Ignite Lab

It’s customary at this time of year for the media commentators to do one of two things:

• A retrospective on what 2010 brought – the events, mishaps and surprises.
• A look forward to 2011 – predictions and forecasts of what will take the world by storm and what, specifically, CIOs will need to be able to grapple with.

We’re well into 2011 now, so here’s our take on what we think the year has in store for senior IT executives, but with a twist.  We aren’t technologists; our focus is on what it takes to extract value from technology , and what we believe 2011 will bring is an increasingly loud and clear call for CIOs to go beyond project delivery and ‘keeping the lights on’ – into the whole arena of business value.  We see more and more evidence that senior management teams are waking up to the fact that delivering technology projects to time and budget is only part of the story.  More and more emphasis is rightly being placed on what you need to do to get value from the system long after the project team has gone away.

Will your IT team surprise you this year?

Read on →

In the current climate councils are faced with the challenge of cutting cost but do want to default to cutting levels of service.

But is the process of enabling the community to do more for itself just a polite way of dressing up a service cut. At Ignite we would argue not – what is important is using the scarce resources of the council to deliver outcomes for the community.

Building the capacity of the community also needs to go hand in hand with the sensible management of expectations of what the council will do and what the community – and individuals within it – need to take responsibility for. Read on →

Eric Pickles was recently heard saying that it is all about localisation/localisation/localisation, but not necessarily in that order. Whatever your view of localisation his point was well made.

So it is with managing change.  Engage/Engage/Engage, but not necessarily in that order.

Anyone who has attempted to manage change that does not have the support of the organisation knows that it is like pushing jelly uphill.  You can’t keep it all together and any progress seems to slip through your fingers. Read on →

It may sound perverse, but the cost challenges now facing local authorities may well present leaders with the biggest opportunity in a generation to change the face of local government. Stakeholders can see what is happening and will never be more open to fresh ideas.

 Local authorities now have an extra layer of clarity. The general consensus seems to be that at 28% the cuts are slightly less painful than the worst expectations.  What came as a nasty surprise was that the cuts are to be front loaded. Whatever the interpretation – it is time to act.

Being bold is a core value at Ignite so it is not too surprising that we encourage clients to follow the mantra. But what does it mean in practice to be bold and how do you convert the sentiment into something tangible.

We liken it to quitting your job and setting up your own business. The moment you make the decision to draw a line and part with the past is the moment when a huge burden is lifted.  Your focus immediately shifts to the design of a very different future – ideas start to flow and people around you become engaged with the creation of something special. Anyone who has done it will tell you how liberating it can be.

So it is with fundamental change.  Read on →

This is a paper that formed the basis for a presentation given by Ignite director Tim Connolly at the IBC Media Convention in Amsterdam in September 2010. 

It would be easy to start this session on a downbeat note.  If managing change around new technology and workflow were easy, we wouldn’t be talking about it this afternoon.  I could easily start with a depressing list of what often goes wrong … and I will do that in a minute, although I shall try to do it in a positive and uplifting way.  But instead let’s start with the good news.  As a race, we humans are brilliant at adapting and responding to new technology.  We do it all the time.  Look around you, look at every aspect of your life.  We travel, communicate, entertain ourselves, feed ourselves, conduct our financial affairs, wash our clothes and dishes, protect our homes, educate our children – I could go on – using technology that has at the very least been transformed many times over in our lifetime and in some cases has enabled us to do things that previous generations would only have dreamed of. Read on →

We’ve previously written about the emergence of the technology function from the back office and how IT teams are increasingly playing their rightful role in leading and enabling new business models.  Clearly, the role of the technology function must have implications for ways of working, skills and performance measures.  But is the core capability so different, whether you are looking for process efficiencies or leading the transformation to updated or new and innovative business models?

Read on →

“Actively engaging customers in a meaningful and creative way to inform the future direction of an organization is a powerful tactic.”

There is no doubting the changing nature of the relationship between customer and supplier. Modern technology, globalisation and changing lifestyles are all reasons why an organisation needs to respond to a new breed of confident and empowered customer.

But how far should this impact spread? There is a myriad of examples of organisations that have gone to extraordinary lengths to get closer to their customers. In terms of engaging them to help develop innovative new products or services, successes at Lego are often cited as a compelling argument for finding ways to tap into the creativity and insight of existing customers. BMW has found a way to collect the views and opinions of car enthusiasts and is using these to inform future commercial activities. Computer gaming giants have for many years benefited from being able to co-create products with computer-savvy youths.

So what have the most forward thinking organisations suggested are the key things to get right when engaging customers in informing the development of future products & services?

Read on →

For a short time in July this year, one face dominated the British newspapers; that of Raoul Moat. An aspect of the saga which proved most shocking for the majority of the British public was the outpouring of support for the killer who, after a week on the run, took his own life. Comments on the Facebook group ‘R.I.P. RAOUL MOAT YOU LEGEND!’ ranged from the excessively violent to mild respect for his self proclaimed war against the Northumbria police and his success in eluding them for a whole week.  What, it must be asked, does all this say about the relationship between society and the authorities? Of course the Raoul Moat case is very extreme, but mistrust and frustration at the conduct of authorities more generally is a big problem. Read on →

For many years, schools, hospitals and local authorities have been irritated by what they perceive as government micro-management, manifested in target setting, inspection regimes and a plethora of national initiatives. As the coalition’s drive towards local freedom and accountability changes all this, the key question is: to what extent will this new freedom and accountability genuinely find itself reaching down to those operating right at the grass roots of children’s services? 

There is a huge risk in pushing accountability far out from the centre in that this increased pressure results in everybody losing sight of one of the most compelling reasons for local freedom and accountability – to enable front-line staff to have great ideas and do something with them. Read on →