What is a Destination?
What is a journey without a destination? How about a better question: what do I mean by a destination?
In the context of the IT journey, by destination I mean the goals for IT services. The desired outcomes. A destination is why you’re compensated for what you do.
The destination is the statement that the non-technical person understands. It is what in their world they’ll have when you do what you do. It is the answer to the ‘so what?’ question. Having the skill of answering that question well is what enables you to do what you know needs done.
A destination is ‘a place where…’ ‘where’ something happens. For example: ‘a home on the range’ is ‘a place where the buffalo roam’. ‘The buffalo roaming’ is what happens. Like a ‘home on the range’, a destination is a place where you want to be. Why else would you be singing about it?
In the IT journey, you can change the destination definition to ‘a place where IT Services…’ Example: ‘a place where IT Services maintain a stable and secure IT environment’. That brings up the next question: like ‘a home on the range’ (the place name), what is the IT Services place name?
The overarching place name is ‘the IT service you want‘. To put the full phrase together: ‘the IT service you want is a place where IT Services…’
| What Happens There | What You'll Have |
|---|---|
| Maintain a stable and secure IT infrastructure | Reliable and consistent IT resources availability |
| Make sure the IT infrastructure pays for itself | An IT infrastructure that offsets through increased productivity and reduced risk more expense than IT services cost |
| Build using what others have done | Lower cost for new and improved IT services that implement faster with less disruption |
| Make changes small and quick | Steady increase in overall productivity supported by IT with less disruption from change |
| Communicate what IT is doing | Increased satisfaction with IT efforts through better understanding |
| Follow mission with IT investments | IT changes with the most impact for the investment by improving what brings the most value to an organization's customers |
The place name ‘the IT service you want’ is all encompassing. Most journeys have a lot happening along the way and at the destinations. The varied happenings suggest more, specific destination names. Below I replace the general destination place name ‘the IT service you want’. In its place I use the ‘What You’ll Have’ column entries from the prior table as destination names. That reverses the previous table columns to read like this:
| Destination (the place name) | Is the place where IT Services |
|---|---|
| Reliable and consistent IT resources availability | Maintain a stable and secure IT infrastructure |
| An IT infrastructure that offsets through increased productivity and reduced risk more expense than IT services cost | Make sure the IT infrastructure pays for itself |
| Lower cost for new and improved IT services that implement faster with less disruption | Build using what others have done |
| Steady increase in overall productivity supported by IT with less disruption from change | Make changes small and quick |
| Increased satisfaction with IT efforts through better understanding | Communicate what IT is doing |
| IT changes with the most impact for the investment by improving what brings the most value to an organization's customers | Follow mission with IT investments |
Now we have detailed destinations which are the goals for IT services. The actions (what happens there) are what you do to stay at that destination. They are the same actions to take to reach the destinations.
I refer to what is needed to reach the destination as ‘steps along the path’. A path is the set of steps to reach a destination.
What I describe are primary destinations. The destinations I share here are not a definitive list. My estimate is that they cover at least 80% of the projects and tasks IT faces. Imagine better decisions in 80% of IT services activities. The result is superior IT services results.
Destinations help you and your team determine what you are or should be doing. The destinations help discern the value to the organization. They help establish priority. Destinations help explain to non-IT decision makers why you’re doing what you’re doing.
