IT Governance: Could the ICT Board be the answer?

While appreciating the presentation by the newly established Kenya ICT Board at the recent Kenya ICT Federation (KIF) luncheon dubbed “State of the Industry” Presentation, what came into my mind was, could the ICT Board be the answer to the IT Governance vacuum that has bogged the government ever since IT, or for the more development inclined, ICT became a priority? The presentation was quite refreshing despite the violence that has rocked the country over the December 2007 disputed elections, one could be forgiven to think that its business as usual hearing the efforts that the Board is putting in place to “develop Kenya to a top ten global ICT hub and a transformed information empowered society”, as stated in their newly crafted vision.

Having been in the ICT Strategy and Policy arenas for a while now, and almost stuck there, this was my focus while listening to the officials of the ICT Board, led by their able CEO, Paul Kukubo of the 3 Mice fame, lay their strategies and mandate in the open for the participants to appreciate and even contribute to their development. One thing that struck my attention was the scope of the Board’s work.

According to Mr. Kukubo’s presentation, the board is mandated to spearhead the development of ICT in the country and also market the country as an ICT investment destination. If you examine this mandate, it appears that, the ICT Board is actually responsible for everything ICT in the country, from advisor to Government to implementer of some “light house” projects. It cuts across policy advisory, strategy formulation and project design and implementation. Although the main pillars are Advisory, Marketing, Investment Facilitation and Project management, performing these tasks may require policy, regulatory and even legal interventions at some point.

This in itself posses major challenges for the Board, given that there are already existing institutions which are doing some of what the Board is supposed to do. A case in point is the National Communication Secretariat (NCS) under the same ministry that has been “advisor to the Government” since the enactment of the Kenya Communications Act of 1997 and the Government IT Services (GITS) under the Ministry of Finance. What I must point out from the onset, though, is the Board’s openness and the willingness to collaborate with other players both within and outside government to perform their mandate. But this is another story for another day.

For now, let’s examine what I mean by IT Governance, since this in itself is a controversial subject. This is sometimes referred to as e-Governance and should not be confused with e-Government. The Centre for Information Systems Research (CISR) at MIT defines IT Governance as the framework for decision rights and accountabilities to encourage desirable behavior in the use of IT or ICT if you want.

IT Governance is driven by the need for closer interaction and involvement with stakeholders both within and outside government. In today’s development lingo, this would be termed as multi-stakeholder participation which emphasizes on integrating the three "C's" of Cooperation, Consensus and Community. IT Governance is not about the specific decisions made, but rather about determining who makes each type of decision, who has input into the decision, and how one is held accountable for their role. This, to me sounds like what the ICT Board is trying to do or address.

Until very recently, it was difficult to point to one organization in government where ICT issues be they policy, strategic or implementation could be handled effectively. Several organizations had bits and pieces of “mandate” to do this and that despite the cross-cutting nature of ICT. This encouraged duplication of efforts, un-aligned priorities, confusion and even unhealthy competition between government ministries and departments. Governance is a key enabler of any transformation and clear active central governance is essential in federated organizations with distributed decision making to achieve strategic outcomes.

I would encourage Mr. Kukubo and his able team to take on the IT Governance challenge in the country and carefully craft the governance model that will be simple, participative and inclusive, formal yet flexible and one that will support the alignment of government-wide and departmental decisions. This way, I promise you, Kenya will alter the current BRIC+9 arrangement.