From IT Support Technician to BRM UK Ambassador

From IT Support Technician to BRM UK Ambassador

Networking

I feel like I have told this story in one form or another multiple times to different people at different places but never really committed it to paper. However, after a conversation with APMG at a BRM European networking event, I thought why not?. So, here’s a potted history of my career path, focusing on Business Relationship Management. Hopefully if you are a BRM or an aspiring one it will help you avoid my mistakes and improve on my successes!

Back to the beginning

So, let’s start back at the beginning. Growing up I had my two parents and my older brother, one parent worked as a Lecturer of Politics at Loughborough University and the other worked as a Computer Programmer at various organisations. Little did I know then as a child, how my parent's career choices would have such an impact on my own. What do you get if you cross a University Lecturer and a Computer Programmer?

Where did IT all STEM from?

At school I excelled at Information Technology, Maths and Science and scraped by at anything vaguely artistic (lucky for me I obtained an artistic wife to address this balance for our children). I was also interested in Business Studies and took A-levels in Computer Science, Physics and Business Studies, I then went on to University to study Business Information Systems. At the time I believed this to be the easy parts of Business Studies and the easy parts of Computer Science, looking for the path of least resistance to a University degree!

After graduating I found a job at the local council offices providing IT Support, running around with a screwdriver, packs of floppy disks (yes we still had them then), CD’s and fixing people's computers. Then an opportunity arose to move over to provide this at Loughborough University, my dad being a lecturer there said this would be very good for as I would have a job for life there. The University was and still is renowned for employing people for their entire lives offering them different roles and responsibilities and also a great work life balance. So off I went to Loughborough University working in IT Support and then progressing to Desktop Development, then Server Administration, but I started to notice one important skill I had which lots of other technical people within IT struggled with, I could communicate with people outside of IT!

Identifying the SOFT SKILLS and thinking out of the box

So yes, my technical skills were definitely not as good as my colleague’s, I struggled with Linux and my scripting was pretty basic, but I had better ‘softer’ skills. This was soon recognised by my line manager and she put me into more of an Account Manager role, going out talking to the business finding out what they wanted, making sure they were happy and re-charging for our services as well as doing the financials.

At this time, we were working towards best practices from ITIL and trying to streamline processes. One of the big, major steps I took was to remove internal recharging. Would we really get requests for 100’s of servers if we didn’t recharge? We just needed to ensure we had the right governance and control in place and then we could stop the needless process of handing money back and forth.

Understanding both the IT department and the Business

Then as I made a name for myself in the University as someone who understood the business and could translate the technical jargon into words that meant something to all stakeholders, I started getting more and more meeting invitations.  I was slowly becoming a BRM, even though, at this point, I still had no idea the role even existed.

As our IT department matured into ITIL service delivery we restructured again and again to adjust to best serve the new working practices. During one such restructure I was approached to be half Relationship Manager and half Server Administrator. I was already doing this unofficially so took the job title and role change with no problems at all, but with this new official role I thought I had better start to research best practices to make the most of it.

Best practices - Out with the old and in with the new

Initially I looked to ITIL, which was at that time the golden fountain of knowledge we should all go and drink from at every opportunity. I found a course I could attend, run by the British Computer Society and off I went on my BRM journey. This first foray into BRM training and development was OK but it was still focused on service delivery which at the time was my aim, little did I know what BRM potential was around the corner....

Finding the BRM Institute

Continuing my Google searching for best practices I stumbled across something new - the BRM Institute, this looked like a fantastic resource of information and there was also a community you could fire questions at, I signed up immediately. Reading through the content I kept asking questions, how would this work in my situation where I have this particular set up? The replies came quickly and they were valuable, they gave me real insight into different ways of working out how this BRM function could be so much more than just service delivery.

My conversations with the people at the BRM Institute grew and grew until they offered me a voluntary role working on their leadership team. I was apprehensive at first, after all I was the one asking all the questions.  Would I now be expected to be providing the answers? They said just keep involved, keep giving input and come over to America and help out at the first global BRM conference. Loughborough University were supportive and paid for my flight over, I met my fellow Leaders and we instantly hit it off, we were all finding our feet and decided to just do our best and see how it went. Well it went fantastically, we had BRM’s from around the globe telling their stories and we helped facilitate, we sat on discussion panels and helped our fellow BRMs solve problems we had solved ourselves back in our organisations. It was so rewarding and inspiring to be exposed to such a vibrant and dynamic group of BRMs, I flew back to the UK full of ideas and reenergised for the role.

