There are various means by which companies can assess their alignment, however, the most comprehensive of these methods is the Strategic Alignment Maturity Model, developed by Dr. Jerry Luftman, Distinguished Service Professor, of the Stevens Institute of Technology. Based on a multi-year research study of Global 2000 companies and his own two decades of practical experience as an IT professional, Luftman created this diagnostic tool to help organizations measure their alignment maturity. [2] According to Luftman:
The Strategic Alignment Maturity Model is patterned after the Capability Maturity Model (CMM), which was designed by Carnegie Mellon University's Software Engineering Institute to help organizations measure and improve the maturity of their software development processes. In a similar fashion to CMM, but focusing on a much higher level of the company, the alignment assessment includes five levels of maturity. Companies are described from the weakest Level 1 ”those that lack the processes and relationships needed to attain alignment ”to Level 5, the strongest, where IT and other business functions (marketing, finance, R&D, etc) adapt their strategies together using fully developed processes that include external partners and customers. The evaluation criteria between the two are understandably quite different. Dr. Luftman's model focuses on six key criteria essential for the assessment and diagnosis of business/IT alignment: communications, metrics, governance, partnership, technology, and human resources. Each of the criteria is described by a set of attributes, as shown in Fig. A.1. [3] Figure A.1. Dr. Jerry Luftman's Strategic Alignment Maturity Model measures alignment according to six criteria: communications, metrics, governance, partnership, technology, and human resources.
A team of both business and IT leaders assesses the six criteria and sub components , using the results to converge on an overall assessment level of the firm's maturity. The approach focuses on understanding the alignment maturity and on maximizing alignment enablers and minimizing inhibitors . To help quantify perceptions, the attributes for each criterion are evaluated according to a Likert scale rating method of 1 “ 5 (typically expressed as a range from strongly disagree to strongly agree). By examining components of the business/IT relationship through such a framework, both sides can objectively assess and then mutually agree upon their level of alignment maturity. Business and IT leaders can then use the diagnostic results of the assessment to better understand what areas require improvement and why. |