You should not read this book because I tell you to. After all, you are an autonomous person, making your own decisions.

You should read this book because you are convinced that it is likely to give you significant insights into a world that matters to you.

Digital infrastructures, and information technology at large, have moved from a fringe niche technology to becoming an essential part of modern life. Most companies would go belly up in weeks, if not days, if their digital infrastructures would fail.

Let’s have a look at some examples. Maersk, the world’s largest shipping company, suffered a large cyberattack (known as NotPetya) in 2017 that disrupted global supply chains and cost over $300 million in damages. Colonial Pipeline, which supplies nearly half of the US East Coast’s fuel, was hit by a ransomware attack in 2021 that forced a shutdown of its 5,500-mile pipeline system, causing fuel shortages and panic buying across the southeastern United States.

Society is impacted in other ways too. Concerns were raised about Cambridge Analytica’s alleged use of harvested Facebook data to influence voter behavior in multiple elections worldwide. This shows how digital infrastructures can be used to distort democratic processes.

And even though failures in shared services projects are less global headline making, they do impact lots of organizations and their clients.

For example, in my professional life, I have seen many projects aiming to improve collaboration unnecessarily delayed because of a mismatch between expectations and what the technology and power structure could afford. There will be examples of that throughout the book.

What I write about in this book is shaped by the conversations I had with many people. I have worked with IT consultants, risk auditors, and their clients. I have worked with architects, CIOs, CISOs, and boards of large organizations. I have also worked with college students who were one third of my age, and whose parents weren’t even born when I wrote my first computer program.

So if you identify with any of these, or the topics I mentioned, this book is for you.