Becoming a certified BRMP and CBRM

I was then approached by ITWINNERS to see if I would be interested in delivering BRM training. Wow what a fantastic opportunity! I said yes straight away. Having passed the Business Relationship Management Professional (BRMP®) followed by the higher level of Certified Business Relationship Manager (CBRM®) exams, I was then assessed by APMG who came out and watched me train, gave me a knowledge test and got me to the point of being a certified BRM trainer. Now I take a small number of annual leave days to deliver both private and public training classes, which I find wholly rewarding and as I deliver and get the discussions going, I continue to learn more and more. This then feeds back into my day job at Loughborough University helping me to become an even better BRM myself.

What do you get if you cross a University Politics Lecturer with a Computer Programmer?

So, going back to the beginning question what do you get if you cross a University Politics Lecturer with a Computer Programmer?

Answer a University IT Business Relationship Manager who trains!

Business Relationship Management Training

Are you a Business Partner, Engagement Manager or Business Relationship Manager?

Looking for some training?

Yes? great, but the first question is......Why?

Do you need guidance to develop your function and move to a more senior strategic position? 

Are you concerned you are not following best practice and could operate more inline with common practices?

Do you need tools to help you work in a more efficient manner?

I don't teach courses so people can collect certificates for a never ending collection, I run courses to help people develop and improve, as a BRM I am always looking to help people get the most value out of any situation! So please look at the Business Relationship Management Professional course running on the 21st - 23rd of November at Loughborough, UK.

You can sign up here: http://itwinners.com/business-relationship-management/business-relationship-management-professional/

Business Strategy replaced by Business Purpose

There is a new wave of thinking washing over Business Strategy and that is one of Business Purpose, but what is it and how does it affect the BRM function?

After years of trying to align IT Strategy to Business Strategy we realised that the true value was actually in convergence rather than alignment. Don’t have a Business Strategy and a IT Strategy have a single Business Strategy after all there is no such thing as Information Technology just Business Technology, remember its all about the business its goals and strategy to meet those goals, well it was until now....

Now there is a new thinking staying that Business Strategy is too confined and we should rather be thinking of Business Purpose, this white paper outlines it brilliantly well worth the time out to read through it:

https://www.managers.org.uk/~/media/Files/Reports/Guide-for-Leaders-White-Paper.pdf

These three points succinctly cover what is Business Purpose:

1) Purpose is a core and enduring motivation in the company

2) Purpose focuses on the ultimate means provided by the emotional capital to serve others and achieve long-term well being

3) Purpose is the fundamental motivation for the company which inspires the vision and guides the mission and resulting strategy

There are five points as to why you should become Business Purpose driven including increasing business performance. Most interestingly there is a section on how to implement Business Purpose including:

• Engaging Stakeholders to enrich your perspective
• Showing benefits through stories and proof points
• Enabling transparency
• Incentivise purposeful outcomes

Sound familiar? Yes the move to becoming a more Business Purpose driven organisation has many similar steps to becoming a successful Business Relationship Management function. So if you see this movement happening in your organisation or if you propose it, be sure to put BRM in the heart of it to work with the business converged into this new way of thinking.

First Annual UK BRM Community Event

Wow what a week, last week comprised of working through the first ever UK Strategic Partnering Approach Workshop, followed by hosting the first annual UK BRM Community Event. Both of which were hugely beneficial, let’s start with the Community Event.

UK BRM Community Event

Firstly I have a new found respect for Marleen Lundy who organises the global BRM events, it is hard work and stressful! We had fluctuating numbers in the run up to the event but it was looking like we had around 50 - 60 people and then at the last minute we had a few drop out and a few add ons., In the end we had a really nice sized group with a good mix of people. As always we had a mix of job titles from Business Partners to Business Relationship Managers from a variety of industries but we all had similar stories.

We started the day with a few presentations setting the scene of why we were all there and who the professional bodies were in attendance. Gary Hardy from ITWinners who helped pull it all together told everyone who ITWinners were and what they do as well as making it clear that they wanted to set this up but it isn't their event but a BRM event ran by BRMs for BRMs.  More on that later. He also told his story of 'finding' BRM and why he thinks it’s the most powerful needed shift in mindset in current times.

