IT’s Reputation is Decided in Exactly Two Places — Transformation or Not

You’ve probably seen these reputation-shapers in action:

✅ Microsoft Teams is running → nobody cares.

❌ The new budgeting tool needs one extra click → “Why does IT always overcomplicate everything?”

❌ The room-booking app crashes → IT is incompetent.

Yet the reality is: IT builds the foundation for almost every business process — and still ends up as the scapegoat department.

Here’s the uncomfortable truth: Even during transformation, your IT gets zero sympathy points.

As IT, you wouldn’t accept excuses from SAP or Microsoft — not even during their biggest migrations or overhauls.

The business expects the same from you.

👉 These two touchpoints decide almost everything about the reputation of the IT department. All the other brilliant work you do (architecture, code quality, tech debt cleanup, security…) is invisible to the business.

1️⃣ Service: 

Invisible when perfect, crucified when something breaks.

2️⃣ Projects & Product Development: 

The business expects new tools to appear almost as fast and smoothly as downloading an app from the store.

Reality: IT has to juggle legacy chaos, GDPR, cybersecurity, group standards, and 15 different process owners — all while half the company thinks “I could do this faster myself” and IT is seen as the blocker, not the enabler.

🔧The Fix?

Make these two interfaces flawless and staff them with your absolute best people — technically excellent AND interpersonally outstanding.

A good reputation is a challenge in regular business operations and is amplified during transformation. But no matter how big your transformation challenges are, these touchpoints must stay rock-solid.

After all, transformation isn’t a one-time project anymore — it’s continuous, it is the new normal. Therefore, it is no excuse anyway.

In the future, IT and Business will become increasingly integrated, and these touchpoints may become less distinct. But right now, at the current maturity level of your transformation:

👉 These roles are the shop window of the IT department.

Invest in them, and the perception of the entire IT organisation will shift, leading to significant improvements in collaboration.

What’s the one thing you did that actually improved IT’s internal reputation? 👇