Governing Magazine/December 1995

TECHNOLOGY COLUMN

LEADERSHIP AND THE KNOWLEDGE GAP

By Jerry Mechling

Jerry Mechling is director of the Program on Strategic Computing and
Telecommunications in the Public Sector at Harvard University's
Kennedy School of Government. To reach him, call 617-495-3036 or send
e-mail to jerrym@ksgrsch.harvard.edu.

A recent survey of American and Canadian government officials produced
a troubling if not unexpected conclusion: There is a huge gap between
the technology community and government general managers in terms of
their perceived depth of understanding of information-technology-
enabled reforms in government.
 The survey, conducted by Harvard University in collaboration with
IBM's Institute for Electronic Government, was extensive and involved
418 respondents. There were slightly more state and local respondents
than feds, and career officials outnumbered elected and appointed
officials roughly three to one. While one of three respondents was a
CIO or equivalent, more than half were general managers or policy
makers.
 The results? About half reported establishing their information-
technology plans and direction at the agency level, with one-quarter
at a government-wide level and one-quarter reporting no formal I-T
plans or direction at all. While two of three respondents were
generally satisfied with I-T progress in their own agencies, most
rated governments unfavorably on their use of I-T overall, especially
on the use of I-T to reform the core businesses of their agencies.
 The most dramatic result was widespread concern about a lack of
leadership on I-T issues. Only about half the respondents rated their
CEOs and senior executive management teams favorably on formulating
and overseeing I-T strategies and budgets. Most problematic were the
ratings for "depth of understanding of I-T issues": While favorable
ratings for CIOs and the technology community were fairly high (86
percent and 77 percent, respectively), the favorable ratings for CEOs
were only 45 percent, for budget and finance officers 36 percent, for
government general managers 28 percent, and for legislative leadership
and oversight groups just 18 percent.
 These results are sobering. How can we succeed if key stakeholders
are thought not to understand what the issues are all about? If
techies are believed to be the only people who know what is required
to harvest the benefits of information technologies, we have little
hope for developing broadly shared and sustainable commitments to a
technology-enabled reform agenda.
 What to do once you've gotten beyond denial and measured the extent
of your leadership knowledge gap? Three routes come to mind:
 1. Educate first, then invest. This may work for a modest knowledge
gap--typically in settings where general managers and oversight
agencies are intrigued by technology-enabled reforms but do not have a
deep understanding of the stresses and processes involved in changing
the core business of a government agency. While technologists
themselves need to learn more about substantive programs and the
politics of change, the key need is for senior general managers and
stakeholders (program clients, overseers, legislators, the press) to
learn about how I-T can be used for reengineered organizations and
global electronic commerce.
 2. Market and invest first, then educate. This may be worth trying in
settings where leaders are not receptive to education, yet the
opposition to I-T-enabled reforms is mild. In these cases, marketing
to get the camel's nose under the tent may be more important than up-
front education. Once projects are started, education should be
piggybacked onto the implementation process. Just-in-time technology-
based options are becoming available (via such technologies as CD-ROMs
and distance education) to reduce educational costs and the time
required. While we haven't been good at blending education with
project implementation in the past, these elements must be integrated
for the future.
 3. If the gap is too great, wait or go elsewhere. For vendors and
staff looking for targets ripe for technology, this may be the sad but
best advice available. The next generation of governmental leaders,
like a few of today's (Gore, Gingrich, Governor Michael O. Leavitt of
Utah and Mayor Stephen Goldsmith of Indianapolis, for example),
undoubtedly will be stronger on I-T issues. Reformers may need to go
where stakeholders are at the very least susceptible to learning about
technology-enabled reform. Invincible ignorance is a killer.
 Since 1987, the Strategic Computing program at Harvard has been
working to help close the gap between technologists in government and
senior program and political leaders. We've seen substantial progress.
Many good systems have been built, and concepts such as
"reengineering" and the "information superhighway" have become part of
the vernacular. Given evidence like the recent survey, however, we
must remember that the glass is still half-empty.

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