Marleen Lundy then presented about the BRM institute, the delegates in attendance were a mix of active members, members but not that active to not knowing about the Institute at all. The importance of the Institute, the best practices, guidance it provides and the accredited training were key points for the delegates especially the Knowledge Pathway, created by Marleen to help guide personal and BRM function development.

APMG were also in attendance supporting the event and informing the BRMs of how social sharing of accreditation can help promote both BRM as a whole as well as your own personal brand.

The last session of the morning was presented by Mariana Carroll who spoke about BRM and emerging technologies, Mariana has a wealth of experience in this area and was truly inspiring.

In the afternoon we opened the floor for our BRM guests to share their stories, I had my story ready to tell if we needed but my main role was to facilitate others telling theirs. The great thing about working with a room full of BRMs is they all want to communicate and share, my story wasn't needed as we had plenty of others. They ranged from theories on early BRM from the introduction of electricity to Leicester University and the creation of a strategic role over 100 years ago to manage this emerging technology disruption, linking back nicely to Mariana's earlier presentation. To stories of becoming strategic and staying strategic through successful positioning of the role in both hierarchy and boundaries of responsibilities. These story telling sessions really got the room buzzing with ideas and excitement as well as shared pain points. I think next time we meet we will have to facilitate some more of these earlier on and then capture and discuss the points in more detail because we were getting so many golden nuggets of information.

As we approached the end of the day, we asked if anyone was able to stay a bit later and discuss ways to help progress this event in the future. We had a good number stay behind and others running off but stating they still want to help out further. Now we are going to need to pull these people together and start to develop next year’s meet up, let it expand and grow and hopefully become even better each year. We are planning on starting this off via the Community Of Interest for the UK on the BRM Institute Online Campus. If you want to join in pop over and say hello, if you need help getting on just send me a message.

This was my first time trying to organise and pull together an event such as this and I was overjoyed with the outcome and feedback. I can't wait to help out on the next one! Though thankfully with so many enthused BRMs to help the second annual BRM community event should be much easier.

Strategic Partnering Approach Workshop

This is a new workshop and part of the BRM Institute knowledge pathway as outlined here: https://brm.institute/business-relationship-management-knowledge-path-success . It's a practical application of the theory which results in a strategic plan for your BRM function. As we had already completed the BRMP training we were familiar with the theory so managed to skip over some of the content and get stuck into the meat of the workshop.

We ran through various maturity assessment pieces which highlighted some areas for improvement, some of which were well within our control others were outside it at an organisational level. The ones outside of our immediate control were considered and some of which we are going to put forward as institutional change requests, but the politics and governance to implement them will be much harder than the changes closer to home.

We then prioritised our potential improvements and started work on a plan to progress our BRM function. Using a combination of these techniques and the excellent knowledge of Gary Hardy from ITWinners we were able to create a great strategic action plan. This is going to form the basis of a BRM re-launch for our function as we re-position, re-focus and clarify our value offering both now and for the future. It's bringing a new energy to the team and we can’t wait to get started on the next leg of our BRM journey!

About me

I am a full time BRM at Loughborough University for IT Services, I am also a qualified BRM trainer, currently offering the Business Relationship Management Professional training and other consultancy. If you would like to go through the BRMP training with a practising BRM drop me a mail, I use my knowledge to liven up the theory with lots of real life examples!

BRM Events Update!

Here’s a quick update on the upcoming Business Partner / Business Relationship Management events we are running at Loughborough (One of which is FREE! limited places though so book early) 11th – 12th June: Strategic Partnering Approach Workshop - £1,000 per person - This unique and practical workshop enables the theory of BRM to be translated into a strategy for adoption. It provides you with roadmap for improved BRM capability to achieve strategic partnering, leveraging the new BRM Playbook in a technologically advanced interactive workshop. More info and register here: https://bit.ly/2qny5Ov 13th June: Networking Event – FREE - ITWinners, in association with BRM Institute and Loughborough University will host this UK meetup. You’ll meet with peers, receive insights about global adoption of BRM and hear from some special guest speakers – including Marleen Lundy of BRM Institute, Nick Houlton COO APMG and Dr. Mariana Carroll. This is a free event, but we request that you book your space to ensure there is sufficient seating and catering. More info and register here: http://itwinners.com/newsevents/brmukannualcommunityevent2018/ 18th – 20th June: Business Relationship Management Professional Course - £1,500 per person - Understand the role, concepts, drivers and structure needed for a successful function. Includes (class, exam, 1 year membership to BRM Institute, 1 year access to ITWinners eLearning tool) More info and register here: https://t.co/cbOByDYDyo Also the same course is running on the 1st – 3rd October: (for those who need a bit more time to request funding) 

New BRMP Classes

Excited to be offering two Business Relationship Management Professional [BRMP®] courses at Loughborough this year.

