Orchestrating IT Excellence: A Musical Approach to Business Technology
- Brandon Alsup
- Jun 13
- 6 min read
IN MUSIC, rhythm is more than just timing. It's structure, discipline, and coordination. It's the silent force that aligns dozens of musicians into one cohesive sound - it's what separates us from the apes! What if your business IT worked the same way?
I majored in Music Composition and Theory, and for years I played in orchestras where the difference between harmony and chaos came down to one thing: rhythm. Not just playing in time, but breathing together, listening across sections, trusting the conductor. It's a kind of organized magic. It may sound cheesy, but as I understand more about the various components of business technology, I believe it can work in a similar way.
I wanted to explore this idea not just as a metaphor—but as a real operational framework. And working with businesses across New Mexico, especially in places like Albuquerque and Santa Fe, I’ve seen how IT rhythms vary dramatically depending on leadership, pace, and culture. The most successful teams, whether they’re in Las Cruces or up in Four Corners, tend to have one thing in common: they keep time well. Businesses, like music, don’t run on one beat. They pulse across multiple durations simultaneously: daily tickets, weekly patching, monthly reports, quarterly reviews, and annual planning.
Before getting into the meat of it, here's a very basic primer on the hierarchy of how music is built up from the smallest unit to the largest:
single note: typically whole, half, quarter, eighth, sixteenth, or sixty-fourth note values
measure: typically comprised of 1-16 notes
phrase: typically comprised of 2-8 measures
section: typically comprised of 2-8 phrases
movement: typically comprised of 2-8 sections
entire piece of music: typically comprised of 1-4 movements
portfolio of work from a single composer: comprised of any number of entire pieces of music.
With that out of the way, here's my breakdown of rhythm in IT:
The Layers of IT Rhythm
Below is a table showing how these two seemingly disparate ideas relate by analogy.
Musical Element | Technical Rhythm (timing) | Who is responsible - music | Who is responsible - organizational |
single note | reactive and in the moment | musicians | Technicians, users, automation tools |
measure | daily | musicians | Technicians, users, automation tools |
phrase | weekly | section leader (e.g. 1st chair of the violas) | Department heads |
section | monthly | concert master (1st chair 1st violin) | IT Director or Lead Engineer |
movement | quarterly | conductor | CIO, vCIO, MSP Account Manager |
piece | annually | conductor | CIO, vCIO, MSP Account Manager |
composer's output | 5-year+ | composer | founder/CEO |
One Measure (One Day): Micro Rhythms
These are the faster, repetitive actions that form your operational backbone:
Ticket responses
Endpoint monitoring alerts
Backup verification
Patch scans
Authentication logs
These are some of the rhythms that happen in one day. Some may be "sixteenth" or "eighth notes" or even a "whole note"—but they form the daily rhythms of the business. In music theory terms, these are your subdivisions: events that maintain continuity and drive.
One Musical Phrase (One Week): Tactical Layer
The weekly patterns where team coordination matters:
Patch deployment
Ticket handoffs and escalations
Internal syncs
Short weekly reports
This is the layer where flow starts to take shape into multi-measure structures. In rhythmic terms, this is where you begin to recognize groupings—phrases of 4 or 8 bars that signal recurring form and expectation. It's about setting a groove that everyone can lock into.
One Section (One Month): Operational Themes
Big-picture motions that advance your business’s systems:
Software updates
Training modules
System audits
Progress on roadmap goals
This is where recurring structure meets strategy. Now we get the "A" section or the "B" section that pulls together single measures and phrases into a cohesive section. At this point in a musical structure, there are typically strong cadences—points of small-scale conclusion. For all you music buffs, think of it as a perfect authentic cadence: a structural signal that something has resolved (even if temporarily).
One Movement (One Quarter): Strategic Coordination
Quarterly rhythm is where everything gets re-aligned:
Asset analysis
Network upgrades
It’s the pivot point between maintaining and transforming. This is the next larger structural element. Here's an example from Sonata Form. Typically, each movement has its own character but maintains thematic coherence. To move from analogy to action, the beginning of the year (the first quarter) is the "introduction," where activities introduce the year’s themes—setting the tone and key, providing a state of the business and indicating where you want it to end up.
The next quarter becomes the "development"—where you start to explore, adjust, and move from planning to execution. Q3 is an expanded development section—continuing exploration and execution on the original themes. Q4 is the "recapitulation"—themes are restated, but transformed by the development sections. This is the concluding section that wraps up the piece.
