Executive Support
The Top Challenges Facing IT Business Partners today
At the BRM Forum in London delegates gained some practical takeaways after participating in the BRM Forum. This is the third in a four part mini-series. BRM Forum: The Panel Article written by James O'Driscoll, Gilbert Scott Associates. On Friday 9th of June the 5th BRM forum took place in central London. The session was a mix of debate, presentation and business simulation via Grab@Pizza. In terms of the debate this was a panel discussion hosted by James O'Driscoll on…
Role Conflict
The Top Challenges Facing IT Business Partners today
At the BRM Forum in London delegates gained some practical takeaways after participating in the BRM Forum. This is the second in a four part mini series. BRM Forum: The Panel Article written by James O'Driscoll, Gilbert Scott Associates. On Friday 9th of June the 5th BRM forum took place in central London. The session was a mix of debate, presentation and business simulation via Grab@Pizza. In terms of the debate this was a panel discussion hosted by James O'Driscoll…
Shadow IT
The Top Challenges Facing IT Business Partners today
At the BRM Forum in London delegates gained some practical takeaways after participating in the BRM Forum. This is the first in a four part mini series. BRM Forum: The Panel Article written by James O'Driscoll, Gilbert Scott Associates. On Friday 9th of June the 5th BRM forum took place in central London. The session was a mix of debate, presentation and business simulation via Grab@Pizza. In terms of the debate this was a panel discussion hosted by James O'Driscoll…
Finding the Right IT Business Partner
Podcast #3
FInding the Right IT Business Partner - Podcast #3 Looking at to our recent surveys, forums and ongoing discussions with the IT Business Partnering community, it has become more apparent that finding the right IT Business Partner for the right IT Business Partnering role is becoming more of a challenge. In the latest Baxter Thompson Associates podcast Jon Baxter and James O’Driscoll discuss some of issues the IT Business Partnering community are currently experiencing and what can be done to…
Continuous Service Improvement
How IT Business Partners help
At the Baxter & Thompson associates BRM Forum in London delegates gained some practical takeaways after participating in the Grab@Pizza Business simulation game. Grab@Pizza! Participants understanding the roles in the game. The simulation game is an experiential learning instrument that can be used as a stand-alone team building exercise. The simulation can also be used in organizations to create buy-in for IT Business Partnering, compliment training and assess current capabilities and agree first steps for moving forward. In the simulation…
Supporting Island Voyagers
Rowing around the UK for the HoneyPot Children's Charity
Supporting Island Voyagers as they row around the UK for the Honeypot Children's Charity Baxter Thompson Associates are proud to be a sponsor of Jeremy Webb, a Business Relationship Manager from The University of Southampton, and his crew of four as they attempt to row non-stop around the UK in aid of The Honeypot Children's Charity, who offer respite breaks and outreach support to young carers and vulnerable children, many of whom would otherwise have nowhere to turn. On the…
Corporate Innovation
Applying Start-up Principles - Podcast #2!
Corporate Innovation - Podcast #2 Today we discuss with Chris Hodgson some of the innovation principles employed in start-up companies, and how they can be applied to the corporate environment. Chris outlines the “three horizon view” to innovation, the very different approaches required for each, their measures, and the different teams of people that make them work. Share Welcome to our second podcast. We had a blast on our first one last time around with Dr Robina Chatham, and this…
IT as a Business Partner
The Challenges and Overcoming Them
Baxter Thompson Associates (BTA) in conjunction with the British Computer Society Elite Forum (BCS) held a debate on the 21st September 2016 “IT as a Business Partner. Jacqui Hogan, Bill Limond and Jon Baxter and 20 executives looked at some of the challenges facing the Chief Information Officer (CIO) in becoming a Partner with the rest of the organisation and some of the solutions that could help the CIO overcome those challenges. BTA has produced a report on the outcome…
Podcast - How to get your business case approved
Our first podcast! With special guest Dr Robina Chatham
Our first podcast - How To Get Your Business Case Approved April 2017 Hosted by Jon Baxter, with guest Dr Robina Chatham The most simple business cases can struggle to get approved. Even when Jon wanted to do something as essential as installing a firewall at a relatively low cost, it took him three attempts to get sign-off. Jon chats with Robina, who has many stories to tell from her several years as a CIO. If you’re struggling to get…
Organisational Stress: Mergers and Acquisitions
Managing your organisation through changing times
What is the opportunity for the IT Director? According to Clayton Christianson et al. in their article “The New M&A Playbook” between 70% and 90% of acquisitions fail. When two organisations come together, it can create a significant amount of work to realign processes, organisational structures, integrations between systems, and employment contracts. That by itself, if not planned for, can be more than what the organisation can bear. However, that’s just what is at face value. Mergers can also bring…
Employee Awareness in Information Security
