Article ID: PR032
Category: Process
Title: Resistance is futile - you will be assimilated

Star Trek villains 'The Borg' were a race obsessed with conformity. They would assimilate by force any culture they encountered, disposing of difference and idiosyncrasy to arrive their own robotic hive mentality. Their main motivation was efficiency and their intended gains were the technologies and processes of the subsumed captives. Science fiction is often used as a metaphor for our own times and stories featuring 'Borg' were no exception. There's a little bit of Borg in all of us. Conformity is tempting because it appears to reduce risk. The underlying thinking is that if it works for them, it'll work for me. We perhaps do not always consider that the cost will be the sacrifice of a little bit of that 'me'. The price of conformity is always individuality on some scale.

There was a saying going around the industry back around when I first joined it, that "nobody ever got fired for buying IBM." It may be odd to believe that now, when our desktop purchasing policies are much more likely to be Dell or Compaq - but back then IBM was the stock conformity and in certain sectors of the market, IBM's rule was pretty much absolute. Then came Micro Channel Architecture, and how we did our best to continue to conform to the original rule, but eventually the fiscal cost of conformity to an incompatible technology got too high. We stopped buying IBM, realising that we had actually been conforming to something else, namely Industry Standard Architecture, all along.

"If everybody looked the same - we'd get tired of looking at each other"
Groove Armada
(Zomba/Warner Chapell/Polygram Music Publishers)

The new conformity for IT Services at least is 'IT Service Management' (ITSM). Professional bodies and vendors alike are using the phrase. The suggestion is that ITSM is a thing that can be obtained and all the best people have it and you should too and why don't you buy our brand of it because lots of others have and they find that life is better this way and... etc.

Let's not get carried away by the hyperbole. It's not a question of you've either got or you haven't got ITSM. If you are a competent manager (and we usually are because if not they'd have got rid of us by now) then you are undoubtedly doing much of what is touted under the loose banner of ITSM. It is tempting to assume some of the brands - say like ITIL or others mentioned elsewhere in this magazine - because that way, much of the thinking is done for us the solutions are tested, so there is less thinking to be done and fewer mistakes to be made. Conformity always purports to guarantee success, whether it may be to a management framework, a religion, a political creed or a current sartorial fashion. ITIL, for instance, claims to offer its adopters 'best practice' - Mr Universe promised that 'You too can have a body like mine'. Same thing really.

Bristol City Council has recently broken from what is probably the biggest conformity in IT. They've decided to switch from Microsoft Office and other products to the cheaper StarOffice and save £1.4m in the process. They're not worried about training - the users would have to be properly trained anyway; nor compatibility - most documents are interchangeable; nor support - technicians don't really support applications use these days anyway. So what then was ever the reason for sticking with Microsoft Office? Perhaps some organisations are willing to pay £1.4m and more for the comfort of conformity, perhaps it's some other reason - but Bristol dares to be different and doesn't appear to expect the sky to fall as a result.

I'm not suggesting you stop buying Microsoft or reject management frameworks - far from it. What I am concerned about is whether we are getting carried away. Take ITIL, for instance. Read any American IT paper at the moment it seems, and there is somebody enthusing about the benefits of ITIL. It's working, companies are adopting it, and as more do, then er, more do because there must be something in it mustn't there because so many are adopting it aren't they? The genuine exponents and advocates of ITIL will state assuredly that it is impossible to comply with or conform to ITIL because it is non-prescriptive. After adoption, your company could still be as culturally and procedurally unique as it is now. But you would be able to include 'ITIL' in your description of your IT department. So what? It's not a question of whether we do it - it's one of why.

"When everybody's somebody, then no-one's anybody"
Sir W.S Gilbert

If we join in because we want to contribute our own individuality to the party, that's commendable. That kind of ownership sparks evolution and moves standards forward. If we're doing it in order to extract our own form of benefit from a set of pre-written processes, then fine. But if we're doing it just because everybody else appears to be doing it, that's less healthy, because that is giving up identity for its own sake. Down that road lies mediocrity.

There is an unfortunate truth about conformity - which is that it is something we may slip into by inaction or default, whereas one must always choose to be different. Personally, even before allowing conformity to take over - as one often must for the sake of social stability and safety of those around one - I always look for the opportunities for difference. Any form of conformity is by necessity a common denominator. Its output will therefore be inescapably average. Excellence is always the exception. If we must conform to any standard, framework or method, let us not drift but dive into it, led by our individuality.

Noel Bruton is an independent consultant and trainer who assists IT Services groups and helpdesks to improve the service they provide. Based in the UK, he has a worldwide clientele since establishing his consultancy practice in 1991. He is the author of 'How to Manage the IT Helpdesk - a Guide for User Support Managers' (ISBN 07506 49011) and 'Managing the IT Services Process' ISBN 07506 57235). He writes extensively in the IT press and is a popular speaker on the IT Support conference circuit.

For more information on on Noel Bruton's services, either call +44 (0)1239 811646 or email noel@noelbruton.com.