Since 2019, I’ve worked with directors, service managers and engineers to decide which technology changes deserve time and money. I start by asking the person who depends on a service what they need to do and what gets in the way. A request for a new system can turn out to be a slow handover, missing information or a decision nobody owns.
Once we understand the problem, I bring the people who use the service together with the people who run it. We agree who owns the decision, what the team can change and how we’ll know whether it helped. Depending on the service, that might mean measuring the time it takes to release a change, the cost of running it or the experience customers report afterwards.
My work includes coaching service teams, running workshops and setting out a shared plan when several departments depend on the same change. I also agree where to take a decision when teams cannot resolve it themselves. That gives people a way to raise problems early and gives managers a clear view of what needs their attention.