Structuring Your IT Department: A Comprehensive Guide for IT Managers

As Elliot Jacques aptly noted, work and satisfying instincts are two of the most important human activities, but people often prioritize the latter. Effectively structuring an IT department is a crucial yet often overlooked task for IT managers. Designing and implementing an appropriate organizational structure requires specialized support, and this structure must be based on sound reasoning that can be clearly communicated to both IT staff and other business units.

The Problem at Hand

Many IT managers — and managers in general — lack awareness of the proper principles for organizing a business unit. The common approach often involves structuring the IT department around application-centric groupings (e.g., managing a specific software application) or clustering technical skills (e.g., LAN and PC staff). This method is usually adjusted over time to meet the evolving needs of the staff.

IT management is a relatively new field that has grown from a small group of uniquely skilled individuals into a vast array of roles, ranks, and specializations. Nowadays, a large IT department includes network specialists, web specialists, architects (data architects, process architects, technical architects), strategic designers, support staff, certified professionals, CICS experts, project managers, software developers, disaster recovery specialists, and more.

Unfortunately, there is no established experience, like that found in bureaucracies, churches, or the military, to guide IT managers in structuring their departments effectively. Additionally, HR specialists often lack the knowledge to offer meaningful advice on how to organize the IT unit.

The Consequences of Guesswork

When an organizational chart is designed based on a myriad of personal, business, and service needs, the following outcomes typically result:

Instability due to constant organizational changes in response to poor performance, leading to a reactive rather than proactive IT department.
Unqualified Technical Staff promoted to leadership or management positions without the necessary skills.
Misalignment between the IT unit’s organization and its outputs.
Scattered Responsibilities where the current structure does not clearly define ownership of key outputs.
Misuse of Rare Technical Skills on tasks unrelated to their expertise, such as procurement, contract management, project administration, or tedious managerial tasks.
Lack of Accountability and customer dissatisfaction due to frequent errors within the unit.

Without a well-thought-out organizational structure, your IT department will lack the necessary foundation to maintain stability and effectiveness.

A Structured Approach

A logical approach to organizing the IT unit can address many of these issues and offer several benefits, including:

Creating a Structure that is logical and understandable to business colleagues, HR, and IT members.
Minimizing Disputes over responsibility boundaries and involvement in each other’s work.
Greater Stability due to a sound foundation and inherent flexibility, allowing for easy restructuring when necessary.
Simplifying Justifications for pay and working conditions in the long run.
Allowing IT Specialists to focus on delivering IT outputs without getting bogged down in unrelated tasks.

The expected outcome of a well-structured IT unit is a more effective, efficient, and business-aligned department that better serves its staff, colleagues, customers, and suppliers.

Practical Application: A Methodical Approach

To create a structured IT unit, it’s recommended to:

Inventory Current HR Resources: Gather information on current human resources and competencies.
Inventory Required HR Resources: Determine the needed human resources and competencies.
Analyze Complexity and Duration: Assess the complexity and duration of each role to determine its appropriate level within the organization.
Update Competency Matrices: Use the appropriate levels to update competency matrices, helping to identify each role’s place in the organizational hierarchy.

Analyzing Work Affinities

Next, determine which workgroups can be logically combined based on process dependencies. For example, the technical support unit, LAN management, and office automation server management often make a good team. Other workgroup combinations might be less obvious and require further analysis.

Structuring the IT Unit

This process may initially seem abstract, but it’s crucial for creating a structured IT department. The difference between this process and traditional “haphazard” structuring is like the difference between randomly mixing ingredients in a pot versus carefully following a recipe to ensure a successful outcome.

Use a whiteboard to draw horizontal lines representing different levels within the organization.
Add the roles of the defined workgroups and place each role at the appropriate level.
Compare the resulting chart with the known needs of IT processes and SLAs, ensuring there are no glaring gaps.
Refine the model while maintaining the groups and levels to achieve a logical organizational chart.

Addressing Support Needs

Identify the environmental aspects required for each team, including:

Necessary Tools: Such as manuals, reference books, software, and system management tools.
Hardware and Office Equipment: Including fax machines, copiers, and binding equipment.
Furniture: Such as shelves, cabinets, desks, and more.
Less Obvious Needs: Such as security enhancements, rostering software, secretarial support, library support, meeting rooms, and refreshments.

Finalizing Role Descriptions

Now, it’s time to:

Finalize role descriptions for your direct reports based on the new structure.
Provide guidance and define the activities for each role’s subordinates.
Ensure quality control to align role descriptions and activity specifications with the underlying IT process model, SLAs, and the organizational chart.

Assigning Roles to People

The final step is to match the logical model with real people. Consider each employee’s:

List of Competencies
Performance Evaluation
Work History
Motivations and Interests

Introducing the Teams

Ensure that:

Each team is adequately briefed on its responsibilities.
Teams understand each other’s roles and responsibilities.
Teams are introduced to their customers, and customers are adequately briefed on the teams.
Clear communication lines are established between teams.

Addressing Gaps and Challenges

The process described will likely reveal gaps in your organization’s skill sets, as well as some surplus competencies. Handling these gaps is crucial.

Checklist for Structuring Your IT Department

Do you have a high-level, comprehensive process model for your IT department?
Does this model include processes for contracting, procurement, and administrative management?
Have you defined the necessary competencies for your IT department?
Have you analyzed the process and SLAs to determine the work required to support the agreed-upon standards?
Have you determined the levels of competency and potential resources needed to meet these requirements?
Have you considered the tools and equipment necessary to support the processes and SLAs?
Have you analyzed work affinities to determine dependencies and logical workgroups?
Have you carefully positioned each role within the management process?
Have you accounted for the varying levels within certain roles, such as project managers?
Have you determined and justified the differences in compensation across different levels?
Have you consulted with SLA owners about potential resource constraints and existing gaps?
Have you assessed the environment and ensured that each team has the necessary facilities and tools?
Have you finalized role descriptions to ensure alignment with the competency matrix?
Are there adequate public spaces, such as meeting rooms and workshops, available?
Have you considered the challenges of managing remote teams and addressed communication control issues?
Have you coordinated with HR on employee recruitment and role assignments?
Have you introduced each team and clarified their responsibilities?
Do you feel confident that each team member understands their role and the responsibilities of their peers?
Are customers informed about the new teams and their roles?

By following these guidelines and regularly revisiting the structure of your IT department, you can create a resilient, effective, and well-aligned organization that meets your business’s evolving needs.

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