Finding the optimal infosec solution for your organisation
Current and former employees were found to be the biggest source of information breaches globally according to the Global State of Information Security Report in 2016. Information Security, for all the technology that is available, is to a large extent, a people concern. Infosec technology can only go so far in mitigating the risk of a costly information security breach. And the costs can be huge. Not only is there a risk of fraud to your organisation and to its…
Measuring Business Maturity
Results from the 2016 IT Business Partner Survey
In 2016, we carried out a survey of UK based IT Business Partnering professionals (or Business Relationship Management professionals) to assess the state of IT business partnering. The results show a snapshot of the companies in which IT business partner professionals work, and go some way to a better understanding of how IT business partnering is being used to develop organisations effectively or otherwise. The survey measures the degree to which IT Business Partnering is embedded in the culture and…
Corporate Politics in IT Business Partnering
Putting the Relationship into Business Relationship Management
Think of the term ‘Corporate politics’ and it may be that negativity dominates your thoughts. People trying to score points, secrecy and subterfuge, and departments competing against each other may be some of the examples you would quote. Work in a large organisation as an IT Business Partner and you’ll probably feel you could write a book on these issues alone! By Robina Chatham Corporate politics is about ways of handling difference, which can also be achieved through positive means…
Emerging Technology and the Insurance Industry
Thoughts and discussion from Instech2020
In December 2016, Jon Baxter was one of the panel of thought leaders at Instech2020, a conference for top insurance companies, Instechs, and innovators to explore the impact of emerging technology on the insurance industry. It was a fantastic meet up with a wide range of knowledge and expertise shared. At Instech2020, thought leaders were asked their opinions on a range of topics including disruption, the future of insurance brokers, and how change can happen. You can watch Jon’s answers…
Opportunities in IT Capability
Results and findings from our 2016 IT Business Partner Survey
Our UK IT Business Partner Survey has highlighted a weak area in IT Capability – Ensure Benefits Delivery. The term Ensure Benefits Delivery is taken from the COBIT 5 capability model that we use in our diagnostic.. After surveying 63 IT Business Partners on ten capabilities that are most heavily impacted by the role of IT Business Partner, we found that there was some variance on how each of the IT capabilities were effective in organisations. Strengths in IT Capability…
The Role of the IT Business Partner in Organisational Change
Change: Are we ready?
In business, organisational change is inevitable. An organisation has to adapt to changing demands – of the customer and the market, of technology, and of the wider environment. With changing demands, it’s the organisations that can keep up with that change that survive, whilst the others fall behind and eventually by the wayside An effective IT Business Partner can identify the organisational change that is needed to keep the company one step ahead. What an IT Business Partner is good…
What is Shadow IT?
How does Shadow IT impact on Organisational Efficiency?
The rise of SaaS (Software as a service) applications over the last few years has opened up opportunities, and created challenges for anyone in the business of managing organisations of all sizes. While SaaS has enabled smaller businesses to scale up quickly and cheaply, widespread use of SaaS within larger organisations can create headaches for IT departments, and senior managers trying to get their individual teams as effective as possible on their allocated budgets. Where IT management has not been…
The UK IT Business Partner Survey 2016
Results and findings from our 2016 IT Business Partner Survey
In 2016, we decided to assess the role of IT Business Partners in UK companies in the hope of finding out how effective they rate themselves. Organisational effectiveness is achieved when departments work together towards the same aim, sharing knowledge and resources to reach business goals. The role of the IT Business Partner is to maximise the value that these departments can deliver through the use of technology. Our survey set out to find out whether IT Business Partners consider…
Managing Difficult People
Business Relationship Management
This post is an aide-memoire for Business Relationship Managers to help identify the key styles of engagement with Business stakeholders . It is last in a series of posts on how to influence others. In our last post we explored the various styles of engagement used in negotiations and sales interactions, and how we can recognize and utilize those to our advantage. Let's now move on to a topic that we will all inevitably encounter: managing challenging people. The key…
The Grab@Pizza Business Simulation Game
Business Relationship Management
This article is the second part of two that discusses the outcomes of the BRMIConnect,written by Paul Wilkinson, owner and director of Gamingworks, a Baxter Thompson Partner who licences the "Grab-a-Pizza" Business / IT simulation. ‘This was incredible….’, ‘I am so pleased I attended this session…..’ , ‘ I have to do this exercise with our key stakeholders….’, ‘….this clearly shows we have a long, hard, rocky road ahead of us if we want to be seen as a strategic…
