5 tips for harnessing your superusers

news
Apr 14, 20081 min

Every IT shop has seen them. Users who take on tech-related tasks IT won’t and, in some cases, even tells people not to.

Hacking the iPhone to work with corporate e-mail servers is the most recent, trendy instance, but there are countless examples.

According to Hank Marquis, director of ITSM (IT systems management) consulting at Enterprise Management Associates, in fact, eighty percent of enterprise IT functions are being duplicated by folks outside of the IT department.

In other words, for every 10 people doing IT work as part of their jobs, you’ve got another eight “shadow IT” staffers doing it on their own.

“They’re walking, talking IT governance nightmares. But they could be your biggest assets, if you use them wisely,” Dan Tynan writes in Guerilla IT: How to stop worrying and learn to love your superusers.