What comes first: business or technology?

For many years technology projects at MICA followed a simple formula:  implement tools and services and then get people interesting in using them to improve business.  This approach worked pretty well for us -- as a small, private visual arts college.  People on our campus really respond to things they can see and experience -- particularly when it comes to technology.  So building or upgrading a system first and then showing that what it could provide was an effective approach. 

But now we are victims of our own success.  We became so adept at our old "build it and they will come" methodology that we ocassionally trip over ourselves as we try to embrace the MICA Connected approach.  One of the great refrains of MICA Connected came from someone in our HR office who, after working here for several years, attend her first Oracle/PeopleSoft Higher Ed User Group conference.  When she got back exclaimed, "It just makes so much sense:  first you have to get your business straight, then you get the technology to help you do it better".

While the model of putting business before technology is spreading like wildfire throughout MIculture we still easily slip back into our old model.  A great debate is going on within our department as we try to formalize a process for delivering improved systems for faculty.  Some believe that we need to have something to show faculty and staff so that they can get on board.  Others think that we need to do our homework first -- to talk with faculty about the business requirements and then model technology to meet them. 

Old habits are hard to break -- and maybe there are some times when they still serve us well.  What about other institutions -- do you have good models for putting technology first?  Or successful models for putting business first?