18th – 20th June 2018

1st – 3rd October 2018

Find out more and register here: https://t.co/cbOByDYDyo 

I will be using an exciting blended learning approach, using a much more fun and interactive delivery method than the normal PowerPoint. Also I’m using my experience of working as a BRM in the public sector where it’s not all about the money and profit margins as well as the shared experiences from my friends and colleagues at the BRM Institute.

Also alongside the June session we will be running a further workshop and conference/networking event. Plans are still being formed but we are expecting these sessions to be offering something new and exciting for the UK. 

New Year, New Me?

Well after a relatively quiet year from a work perspective I have had a busy one in my personal life having my wife give birth to a baby boy. Looking back though all things BRM in my life have also moved on, all be it at a slightly slower rate while I focused on my new family extension.

So last year I attended conferences big and small, won an award for BRM innovation of the year from ITSMFUK and tried to keep up with all the goings on at the BRM Institute.

Now with a new year its a good time to re-group and re-focus and set your sights on some new challenges and opportunities. For me this means looking at a number of different areas:

1) Loughborough University Business Partnering for IT Services - This is my "day job" and is constantly progressing and maturing as a function. For the new year its time to review the longer term plans and make sure we are all still on track, check what needs adjusting and setting some medium term objectives to meet this year. This year the focus will be on expanding the strategic partnerships out to those at a lower maturity level and looking at adjusting the levels of engagement to maximise the resources we have available. Unfortunately in these times the pressure is on financially and that hits our resources so we have to "do more with less" or "work smarter not harder"

2) The BRM Institute - This is a big part of my work life, working as vice chair to the leadership team is a big responsibility and takes a lot of time and effort. As we are expanding as an institute we need to also plan and re-adjust, so I am just at the minute in the middle of working out how best I can help facilitate that and what plans I can help push forward. As always exciting times a we grow, mature and adjust to the changing landscape.

3) IT Winners - I have just signed up to work with IT Winners as an Associate and BRM trainer, I cannot wait to deliver my first BRMP training course and work with this group of talented people to further expand my BRM horizons! Watch this space for more info on this soon!

So as well as all the normal New Years resolutions, get fit, eat healthy, drink less alcohol, spend more time with family and friends, travel more and see the world....what work life changes are you making? how are you going to focus your efforts and progress this year?

There is no such thing as an IT Strategy!

Business strategy is the only strategy, that's right there is no IT strategy, that IT strategy document you've been working on for months is worthless and here’s why.

The IT strategy is a supporting strategy to support the overarching business strategy, yes this is true but does it have any worth? Now we all know it’s hard to get anyone to read a long winded strategy, so often these supporting strategies come in two forms the long one and the one sider overview. I’m going to argue both are pointless, although I’m willing to be proven wrong as I have been a big fan of them in the past and could just be having an off day.

Lets take the one sider first, that's got to be useful hasn't it? Ok lets take it to the senior business leaders who are in charge of the organisational strategy first, they have their strategy saying they want to be doing X and Y to get to point Z in the next 5 years. Now we take the IT one side strategic overview saying we will help their strategy by doing A and B so we are at point C. Now if the business leaders have no faith in IT and IT have failed to deliver in the past they may take an interest in the details of this but ultimately they have told you to support X and Y and to come with them to point Z, so just get on with it the best way you can, that's what they pay you for. If anything is happening that results in going off track then tell us.

Ok so the top level isn’t interested what about the people working towards the strategy within IT? They need to align their services and projects with the IT strategy right? Wrong. They need to be thinking about the business strategy and not getting bogged down in this supporting strategy that will most likely be out of date by the time they read it, they need to understand from a high level where the organisation is going and adjust accordingly. Yes, I suppose the IT strategy could be seen as a tool to enable staff to better understand this by providing them a stepping stone they can relate to, but this runs the risk of them using this tool as a final strategy and not looking beyond to what is really needed.

