"He questioned everything that could be questioned and challenged every position, yet he was an incredible talent and could see opportunities and risks. As a devil's advocate, he kept the rest of us out of potential disaster, and he could take a program from just being effective to extraordinary," says McCracken.

McCracken clearly remembers this iconoclast's behavior when IT was building a complex worldwide system to support a build-to-order manufacturing environment. "He would ask a lot of questions [and] was almost annoying in demanding an answer he could really understand," he says.

The maverick thought the system was being overdesigned. He was promoting simplicity. Gradually, his repeated questioning began to have an effect. "He would take us down paths through that questioning process," McCracken recalls, and ultimately his simpler design was implemented.

Despite mavericks' contributions, IT leaders are often clueless about how to manage them. "I see this over and over again. People say they want that person who is truly creative but then force the person into a very structured environment and criticize them for not being process-oriented," says Dennis McGuire, founder and chairman of TPI Inc., a sourcing advisory firm in The Woodlands, Texas.

If their energy and ideas aren't properly channeled, mavericks can become bored, unhappy or disruptive. Or they might just leave the company, taking their insights with them.