Week 4 – Strategic Alignment Model

Week 4 – Strategic Alignment Model

Sources/References:

1)      “Strategic alignment: Leveraging information technology for transforming organizations”,  J.C. Henderson and N. Venkatraman, 1993

http://gunston.gmu.edu/ecommerce/ITGovernance/doc/henderson.pdf

2)      “Online banking”, Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Online_banking

3)      “HSBC to cut 3,000 jobs in Hong Kong over three years”, BBC News, 8 Sept 2011

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-14832575

4)      “Apple Inc.”, Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Inc

5)      “Steve Jobs”, Walter Isaacson, Oct 2011

Subject:

In Lecture 4 - Which alignment strategy in SAM model is the best? and why?

Response:

In my opinion, there is no best alignment strategy in SAM model. It is because IT is in different roles in different projects and industries. Therefore, no alignment strategy will be the best in all industries. In the following paragraphs, I would like to give some examples in the real world to show support on my stand.

Firstly, I would like to emphasis that IT is in different roles in different projects and industries. Therefore, there may have a best alignment strategy in a same type of project, but not in an industry.

For example, for the banking system, e.g. HSBC, Hang Seng Bank Limited etc., they most likely to have a strategy execution alignment perspective, which business strategy as the driver and the role of I/S management is a strategy implementor only. This means that, in the manager’s view, IT is an expense to the company, which not contribute to business finance. Recent news on cutting jobs of HSBC support my point of view. In recent news, it was reported that HSBC cut jobs since Sept,2011 and will continue to cut job in the few years, which deployment rate of IT department is the most in both 2 recent cutting job actions. I can conclude that, the main business strategy of HSBC is Strategy execution alignment perspective.

However, focus on the e-banking service of HSBC, I believe that the alignment strategy is different. In my opinion, I think that the alignment strategy of HSBC’s e-banking is Competitive potential alignment perspective which IT enables strategy opportunities and make the company survive in the industry. Therefore, the role of IT is changed, which the driver is IT strategy and the role of I/T management is catalyst. This means that, the role of IT is still supporting the business, but no longer has no contribution on business finance.

Therefore, IT is in different roles in different projects. 

Also, IT is in different roles in different industries, comparing HSBC and Apple Inc. These 2 companies are doing their business in focusing on different products, one is focus on finance products and one is technology products.

Back to 1985, Apple Inc. implemented Strategy execution alignment perspective, which finally ended up with people were dissatisfied on Apple's product and would not like to buy those products. With the back of Steve Jobs on 1996, Apple Inc. changed the strategy alignment to Service level alignment perspective, which all the iProducts were designed for using in the user-friendly way and increase the satisfaction of customer. Due to this change, Apple Inc. now become that most famous and profitable IT products' company in the world.

Therefore, IT is in a different role in different industries. 


From real world example, we can conclude that using an unsuitable strategy alignment in all projects and industries would only make the business going worst. Therefore, there is no the best strategy alignment among all projects and industries.

To conclude, I believe that there is no the best strategy alignment in all types of projects and industries. The best strategy alignment is depended on the type of industry, or even the type of project.