping it simple is usually the better approach in forging a consensus.


Cesare Mainardi: Hire a CIO With a Sledgehammer

If the wall between IT and everyone else is still up in your company, it's about to become an even bigger problem. The rapid digitization of virtually every industry requires that IT be more integrated into your business than ever before. Traditional IT is being replaced by a new partnership model that demands IT departments transform themselves from service bureaus to strategic partners.

And to further up the ante, our research shows that if a company doesn't break down walls and achieve close collaboration between all functions, including IT, it can never truly succeed in building differentiating capabilities—that magical, messy combination of people, systems and know-how—that allow a company to do a handful things better than anyone else.

The key to success in the long term is to build a system of these three to six unique capabilities and then focus all your energy there. These are things like Apple's appealing, intuitive, ergonomic design; Walmart's rigorous, sharp-penciled supplier management and Southwest Airlines ' way of enlisting passenger engagement in keeping airline travel low-cost and fun. That's the "secret sauce," their differentiating capabilities that help them win in the market.

So the best way to break down barriers inside a company is to develop strategy through this capabilities lens and then use that road map to drive change. Then IT, and all other functions, can strategically reallocate time and resources away from the "nice-to-haves" and toward the things that truly drive the business.

To transform IT specifically, you may also need a whole new breed of CIO to lead the charge. Hire someone who will relentlessly focus on how IT can best contribute to your company's differentiating capabilities. And hire someone who will immediately pick up a sledgehammer and start knocking down that wall.


Jay Hooley : It Starts at the Top

The tone has to be set from the top. Successful leaders encourage their teams to see the company's technologists as innovators and great problem solvers. The best business leaders have already driven the transformation from "information technology" to "integrated technologies." IT plays a strategic business function and not just an operational function. Leaders should be bringing their top technologists to every important meeting, especially client meetings where you are working with them to solve complex business challenges.


Kenneth Freeman : Respect, Resource and Hold IT Accountable

Organizational silos are the biggest roadblock to progress in businesses. Include IT at the table when defining and implementing corporate strategy. In turn, put a "non-IT" person in charge of the function so that IT is aligned with the business rather than with the bells and whistles of technology. Treat IT as the central nervous system for your organization. Respect IT, resource IT, hold IT accountable for delivering on all the vital signs (traditional infrastructure measures, and enabling strategy implementation and growth).