So what about the long strategy the one no one reads, well that is often used for one purpose and that is to justify projects. We are doing this project because it works towards the strategic aim 3.78b in the IT strategy, no you are not, you are doing the project because you want to, you like the technology, you want to work with that team of people again, there is another true reason and you are using the strategy to justify it. This happens all too much in my experience and without an IT strategy this would not be possible, projects would have to relate to the true business strategy.

So all of that might sound like someone who has gotten out of bed the wrong side this morning and it is all a bit one sided but hopefully it will make you think and start a debate around what strategies are needed and why. 

Measure Your BRM to Change Your BRM

Now, no one really wants to blow their own trumpet, peacock feathers splayed, and go strutting up and down the workplace shouting about how great they are. However, sometimes this behaviour is necessary to measure your effectiveness and how well your function is performing—although you may want to keep the peacock feathers to a minimum!

The reasons for this can be easily categorised into the familiar Run, Grow, and Transform framework:

• Run – Firstly, it may be a requirement from your organisation to justify your existence, so to survive and run the BRM function you may need to measure your effectiveness and report back to your superiors proving your function is still a valuable asset.
• Grow – This is to bid for additional resources to be applied to your function; in the case of BRM this is almost always additional staff resources. Generally because of the great successes and huge benefits the function brings, but that doesn’t mean you don’t need to prove it from time to time.
• Transform – Lastly, you may want to measure your effectiveness to help transform the function to focus on either new areas or shift some resources onto a particular area. This may be due to a change in strategy from the organisation, or because there is a particular piece of value that has been identified. Either way, this could highlight both the additional value in another direction, or a loss of value in an area you need to move away from.

So now that you have a good understanding of why you want to measure your effectiveness, how do you start?

There are a number of quantitative and qualitative measures that could be focused upon, and this number will vary hugely between organisations. Quantitative measures could be high-level figures, such as the number of projects delivered in a particular strategic area or the value delivered to a particular business unit over a period of time. You could also focus on the value beyond the internal business, such as a measure on customer experience feedback into the organisation. The qualitative areas are harder to measure in an objective and unbiased way; often, multiple viewpoints need to be gathered to investigate low scores and any differences.

Lastly, take particular care when selecting the criteria for measuring the effectiveness of your BRM function, as it not only has to hold true and be relevant now, it also needs to maintain that level of relevance for years to come. Otherwise, when you analyse your year-on-year trends, you may find that you no longer have the data you need to help you Run, Grow, or Transform your BRM function into the direction you desire—and this data is the critical first step to being able to measure effectiveness. After all, before you make a change, you need to know exactly where you’re coming from.

Internal Focus: Building Relationships with BRMs and Peers

As BRMs, we should be experts in building relationships, but since no two relationships are the same, no one technique for building and improving them will work across the board. That said, I am always open to advice and guidance on any new skills or approaches I could use that could help me, so in thinking of others who may feel similarly, I thought I should share some of the tips I have received recently.

The first tip that was brought to my attention recently is that while we often think of technology bringing us closer together, it turns out that it can actually be a relationship killer, whereas face-to-face engagement can be a much stronger way of building relationships. While I’m still not sure that I entirely agree, it did make me think critically about my patterns of communication and human interaction. As BRMs, we should try not to hide behind a screen pinging emails back and forth, and instead get out of our offices and meet face-to-face. The reason for this is that so much is told via body language, which makes interactions flow and work progress.

When a BRM meets face-to-face with a business partner, they normally have one thing at the forefront of their mind: value. As much as the focus should be on value delivery, however, there are often some more subtle things to think about. Examples of these things can be as simple as eye contact, smiling, having an upright posture, and displaying curiosity leading to a connection based on a common interest. Even a smooth, fluid handshake has been proven to offer a greater connection than a jerky, rigid one. Other research suggests that people are more likely to be open to agreeing and being influenced after they have eaten and are sitting on a comfortable surface, so those post-lunch meetings should theoretically be much more successful than the ones just before lunch. However, it’s important not to force these subtle engagement changes—obviously, it’s not the best idea to hug someone you've never met whilst smiling in their face and offering them a sandwich to eat and a beanbag to sit on!

Once you’ve considered these social interactions, you need to think about the content of your engagements, beginning with a clear agenda that benefits each member of the meeting. After all, if someone isn’t benefiting from the meeting, then why are they there? It’s important to be transparent and inclusive about the intention of the meeting, let the relevant people in the meeting have their say, and prompt those who haven’t spoken for their opinion.

