Commentary: Six Rules for CIO Survival - ' Rules Four, Five and '

Fourth Rule: If you've made an irrevocable decision, make it pay off fast. This buys you some wiggle room if you have to change your mind later. In fact, a focus on realizing benefits early is almost always a good idea in technology because (even today) things change so fast. If you have to wait years for the technology to pay back, it's highly likely that, by then, there will be a much more cost effective way to do what you need, and your choice will look foolish. You can also get trapped in a technological "fashion" (remember Steve Jobs's NEXT) or in adopting an emerging technology that evolves away from your expectations (virtualization is a good current candidate). This will matter less if the ROI is already in the bank.

By the way, this is a survival rule, not a success rule. If you made a poor decision but it worked out well financially you should survive the disruption caused by the "revocation." But it's not likely that anyone will thank you.

Fifth Rule: Buy insurance (and maybe some reinsurance too). Insurance comes in several forms. One form that's easy to acquire is the adoption of broadly supported industry standards. Such standards give you some insulation from individual vendors and offer a place to switch to if a selected technology supplier fails or a strategic relationship turns adversarial. Broad standards tend to have one or more major "anchor" vendors and a rich "ecosystem" of aligned ISVs. SIs and VARs, so you should have plenty of tactical options as well as a rational basis for your "strategic" selections. You'll also probably have plenty of company in any misery that does surface, so you won't look like you missed obvious warning signs.

Another useful form of insurance is the "plus one release" planning model. Always assume that the feature (or capacity or cost level) you need will be one release later than the vendor promises. You will sometimes be pleasantly surprised and occasionally acutely disappointed, but the majority of the time you will look prescient.

And finally, remember that you only need insurance when something bad happens. Having insurance doesn't stop bad things from happening; it just gives you the tools to survive and recover from the bad outcomes. The actual recovery process will still usually be unpleasant.

Sixth Rule: Expect to be surprised. Even if you do everything right and make all the decisions you have control over correctly, things can still go wrong. The future is inherently uncertain and there are plenty of things you can't control that can derail your carefully thought-out plans. So it makes sense to stay (a) alert and (b) agile. This is especially true if you have made some (carefully considered and insured) big bets that can't easily be undone. Even though you can't really anticipate surprises, you can pay attention, by implementing competitive intelligence and technology trend monitoring programs that let you peer a little way into the future. If you pay attention to what the signals tell you, you can often detect the early stages of a surprise in time to adjust course. That's the agility requirement.

And you never know. Not every surprise brings bad news. Some of the surprises you detect might even make life better, and your ability to incorporate them quickly and easily into your plans will make you look smart. And that's much better than merely surviving.