Kyle, the IT manager in the company, found he spent most of his time trying to explain what information technology could and couldn't do as he created a patchwork of applications to solve individual problems. As soon as upper management heard that Matt, the operational manager, had found a way to shave a day or two off of order fulfillment with a new application idea, Kyle knew they would tell him to drop everything and make it happen.
However, Kyle needed answers to a list of questions (requirements) before he could help. Unfortunately, despite his competence, Matt couldn't answer the majority of his questions, and had absolutely no clue when it came to IT. He was angry that Kyle made it seem like a monumental task to take a simple Microsoft Word document that the sales department already had, and just speed up how soon his production planner received that information via an application to pull it from sales. At the conclusion of their meeting, both parties walked out feeling they had accomplished nothing. Creating yet another specialized application would ultimately generate future problems for both Kyle and Matt's departments, and yet these two well-intentioned managers were about to spend thousands of dollars in application development, man-hours, training, and productivity.
The problem was, they were speaking different languages. If Kan had been present at this hypothetical meeting, "I could have interpreted between the two functional areas," he says, "but only because of my background in operations and IT management-a background most people on either side do not have. I have been on both sides of the table, as an IT manager like Kyle, administering IT projects and resources, and as an operations manager like Matt, helping businesses reach the next level of operational effectiveness. I have worked with fledgling start-ups and with companies employing thousands of people, in industries as diverse as e-commerce, manufacturing, and government. My career spans from an-in-the-trenches IT developer at the bottom to a senior manager at the top of it. Even my education encompasses both business and IT with a master's in computer science and an MBA."
Coming across hundreds of scenarios similar to Matt and Kyle's led Wang to design the People, Process, and Technology Management Framework to help companies deal with the immediate, secondary, and/or long-term problems the lack of efficient communication between departments caused. The PPT Framework was not developed to answer all of a company's problems-nor was it meant to capture every single piece of data and information within a company's operations. Rather, it is a powerful methodology that provides a stable platform for managing growth and complexity, affording stability while also being flexible enough to allow for rapid operational change. Similarly, the book's purpose is not to provide a step-by-step guide for implementing the PPT Framework for a specific industry, company, department, or process. It is a broad reference for those considering the need for the framework as well as those who are in the process of implementing it.
"Implementing the PPT Framework never truly ends," says the author. "As a business expands, as the market changes, as people come and go, and as new technologies are incorporated, a company continuously changes. Thus, this book addresses the specific elements of the framework-the building blocks, if you will-and provides an illustration of how it could be implemented by using Matt and Kyle's situation as an example." Due to its scalability, the PPT Framework is just as applicable to small startup businesses as it is to companies that employ thousands of people, and one of its appealing aspects lies in its simplicity. After turning the last page of this inspiring, enlightening, and highly unique guide, it's guaranteed readers will be motivated to say, "I can do this! It will help my career as a manager."