Beyond conversational engagement, the single most important part of relationship building is attentive listening. A BRM is not there to sell to the provider, but to listen and see how they can shape the provider to their business partner’s needs. Therefore, it’s critical to find out what is important to the provider, what drives them forward, and what they are working towards in both the short and long term, in order to have a successful relationship. All of this ties back to maintaining a level of curiosity that leads to finding a common interest or issue that can be worked on.

By building up from a sound social interaction base, to a clear and inclusive engagement, up to value delivery, a successful relationship will form—and more importantly, persist long after that initial interaction.

Challenging Changes: Organisational Cultures and How to Handle Them

While change can be both tricky and expensive within organisations, it’s also necessary in order for the organisation to innovate and adapt to the world around it. Needless to say, however, the implementation of a new BRM capability can be challenging if the culture within the organisation is prohibitive.

The actual implementation of a BRM capability is essentially a business process change, which is achieved by business process re-engineering (BPR). BPR is about being innovative and thinking ‘outside of the box.’ As Archer and Bowker put it, BPR is “a vision-led structured methodology for the fundamental rebuilding of business process through the balanced interaction of work tasks, people, information, and technology.” To re-engineer a business process is to completely rethink the way it works from beginning to end, questioning everything from the perspectives of both the customer and internal efficiency.

BPR is likely to entail not just the reorganisation of roles and responsibilities, but also some fundamental changes in the organisational culture. When faced with this challenge, it is important to first identify your organisational culture, which is often heavily influenced by the managerial cultures and are commonly categorised into the sections below:

Autocratic power culture – Led by management, wherein an autocratic leader can be charismatic and well-respected.

Bureaucratic role culture – Formal and centralised, wherein everyone’s roles are clearly defined and relationships are also clearly set out. However, there are often informal relationships and roles that people exploit to get things done quicker and easier, rather than using the formal channels. This can be particularly important in areas of organisations that have a specific technological expertise.

Matrix task-based culture – Tasks are devolved to the lowest practical level in a project management style.

Anarchic individualistic culture – Informal and decentralised, in which everybody has a say in all decisions.

Whatever your organisational culture, it needs an appropriate approach to ensure success—and this may mean changing the culture completely. Davenport and Short^[2] summarise the culture on which successful business change must rest, expressing that organisational culture must move from:

• Hierarchies to teams
• Controlling to empowering
• Analysis to action
• Risk aversion to calculated risk taking
• Boundaries to networks

Commitment to change

Once you’ve determined your organizational culture, the next step is to build commitment to the change you are trying to implement—in this case, a new BRM capability. Yeates and Cadle^[3] state that in order to get all staff to commit to the organisation’s mission statement—and to make the pursuit of improvement a core feature of the organisation’s culture— organisations must be willing to spend the money to adopt a distinctive managerial style. The two key goals they identify are:

• The removal of hierarchical differentiators, with the same privileges for management and staff alike. This also fits into Robertson’s current style of thinking, Holacracy.^[4]
• The application of resources, such as quality improvement teams to identify and solve quality problems. A BRM team could fill this role!

Widespread organisational commitment is integral to the success of the new BRM capability, as it sets the stage for C-level buy-in. Hammer & Champy detail some further benefits, including the organization’s transformation into becoming processed and culture-focused, which helps to empower the right people in the right way, improve understanding, and focus on value delivery.

Common obstacles

Of course, it’s unlikely that such a tremendous business reorientation would be accepted without a fuss in most organisations. Some common obstacles to change I have encountered are people’s inherent fear of change, an inability to see the potential benefits of the change, pockets of resistance from some stakeholders, general confusion about the scope of the change, lack of commitment to the change, and unrealistic timelines for people to see the benefits of the change.

Without a patient and thoughtful CIO at the helm, all of these obstacles could very well be the downfall of the new BRM capability within the organisation. The support of C-level management is critical in these instances, as well as a strong organisational understanding of the BRM capability and its benefits.

