What's New?

But outsourcing to India and working with EDS aren't exactly revolutionary practices. What is it that separates a truly flexible or "elastic" IT group from those that just outsource or hire systems integrators?

Goodman says the difference is that elasticity demands a sweeping, big-picture approach to the entire range of IT tasks, projects and services. Elasticity assumes that "you look across the board," he says. "You're managing a portfolio of projects and finding the correct cost-effective approach to each one, all within typical [budgetary and service delivery] constraints." Goodman is describing IT portfolio management -- a practice lifted from the financial investment arena -- which involves managing the suite of corporate IT projects as if it were a financial portfolio, balancing riskier projects with safer ones and monitoring the portfolio to ensure an acceptable risk/reward ratio.

It's clear that while its components, such as offshoring or hiring temps or contractors, tend to be tactical and reactive, true elasticity is strategic and anticipatory.

The People Part

If strategic thinking is one pillar of IT elasticity, the other is true commitment to the backbone of the organization: full-time employees. "If I were a CIO wanting more elasticity, I'd look carefully at employee development programs," says Rick Poppell, an analyst at People3, a Gartner research firm in Bridgewater, N.J. He says the best elastic IT groups are broadening staffers' skills to move them from back-end processes, such as coding and maintenance, to front-end roles, which include project management and business analysis -- high-visibility, high-value jobs that reflect the symbiotic relationship between technology and business.

That has been the model at Harrah's, where solutions management group participants develop a broader-than-usual range of skills, according to Daughtrey. "Rather than predominantly supporting one [proprietary application] such as casino management, they work on a variety of projects: e-business, lodging, casino, etc.," he says.

Humana also keeps a close eye on IT staffers' career paths. "Despite our partnerships and outsourcing, we make it clear we have plenty of career opportunities [for full-timers]," Goodman says. He believes the key to retention is to offer employees challenging, high-value-add development assignments in hot areas such as data mining, wireless and Humana's intranet.

Tim Ramsay agrees. An associate vice president at the University of Miami, he advocates elastic IT staffing, which he says is relatively easy in a university environment, where undergrads eagerly tackle thankless jobs. "The core IT staff is happy to let students do some of the tedious stuff, leaving them more challenging work," he says.

In the end, Poppell says, truly elastic IT organizations are easy to distinguish from those that are merely plugging holes. "The companies that are doing better understand the business drivers behind IT," he says. They have a formal IT plan supported by an infrastructure plan that looks ahead three years. This, he says, allows businesses to create a "formal IT workforce plan that asks, 'Do we have the capability to complete our various projects?' "

If your IT group lacks such strategic planning, you're probably not yet really elastic. That means you're most likely paying a premium for skills you could have developed in-house, and the only things stretching are your budget and your employees' patience.

Ulfelder is a Computerworld contributing writer in Southboro, Mass. Contact him at sulfelder@charter.net