One Piece (One Year): Long-Term Health
The full arc of your system’s evolution:
IT budgeting
Lifecycle management
Annual cybersecurity assessments
Maturity scoring (NIST, CMMC, etc.)
This is where your rhythms resolve—or reveal what went unplayed. These are the major rhythmic moves of the piece. Returning to the Sonata Form analogy, the first movement (Q1) is generally quick and lively with simple rhythmic elements—clarity over complexity. The second and third development movements (Q2–3) are slower, more intricate and pliable. The rhythm becomes more unstable and varied—many composers use hemiola, metric modulation, or sequential development to evolve ideas rhythmically.
This works well in IT: as initiatives are rolled out, one must adjust to the environment and results, but stay within the structure. The final movement (Q4) typically returns to a faster tempo and rhythmic stability. It releases the tension built during development and provides a satisfying conclusion. From a bird's-eye view, a composer or business leader might structure the year as:
Tempo: fast – slower – fast
Rhythm: simple/stable – complex/exploratory – simple/stable
There are, of course, many ways to approach this and many musical forms to draw upon, depending on your organization.
Multiple Works (5+ Years): Technical Legacy
The rhythms that span generations of infrastructure:
Cloud transformation
Legacy retirement
Strategic vendor shifts
Business model evolution
This is your body of work. Think of this as your portfolio of music. Each piece may not connect directly, but it sounds like you wrote it. It has your signature sound. The rhythm of your organization can have an intentionally built "sound." In this analogy, each of these major technology developments is a one-year piece of music. Together, they form your legacy.
Who Conducts? Who Performs?
In music, the conductor aligns the ensemble. In IT:
Composer: Business owner/visionary/founder
Conductor: CIO, vCIO, MSP Account Manager
Concertmaster: IT Director or Lead Engineer
Section Leaders: Department heads
Musicians: Technicians, users, automation tools
No conductor? Expect chaos. No score? Expect improvisation, not excellence.
I remember watching a conductor once freeze a rehearsal after the horns came in early. He didn’t scold—he adjusted. Gave a better cue. Clarified the measure. The entire room tightened up and the next pass felt electric. That kind of leadership—timely, precise, calm under pressure—is exactly what IT teams need when they're syncing roadmaps, support, security, and budgets.
Why Rhythm Matters in Business: Lessons from Music
Before we dive too deep into IT structures, let’s zoom out for a moment. One of the clearest parallels between music and business is not just that both involve rhythm—it’s that both require rhythm to function at all. Whether it's ticket response times or quarterly roadmap reviews, rhythm shapes the tempo, expectations, and flow of everything you do.
Here’s what years of musical training taught me—and how it applies directly to running a well-coordinated business:
Tempo Discipline = Operational Clarity Musicians must know the tempo. Teams must know what to expect daily, weekly, monthly.
Sheet Music = Process Documentation Don’t expect your team to memorize everything. Write down your rhythms.
Cues = Dashboards & Communication Just like orchestras rely on subtle cues, IT needs clear metrics and alert systems.
Rehearsal = Testing You wouldn’t debut a symphony without practice. Same goes for DR plans, onboarding, or system rollouts.
Ensemble Listening = Cross-Team Awareness The best teams, like the best quartets, are listening more than they’re playing.
Conducting = Leadership It’s not just about order—it’s about emotional tone, pacing, and intention.
These lessons aren’t fluff. They’re practical structures that high-functioning organizations already use—sometimes without realizing it. Rhythm builds trust. Repetition builds mastery. And the right tempo keeps the whole operation from falling out of sync.
How to Build Your IT Rhythm
Audit your rhythms: Which are tight? Which are drifting?
Name your conductor: Who owns your tech tempo?
Set your cadence: Define what happens daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly.
Rehearse your mission: Run drills. Test your processes.
Write your score: Document your rhythm, then scale it.
Rhythm isn’t optional in music. It’s not optional in business either—especially not for organizations trying to scale across regions like Albuquerque, Santa Fe, or greater New Mexico.
The question is: are you playing noise—or a masterpiece?
Disclaimer
The information contained in this communication is intended for limited use for informational purposes only. It is not considered professional advice, and instead, is general information that may or may not apply to specific situations. Each case is unique and should be evaluated on its own by a professional qualified to provide advice specifically intended to protect your individual situation. Kosh is not liable for improper use of this information.
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