Climbing the ladder of support

Jobber^[5] offers a useful typology termed the “ladder of support,” which identifies the different stages of acceptance displayed by those affected by the change:

• Opposition – When employees are openly against the change, and use direct and forceful methods to try and stop it
• Resistance - When employees show their displeasure about the change less openly, and more passive-aggressive in tactics to delay or stop it
• Compliance - Employees will act in accordance to the change, but still believe that it is not the best option, so they do so with minimal effort
• Acceptance - There is a high level of support, and employees realise the benefits of the change and will work towards the change
• Commitment - Employees are committed to the change, fully believe in it, and work towards it with conviction and enthusiasm

It is important to note that this is not a simple hierarchical chain—people can start anywhere on the ladder and move in either direction. Therefore, it’s important to find out where key stakeholders are on the ladder and help move them in the right direction.

Conclusion

When implementing a new BRM capability, it is absolutely critical to analyse your organisational culture before setting any other steps in motion. Ask yourself, What managerial styles are in place in my organisation? Do they differ throughout different business functions within the organisation, or do they shift as I move up and down the hierarchy? What is a tried-and-true method to approaching change with these groups? Which methods of resistance could I potentially run into?

In order to ensure that the BRM capability thrives within the organisation, you must be prepared with answers to all of these questions—and then some. Can you think of some other questions you’ll need to answer before beginning this journey?

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[1] Archer, Richard and Bowker, Pauk. (1995), “BPR consulting: an evaluation of the methods employed”, Business Process Re-engineering & Management Journal, Vol. 1 No. 2, pp. 28-46.

[2] Davenport, T H and Short, J E. (1990), “The new industrial engineering: information technology and business process redesign”, Sloan Management Review, Summer, pp. 11 - 27

[3] Yeats, D and Cadle, J. (1996),”Project Management for Information Systems”, Pitman publishing.

[4] Robertson, Brian J. (2015),” Holacracy: The Revolutionary Management System that Abolishes Hierarchy”, Portfolio Penguin

[5] Jobber, D. (2001), “Principles and Practice of Marketing”, McGraw Hill, 2^nd edition.

The role of the Council at BRMI conferences

Below is a copy of my article for the BRMI newsletter, the original article can be found here.

Welcome to this edition of the BRM Council Corner! This month, we will discuss the role of the Council at BRMI conferences. There has been only one conference to date, but what a conference it was! To see just how amazing it was click here.

BRMConnect 2015 was held in Portland, Oregon, and the Council was honored to perform the role of owner and facilitator at the conference. Our responsibilities included helping to welcome the delegates to the venue, putting them at ease, and answering any questions that arose. Additionally, we managed breakout groups to evoke participation and creativity, which was particularly rewarding when we solved some key issues people were facing in their work. Most importantly, however, it was a pleasure to join in and ensure that everyone was having fun and getting as much BRM value as possible.

This was a highly rewarding role for the Council, between our assistance with bringing everything together to seeing the value transferred from the conference delivery to the delegates. One session I particularly enjoyed was the simulation in which we put the theory and advice into action in a simulated, “real-life” situation. This was kept light-hearted and fun, while also highlighting the issues and techniques needed to overcome them in an organizational environment—the beer and pizza provided was the icing on the cake.

In 2016, we now have the exciting prospect of not one, but four BRMConnect conferences spread throughout the year and across the globe—so despite four times the work, there will also be four times the reward (and of course, four times the fun!). This year, the Council members are thrilled to have the opportunity to take on more responsibilities within the conferences by becoming more involved in the planning stages, as well as the ownership and facilitation of the conferences.
Among these increased responsibilities, members of the Council will be able to join planning groups in charge of tasks such as helping to choose venues, working out logistics, and finding local events that can complement the conference. Members will also now be able to review the conference content and decide what information may be more relevant in specific parts of the world. For example, I’m working on the BRMConnect conference in Amsterdam, and I know that within Europe, BRMs are twice as likely to use service management techniques than in the United States. Therefore, conference attendees will benefit greatly from a session highlighting where service management ends and business relationship management continues, in order to add extra value to location-specific BRMs. It’s exciting to be able to use my professional knowledge and experience to impact BRMs positively across the world!

Although BRMConnect is still in its infancy—being a mere one year old—the resounding success of the inaugural conference shows great promise for 2016 and beyond. With the continuous evolution and improvement of BRMI, it truly is an exciting time for the BRM Council to be involved! Be sure to register for one of the four conferences now!

BRM facilitating innovation

The BRM is fundamental to business convergence, helping to bring together business operations and business functions at a strategic level. Leading organizations are now eliminating the service silos of yesterday, empowering business functions such as IT, HR, finance and the other departments to share accountability for strategy and business value through a teamed approach to value realization.

