The Internet Strategy Forum (ISF) recently released findings for research conducted in 2008 focused on the demographics and responsibilities of those who manage corporate web sites and underwritten by us; 250 corporate web executives responded to the survey. The findings show that the people who run websites are better educated and more highly paid than they were in 2005. Also, there is a clear shift in title from "manager" to "director." These documented trends validate what many of those who work in the web industry have already intuited: websites are no longer being managed by renegade webmasters off in a corner doing their own thing, but by "mature" corporate web personnel who are responsible for delivering or supporting the delivery of an organization’s mission, goals, products, and services online.
As the organizational web presence matures, so do the personnel who support the web efforts. The solo corporate webmaster who used to be responsible for coding web pages and creating web graphics is now a program manager or division head with a staff, responsible for selecting and implementing large-scale web infrastructure tools and software applications and, in many cases setting strategic direction and policy for the organizational corporate web presence. So, the question arises, where should these more sophisticated web teams be placed within an organization?
Since the advent of the corporate web in 1993 there has been an on-going debate regarding where web resources belong within the corporate structure. Should they report into the systems-focused information technology group, or to the communications-focused marketing/public relations group? This debate can be fierce. IT resources insist, correctly, that the web is a technical platform, a very large software application and, thus, should be managed by IT.
On the flipside, marketing believes that the web is primarily a communications tool and therefore insists it be managed by its group. The reality is that websites are both of these things and require a range of technical and non-technical human resources to ensure that the site is well-managed and is an asset, not a risk, to the organization. Web teams deserve their own functional area, separate from, and equal to marketing and IT.
Not so frequently mentioned by marketing or IT are the range of web-management skills that are neither technical, nor communications-centered. They are a set of skills that focus on the organization and accessibility of information, and expedient production and delivery for multiple channels like print, web, and mobile. When communications teams and IT teams play tug of war over ownership of the site, they do so in a shallow manner with IT resources focusing on the web applications and communications resources focusing on design and static pages. Everything else falls into a gap. This view does not take into consideration what happens when design and the written word meet an application, as more sophisticated web sites like NYTimes.com, Amazon.com, or simple blogs that utilize dynamic content delivery so often do. Nor does it take into account how to get all that corporate knowledge onto the web in a way that will make sense to an "outsider." This is where the mature web professional steps in.
A good web manager understands that a site is not a place where static pages and applications happen to intermingle. The mature web professional understands that running an organization’s website is about ensuring that the "public" is able to get the right information from the organization at the right time, and do business online in an intuitive way. Also important to understand is that the first rule for maintaining an effective web presence is that the organization must effectively get the information to the web in a quality manner.
This is no small task for organizations that have huge quantities of content--thousands or even millions of webpages and other content assets—not forgetting the large number of applications, which must be produced in concert. Orchestrating these aspects of information management, business process management, human resources management, and technology development to create a high quality, risk-free web presence is neither an IT competency nor a marketing competency. It is a web competency.
What the ISF research supports is the need for standalone web teams--teams that are spear-headed by web product managers who can holistically focus on the quality and effectiveness of the organization’s web presence and that are supported by program or department managers who can be champions for the needs of the web organization and be held accountable for its failures. Organizations should stop the battle between marketing and IT by forging new territory, and establishing new roles, pulling the best and the brightest from these two competing organizations and putting seasoned web professionals in the lead.
(www.welchmanpierpoint.com/node/257)