Strategic IT Management Course Overview

Strategic IT Management

• The course is offered by the Chair of Business Information Systems at Chemnitz University of Technology.
• The professor is Dr. Barbara Dinter
• The course's website is: http://www.tu-chemnitz.de/wirtschaft/wi1
• The winter semester is 2024/2025

Job Posting

• There is a part-time position available at the Business Information Systems 1 chair.
• Required tasks include research, data analysis, website maintenance, and course revision/support.
• Necessary skills include independent work, teamwork, web development knowledge (HTML, PHP), and proficiency with MS Office software in German and English.
• The link to the position is: https://www.tu-chemnitz.de/wirtschaft/wi1/stellenangebote/hiwi.html

Literature

• ISO/IEC 38500:2015 (en) Information technology - Governance of IT for the organization
• Weill, Peter; Ross, Jeanne: IT Governance - How Top Performers Manage IT. Harvard Business School Press, Boston, 2004.
• COBIT 2019: Introduction & Methodology
• COBIT 2019: Governance & Management Objectives
• Tiemeyer, Ernst: Enterpise IT-Governance
• Yassine Maleh, Abdelkebir Sahid, Mustapha Belaissaoui: Strategic IT Governance and Performance Frameworks in Large Organizations, IGI Global, 2019

Today's Lecture: IT Governance and COBIT

• IT Governance
  • Introduction
  • Understanding according to Weill and Ross
  • IT governance & digital transformation
• COBIT
  • Overview
  • Implementation
  • Reading COBIT 2019

Corporate Governance

• Describes a system of rules, practices, and processes for balancing stakeholder interests (management and shareholders).
• Aims to gain long-term added value for the organization.
• Corporate governance is generally understood and defined.
• Goals: Transparency in internal processes, strengthening internal/organizational controls, and improving the quality of business processes/financial reports.

IT Governance (1)

• IT governance is the subset of corporate governance specifically related to IT.
• It's a core managerial task to ensure the use of IT is strategy-compliant and effective.
• Design of suitable organizational structures and IT processes for efficient IT use and handling potential risks.
• Scope of IT action is defined by goals, processes, and responsibilities, overseen by executive/senior management.

IT Governance (2)

• Decision fields:
  • Determining the role of IT in the organization.
  • Alignment of business and IT strategy.
  • Requirements and risk management.
  • IT product and service portfolio.
  • Regulation of responsibilities and guidelines.
  • Development of IT enterprise architecture.
  • Controlling and auditing IT performance.
• Best practices standards (e.g., COBIT) to support implementation of IT governance.

IT Governance Understanding according to Weill and Ross (1)

• Defining decision rights and the framework for accountability to incentivize desirable behaviors in IT use.
• It's a system of decision rights and responsibilities.
• Determining: who makes decisions on IT, who participates in those decisions, and holding participants accountable for roles.
• Organizational structural and process aspects, fundamental to IT decisions, play a role.
• Business/IT alignment as a primary driver for IT governance.
• Less focus on control mechanisms compared to COBIT.

IT Governance Understanding according to Weill and Ross (2)

• Five aspects of IT governance:
  • (Abstract) principles for IT that support business operations and define fundamental IT rules.
  • Architecture decisions for logical/technical system structure and integration.
  • Infrastructure with shared/central IT services.
  • Business requirements for IT application demands.
  • Investment decisions for structuring, focusing and prioritizing IT projects.

IT Governance and Digital Transformation

• Digital transformation involves leveraging new technologies like social media, mobile devices, etc. to streamline processes, improve customer experience, and create new business models.
• This usually requires a company-wide digital transformation strategy.
• A new area of IT governance: digital transformation governance; that aligns with corporate goals and assigns responsibilities—establishing roles like Chief Digital Officer (CDO) for central digital transformation leadership.

Overview COBIT 2019 (1)

• Motivation behind COBIT 2019: increasing business data and processes requires proper governance to avoid error-prone situations.
• COBIT 2019 is a framework for directing and monitoring Information and Technology (I&T).
• Integrates multiple standards, aims to create business value, and satisfies stakeholder needs via I&T governance systems.

