We rely on these core principles to guide every engagement:

Form follows function:

We don't know the answers before we've gathered the evidence. We haven't prepared our deliverable before the engagement began.

No best practices:

We develop our results based on your specific situation, on the principle that there are no "best practices," only practices that fit best.

No "internal customers":

We start with the premise that everyone in the enterprise should have the same customers - the people outside the walls of the company who make buying decisions about the company's products and services. We help restructure the relationship between IT and its business ... not customers, but collaborators ... to help everyone keep their eyes on the ball.

No "run IT as a business":

Run IT in a businesslike way? Absolutely. Run IT as a business, complete with internal customers and charge-backs? It's a rare company where this makes sense. But if it does, we refer back to our first guiding principle, Form Follows Function.

Why employees resist change:

Talk to most business change management "experts" and they'll tell you, "People just naturally resist change."

We think that's utter nonsense. Employees resist change because they're smart, and have excellent memories of past business changes that invalidated skills they worked hard to master, resulted in painful restructurings and layoffs, and otherwise made their lives more difficult. Help them understand why a change is necessary, involve them in its design and planning, make sure they know how it's going to work, and for the most part they'll support it.

We'll hold our business change management methodology up against anyone's. It works, because it starts with the premise that you hired smart people.

We put process in its place:

In IT, process is important ... as part of the supporting infrastructure that helps employees maximize their effectiveness.
Our approach: We help you establish a "culture of process," because until employees think about their work in terms of processes, procedures, and methodologies, process frameworks such as ITIL can't possibly succeed.

Even more important: We help you establish balance, to prevent the all-too-frequent slide into bureaucracy that's the end-point of so many process-focused organizations.

We put metrics in their place:

Too many of our competitors consider measurability to be ... well, the measure of a good decision. We propose a radical departure: Start with a clear understanding of what you're trying to accomplish, whether or not it's easily measured.

Then, after you've clearly established your goals, we help you design what metrics ought to be - the answer to the question, "How will you know you're making progress?"

Most important, we put people in their place:

Which is front and center. Your employees are the most important determinant of your success. In our view, great employees can overcome even the worst processes and poorly designed technology, while poorly led, demotivated employees will cause even the best processes and technology to fail.

There's only one conclusion to draw: Focus first on employees and the factors that make the difference between their success and failure: Leadership, staffing decisions, team dynamics, and the business culture.