Align with business strategy

Benjamin Low
Managing Director, SE Asia, India
Secure Computing

COMPANIES should view IT as a long-term strategic business move that requires utmost attention and decisions should not be based on the lowest quote. Often, the most 'value-for-money' or one-size-fits-all solution may not be the most suitable for the company's unique requirements. Consulting, architecture and long-term project management need to be taken into consideration during the entire decision process. Lastly, the results of the project should be measured over time and not immediately after implementation.

On the vendor's end, it is crucial to invest time in understanding the client's overall business strategy, processes and long-term goals. In addition, vendors need to spend adequate time to ensure their channels/ resellers are fully trained and certified to effectively represent their solutions to potential customers.

Noboru Oi
Group CEO
Fujitsu Asia Pte Ltd

MANY companies know that their IT expenditure needs to be aligned with their overall business strategy, but some of them are not doing this successfully. This typically happens when IT spending is not properly managed, or when the benefits of these IT investments are not properly analysed.

IT investments are sometimes viewed as a means to cut costs - which is fine, but it should not be the main reason for implementing new technologies. The main reason should always be to improve productivity, which means IT expenditure should be geared towards improving processes, creating innovative products and services, as well as doing things in newer and smarter ways. Generally, companies that plan their IT expenditure based on these goals are more likely to enjoy reduced total costs of ownership - in other words, long-term cost savings - than organisations that merely look at short-term cost-cutting measures.

Proper IT portfolio and asset management is vital for realising productivity gains and cost savings. Based on our studies, companies that can achieve this can potentially cut IT spending by about 30 per cent while enjoying a 20 to 30 per cent increase in ROI.

Danny Teoh
Managing Partner
KPMG

KPMG's recent Business Complexity study found that just 8 per cent of companies surveyed hit their efficiency targets. Most executives blamed this on poor systems implementation, an inability to identify projected savings and having to continuously fix operational problems.

An earlier Global IT Project Management Study we conducted suggests how companies can obtain more value from IT projects:

Firstly, they should align initiatives with business strategy and recognise the links between strategy and project execution. They should also put the appropriate capability, capacity and risk models in-place. Companies also need to have an integrated end-to-end IT governance framework for their IT projects, and have processes to constantly evaluate and maximise the value of their IT investments.

Lastly, assigning individual accountability to team members is a must to increase the chances of success.

Lars Ronning
President, Asia Pacific (excluding China and Japan)
Tandberg

POOR definition of requirements and the lack of business-IT alignment are the main causes for delays in the delivery of IT projects. Taking a step back, one wonders if there had been miscommunication along the way that led to mismatched expectations and results.

Apart from setting and adhering to strict timelines for project milestones, it is also important to have well-defined objectives for any project and for them to be communicated clearly. In cases where the organisation and the IT vendor are located at two opposite ends of the globe and face-to-face communication is lacking, miscommunication may occur. Organisations can consider leveraging on video communication to facilitate meetings.

Advancements in technology allow for 'natural communication' that is as good as a face-to-face meeting. Presentations or demos from IT vendors can also be shared to minimise the chances of misinterpretation, thus leading to more satisfactory outcomes.

Eric Hoh
Vice President, Asia South Region
Symantec

BOTH IT vendors and the customer organisations share equal responsibility in the project success, and hence must adopt a multi-pronged and collaborative approach. The most critical step is to tightly align IT goals with the business units to meet corporate and strategic goals. It is also critical to set key performance indicators for the overall project and at each of the project milestone intervals, so that companies can actively monitor and manage anticipate issues.

IT projects cannot be show-stoppers for the business, so companies need to ensure that their project timelines factor in their product/service lifecycles and go-to-market programs. The human factor is also a critical success factor, which includes securing executive commitment, putting together a cross-functional project team with different skillsets, as well as developing a change management strategy to ensure that employees' mindsets are aligned to the business process changes.