Overview COBIT 2019 (2)

• Main idea is structured IT management through control objectives and processes.
• COBIT includes:
  • Goals Cascade
  • Governance and Management Objectives
  • Governance System Components
  • Stakeholders
  • Information Criteria

Goals Cascading According to COBIT 2019

• Stakeholder Drivers and Needs (balancing benefits, risks, resources to realize value creation).
• 13 Enterprise Goals (e.g., quality of management information, staff skills, motivation, and productivity).
• 13 Alignment Goals (e.g., quality of I&T management information, links between enterprise goals and governance/management objectives)
• 40 Governance and Management Objectives (e.g., managed performance and conformance monitoring).

Governance and Management Objectives

• Total number of objectives: 40.
• Breakdown into governance and management domains.
• Specific objectives relating to particular business and IT functions.
• Objectives cover evaluation, alignment, planning, implementation, and service delivery across the entire organization.

The Governance System Components (1):

• Governance systems' role is to enable meeting governance and management objectives.
• Example (MEA01-Managed Performance and Conformance Monitoring), which includes five processes.
  • Organizational structures
  • Policy recommendations
  • Input information objects
  • Cultural recommendations
  • Skill recommendations.

The Governance System (2):

• Governance system viewed as comprised of core components including culture, ethics, behavior, people/skills, processes, and information (in relation to organizational structures, M&G Objectives, and services/infrastructure/applications).

Stakeholders

• Internal stakeholders (Boards, Executives, Business Managers, IT Managers, Assurance Providers, Risk Management) and external stakeholders (Regulators, Business Partners, IT Vendors) covered.
• Understanding the benefit of COBIT and internal/external stakeholders.

Information Criteria

• Information must satisfy business objectives and conform to certain criteria (quality criteria).
• Criteria include accuracy, objectivity, believability, reputation, relevancy, completeness, currency, appropriate amount, consistent representation, interpretability, understandability, ease of manipulation, availability and accessibility restrictions.

Components of COBIT 2019

• Main books: Introduction & Methodology, Governance & Management Objectives, Implementation Guide, and Design Guide (Excursion).
• Focus areas: COBIT for small and medium enterprises, DevOps, Information and Technology Risk and Information Security.

Overview COBIT 2019

• Inputs (standards, frameworks, regulations, community contribution).
• COBIT Core Reference Model of Governance and Management Objectives.
• Design factors
• Focus areas
• Tailored Enterprise Governance System.
• Information and Technology.
• Priority governance objectives and management guidance based on focus areas for various capabilities (e.g., SME, Security, Risk, DevOps).

Governance System Implementation (1)

• COBIT 2019 consists of 40 governance and management objectives.
• Difficulty in implementing all objectives is acknowledged.
• Focus areas (e.g., SMEs, cybersecurity, digital transformation, cloud computing, DevOps) are needed to select starting points for governance system implementation.

Governance System Implementation (2)

• Design factors influence the design of governance systems impacting strategy, goals, size, risk profiles, threat landscapes, information technologies, roles/responsibilities, and regulatory compliance.

Display of Governance and Management Objectives

• The structure includes a domain name, description and purpose of the objective.
• Focus area refers to the COBIT publication for context and clarification.

Goals Cascade

• Describes the relation between governance and management objectives (and enterprise goals)
• Includes example metrics for each enterprise goal and alignment goal covered.

Processes (1) and (2)

• Each governance and management objective includes specific management practices
• Describes practices through example metrics.
• Activities in relation to capabilities of the enterprise.
• References to other process standards.

Organizational Structure

• Organizational structures are outlined through RACI charts.
• Highlights responsibilities, accountabilities, consultation and information requirements.

Information Flows and Items

• References the outputs from other processes for proper implementation.
• Does not reference every process that receives input output (more detail is provided in a separate table).

People, Skills and Competencies

• Focuses on necessary human resources and skills for attainment of governance and management objectives.
• Based on guidance from the Skills Framework for the Information Age (SFIA version 6).

Principles, Policies and Procedures

• Provides instructions on relevant policies and procedures for the governance objectives.
• Example of policy related guidelines.

Culture, Ethics and Behavior

• Governance element on culture, ethics and behavior for maintaining desired cultural aspects in the organization and achieving the governance/management objective.
• Includes referenced standards.

Services, Infrastructure and Applications

• Information on third-party services, infrastructure types and applications that support the attainment of a governance/management objective.
• Provides primarily generic advice.

Explore the Strategic IT Management course offered by Dr. Barbara Dinter at Chemnitz University of Technology for the winter semester 2024/2025. This course focuses on IT governance, data analysis, and essential skills for a part-time position within the Business Information Systems chair. Ideal for students looking to enhance their knowledge and career prospects in IT management.