We know that the business innovates by changing business processes, expanding into new markets, creating new products, and exploiting changes to the macro-environment. On other hand, we are also aware that the business functions drive innovation as well, particularly through the expansion of capabilities and potential offerings. This is especially true of the IT sector, where the recent explosion of cloud-based IT services makes innovative capabilities newly available every day.

So how exactly does the BRM help facilitate the convergence of the business operation and function to produce innovative value creation?

For one thing, the BRM must keep up-to-date with the industry’s latest capabilities, as well as those within the business operational and functional capabilities. This way, the BRM will be aware of all the possibilities available to support the business’ ever-evolving needs. Ideally, this responsibility should be formalized in the BRM job description, as well as in other key roles.

Google used to encourage employees to spend 20% of their time on their own innovative ideas to add value to the company, which resulted in some fantastic services—and many failed ideas. Now, the company focuses on taking a more measured approach, encouraging innovation through a more top-down system in which specific areas or problems must be solved in innovative ways. In your organization, you may have some dedicated groups working in a similar model to Google, or you may even have innovative internal roles like that of the  Cloud Services Manager, whose responsibility it is to look at emerging cloud offerings and how they could be integrated within existing systems to bring added capabilities and value to the organization. If you’re really lucky, you may even have a Futurologist (coolest job title ever!) who is dedicated to looking beyond the current internal and external capabilities and instead foreseeing what is likely to be available in the future. With this role in your organization, you could plan to innovate and get even further ahead of the innovation curve.

However it works within your organization—and whatever functional area the BRM is in—the role of the BRM is key to merging not only the business operations and functions, but also their respective innovations, in order to ensure that they move together as a strategic partnership. Your BRM may not have a crystal ball, but you can certainly try and glimpse into a future of realized value—and then try and steer the convergence towards it.

The Unflappable BRM

I was recently reminded of the importance of keeping a cool head during stressful situations  while reading articles about the new CEO of Google, Sundar Pichai. One story that went viral on the internet was the “cockroach story” he supposedly delivered at a recent speech. (I say supposedly as the story is at least four years old and he may not have even delivered it—you really can’t believe everything you read online—but regardless, the moral still holds true. Here is the story:

“At a restaurant, a cockroach suddenly flew out from somewhere and landed on a guest, who promptly  started screaming. The guest began jumping around and wringing both hands, desperately trying to get rid of the cockroach. Their reaction was contagious, as everyone in the group also began panicking. Finally, the guest managed to push the cockroach away, but unfortunately, it immediately landed on someone else in the group. Now, it was the next person’s turn to continue the drama.

The server rushed forward to their rescue, but in the flurry of movement, the cockroach next landed on the server’s shirt. However,  instead of panicking, the server stood firm and composed, and observed the behavior of the cockroach patiently. After a few still moments, the server was finally able to calmly pick it off and throw it out of the restaurant.

Sipping my coffee and watching the amusement, I began wondering, did the cockroach necessarily warrant the guests’ panicked behavior? If so, then why was the server able to handle the situation without any chaos?

I realized then that it is not the shouting of my father or my boss or my wife that disturbs me, but rather my inability to peacefully handle the disturbance caused by their shouting that further disturbs me. The traffic jams on the road don’t disturb me inherently, but rather my inability to handle the disturbance caused by the traffic jam that disturbs me.

More than the problem, it's my reaction to the problem that further creates chaos in my life.

Lessons learnt from the story:

I understood that in lieu of a knee-jerk reaction, I should instead respond. The guests in the restaurant reacted, whereas the server responded.

Reactions are instinctive, whereas responses take time to think about in order to save a situation from going awry, to prevent cracks in relationships, and to avoid making decisions while angry, anxious, stressed, or rushed.”  

This story shows how reactiveness can often cause increased panic, and exacerbate the situation rather than resolving it. On the other hand, a calm, measured response can bring value.

So how does this relate to the world of BRM? Well, although we would like to spend 100% of the time working strategically with our business partners, there will be times when a major incident occurs and our business partners and the provider will need us to help them through it. In these situations, the calm, unflappable BRM can play a key role by remaining calm and facilitating the cockroach’s removal from the restaurant. Adding value to a fraught situation is always appreciated, from both sides of the BRM role, so always try to remember to remain calm, gather the relevant information and respond accordingly or help facilitate the correct response.