Net-Centric Computing and Information Systems

Net-Centric Computing and Information Systems

In the 10 Principles of Effective Information Management James Robertson outlines ten key principles to ensure information management activities and strategies are effective (Robertson, 2005). The author's approach to defining these 10 principles is heavily focused on best practices of implementing technology in complex enterprises. In the article he discusses how these 10 principles make technology implementation, change management, and ongoing strategic attainment of objectives demanding orchestration the most challenging of any enterprise software or technology implementation. He also captures the paradox of how critical it is for companies to continually plan to improve their information systems and technologies (Minard, 1987) while also being mindful of how difficult it is to manage change (Sharratt, McMurdo, 1993). He also implies that transformational leadership is critical for any change management program to be successful. It is the core set of transformational leadership skills, from the ability to be highly empathetic and able to listen (Nasir, 2005)

Analysis of Robertson's 10 Principles in the Context of a Network

The applying of the 10 principles and their ancillary points throughput his excellent article are extremely difficult to implement in a network. Not only are there a very wide variation in perceptions of what success or failure is of the network's performance over time, there is also the need to define reasonable expectations across each of the ten factors shown in the list (Robertson, 2005). Simply put, these 10 principals put an entirely new dimension of complexity into the overall series of constraints, costs and continual change management strategies that a network must continually abide by to be successful. The presence of a wide variety of uncontrollable and often conflicting objectives can in turn exacerbate even the best-managed implementation of a network, regardless if there is technology involved or not (Murdick, Ross, 1972). All of the planning and continual monitoring of these factors won't help; it will be liking a train wreck happening in slow motion. The challenge is to implement a complex enterprise-wide network that are implemented using the 10 principles as defined by Robertson (Robertson, 2005). To make these ten principles resonate and successful, and apply them successfully in the context of a network, enterprises would be better off choosing a project manager who has exceptional levels of transformational leadership skills in conjunction with innate Emotional Intelligence (EI). In addition to these factors, a project leader will also need to inspire a very high level of trust and ability to mobilize people to invest heavily in the enterprise software being implemented or project being installed (Vital, Bernier, 2006). For the 10 principles that Robertson has defined to be successful, they will need to galvanized around a strong level of trust and a belief in a very strong vision for the future. As each of the principles is predicated on each person involved in the implementation taking a personal role in their success, transformational leadership is crucial for its success. As the transformational leader has the ability to get people to move beyond their own boundaries of the status quo and move forward despite fear, for the 10 principles as defined by Robertson to be successful, there will need to be a continual focus on transformational leadership and a continual reinforcing of the value of the change as well. All of these factors will need to be unified in a very thorough communications plan that gets beyond the generalities to the specific very quickly. Only by having a strong project director with these skills with any project succeed and attain the 10 principles as defined (Vital, Bernier, 2006).