Sarah Perez has written an excellent piece on the new trend of Technology Populism – where “more and more people are functioning as their own IT department at work.”

More than anything, IT Managers need to realize that the power of individuals to provision their own applications, information, and social networks is a trend that’s unlikely to stop. They can block sites on their firewall, but as users venture out on laptop computers beyond the company’s walls, those sites become accessible again.

It’s like a hydra – cut off one head, proverbially speaking, and three more will grow it its place. People will use what they want to use.

For an IT manager to successfully balance the risks and rewards of technology populism, they must first embrace the trend to move forward, then they must address their particular company’s exposure levels.

Some IT managers dig their heels in and refuse to embrace the new trend.

But I think that group is smaller than one would think. Many more IT managers try to address and manage exposure levels – but the problem is they jump right to that step without first putting out the message that they embrace the new trend, and I think that leads people to think they don’t.

Direct, unencumbered communication with customers is more important than ever, and in this case the customers of an IT department are employees. So IT managers have to be clearer than ever about not only embracing the new trend, but telling employees they embrace it. Here’s why:

Paul, commenter on Sarah’s post, writes:

The ‘enterprise applications’ I’m forced to use are awful. Slow, cumbersome, horrible usability (are you listening Peoplesoft??? the Outlook dev team???) and cost the organisation a fortune (we’re talking millions).

Web software / applications are often successful because they “just work”. When was the last time you needed ‘training’ to use Basecamp / Backpack / Twitter / GMail / Delicious / Facebook?

Jess, another commenter on Sarah’s post, writes:

Sometimes the software just plain stinks. And I bristle at the idea that users are responsible for mastering a poorly designed UI. Yes, it goes deep in features and is secure, but it does not address the needs of a new generation of users.

The proliferation of web-based apps has allowed us to expect fun, easy-to-use, collaborative applications. And really, is that too much to ask for?

This chart shows the use of blogs, wikis, podcasting, RSS, and social networking in organizations that are

1. already investing the technology
2. considering investing in the technology
3. not planning to invest in the technology

In every case, the combined number of recipients at companies planning to invest or not investing in the technologies is equal to two thirds or more of the recipients at companies that are investing in the technology.

Know what that means?

Even if the company isn’t using the technology officially, the people at the company are, and that means the company is using the technology whether it knows it or not.

So there’s no point in pretending the technology isn’t in use, or even discussing whether to use it!

It’s there, and people are using it. Embrace it, IT managers, and let people know that you embrace it. Once people know they’re all working toward the same goal, it’s much easier to work through the details.