Units that rely on one internal supplier or one sponsor for something critical develop a second source, so no single gatekeeper can stall their plans or set the price of cooperation.
An example
Everything the digital products team at a magazine publisher deployed went through the corporate IT group, whose queue ran six weeks, and the head of IT used the queue to bargain: features went live faster for teams that supported his budget requests. The head of digital products did not fight the queue. She got the chief technology officer's approval to qualify a second deployment path for the subscription pages only, through a managed hosting vendor already on the company's approved list, with IT's security review built in. It took four months and cost $180,000 a year. Releases on the subscription pages went from six weeks to five days. Within a quarter, IT's turnaround on her team's other work had improved as well, and the budget conversations stopped coming up.
Why it works
Power over someone comes from controlling something they need and cannot get elsewhere, and every alternative they develop weakens that hold. With a second source in place, a single gatekeeper can no longer stall the work or set the price of cooperation, so the sponsor's plans become easier to carry out, and often the original supplier improves its service to keep the business. It depends on the alternative being real, sanctioned, and good enough to use.
The thinking behind it
Richard M. Emerson Power-Dependence Relations (1962) holds that one party's power over another rests on the other's dependence, which grows with how much it values what the first provides and how few alternative sources it has. Emerson described balancing operations, among them finding alternative sources. Qualifying a second deployment path is one: the IT group's hold on the digital team weakens as soon as the alternative works.
Jeffrey Pfeffer Pfeffer and Salancik's The External Control of Organizations: A Resource Dependence Perspective (1978) argues that whoever controls a critical, scarce resource gains power over those who depend on it, and that organizations act to manage those dependencies by reducing their own. Inside a company the same logic applies between units: a team that reduces its dependence on one gatekeeper stops paying the price that gatekeeper sets.
When it fits
Units that rely on one internal supplier, one approver, or one sponsor for something critical, and find that reliance used against them, are the case. You need approval to develop an alternative, a budget for it, and an alternative that meets the company's standards for security, quality, or compliance.
How to use it well
List what you depend on that only one party can provide: a system, a team, a budget line, a sponsor.
- Rank each by how badly a stall would hurt you.
- For the worst one, find a sanctioned alternative: an approved vendor, a second internal team, a second sponsor.
- Get approval openly from whoever owns the policy, and keep the original supplier informed.
- Use the alternative for enough of the work to make it credible.
Keep the relationship with the original supplier. What you want is a real choice and a working relationship with both.
What it costs and where it backfires
A second source costs money and management time, and the original supplier may take it as an attack. Some dependencies exist for good reasons, such as security or standardization, and working around them can create real risk. The clean form ends where you route around a control the company needs, or build a shadow system without approval.
When it is used on you
Treat a second source, developed by a unit that depends on you, as information about your service. Ask what drove it, fix what you can, and compete on turnaround and quality. If the alternative creates real risk, raise it openly with the policy owner, with specifics.