How we fool ourselves—and why it has to stop now.
There’s a saying I increasingly quote in boardrooms and management meetings:
“Lies, damn lies, and statistics.”
Honestly, I’ve rarely seen it put into practice as often as in IT management reports.
We present averages that conceal the extremes. We report 99.9% uptime while customers left during precisely that 0.1%. We quietly stop projects without ever admitting they had no buy-in.
Meanwhile… the report looks like this:
Everyone sees the fire, but as long as the dashboard is green… “This is fine.”
🔍 Why does this happen?
Because statistics are seductive. They suggest grip, control, and progress. But when statistics become an alibi rather than an analysis, they work against us.
Let’s be honest:
📊 Management reports are often designed as politically correct theater.
🌡️ Not as thermometers.
⚙️ What I do differently as an interim IT manager
Every new assignment is a new opportunity. I use it to introduce radical transparency. No decoration. No excuses. Just this:
✅ Downtime in minutes—with root cause and follow-up
✅ Incidents by priority—not smoothed into quarterly averages
✅ Project assessment based on buy-in—not just percentage complete
✅ Shadow IT detection—even when it hurts governance
✅ Signals from the teams—treated as fully valid data points
🧠 What does that deliver?
📌 Fewer surprises
📌 More ownership
📌 Better-aligned priorities
📌 Above all: trust
Not because everything runs flawlessly, but because we report honestly. That’s leadership.
🧭 Conclusion
Transparency in reporting isn’t a risk—it’s our salvation. It’s the difference between managing appearances and managing reality.
So:
💥 Enough with the KPI circus
🧠 Time for reports that actually provide direction
🤝 Time for IT to demonstrate the maturity we so often demand of others
👋 What can you do?
🔁 Share this if you’re also done with dashboards that hide the truth
💬 Comment: what’s consistently missing from the reports you see?
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#ITLeadership #Transparantie #Rapportage #InterimManagement #DigitalTrust #CIO #KPI #TruthMatters #ThisIsFine #TechCulture
Originally published on LinkedIn. View all blog posts.