This is no place to get all party political but did you see the look in Iain Duncan Smith’s face when he heard that there was provision for a national living wage in the budget? This tells us two things. First, he genuinely wanted one. Second, the Chancellor is a bit secretive and won’t even tell his colleagues when he agrees with something.
Austerity is still with us and it’s likely to affect the culture of the boardroom, so there’s a lot to learn from politics. Duncan Smith will have been cajoling, asking, dropping hints and persuading all over the place for the living wage. He will have made overt and if not exactly covert then not completely open bids for its funding. As everyone saw, he was over the moon when he got it.
IT directors need to take a similar view. There’s no longer any point in putting a bid in for funding and leaving it at that. You need to champion IT, to focus on the benefits rather than the technology and offer some sort of vision of the business case.
If you don’t, someone else with their eye on the corporate pot will.
