Strategies and Trends for Information Technology Leaders
A few months ago I wrote about 2009 being theyear of doing more with less and referred to some broad ITSM/ITIL-based initiatives that can help you to prioritize your work and contain costs. Well, here are five more ways to identify and cut specific costs within your organization. As an added bonus, some of these…
Cost pressure is nothing new for IT. In this economic climate you are getting even more pressure than usual, so why not make the CFO your best friend. If the thought of this seems odd or impossible, take a minute to step back and consider the benefits: less angst and more money. It’s not impossible….
They do not want to see your IT plan. Trust us, they don’t. Up in the C-suite, the CFO, CEO, and the board chairman are way too busy ducking pot shots from the Obama White House; conjuring up creative explanations of down quarters to pacify shareholders; and reading economic tea leaves in hopes that there…
In the groundswell of economic pressures, companies big and small are looking to the Cloud for relief. The buzz is everywhere: Cloud computing can cut costs, speed implementations, and scale quickly. The buzz, however, may be slightly off-the mark … at least in product pitches. “Just like SOA hype was vendor fueled and thus became…
The Boston Consulting Group’s (BCG’s) sixth annual global survey and report on innovation, Innovation 2009: Making Hard Decisions in the Downturn, reveals that, not surprisingly, economic concerns are weighing on many companies’ innovation plans. A significant percentage of companies plan to reduce innovation investment in 2009—and the percentage that plan to increase spending is at…
The economic downturn has had a significant impact on IT spending, particularly in certain sectors. According to new EMA research, 2009 budgets in the education, retail, manufacturing, and banking/finance sectors are all down between 15% and 35% over Q1 of 2008. January and February 2009 IT dollars show a continuation of this decline in spending,…
Gartner’s latest analysis of the direction of global IT spending during 2009 released March 13, includes significant downward revision to its last market growth forecasts, which were made at year-end 2008. In an advance look at its forthcoming 1Q09 update, Gartner’s preliminary forecast is that IT spending during 2009 will decline by 3.7%. The sharp…
This category of outsourcing adds “ping, power, & pipe” services to the in-house managed model. The service provider offers colocation by providing space, power and a link to the Internet for their customers’ servers. They do not perform maintenance or troubleshooting. The only provide a rack to house the servers and a repetitive test to…
This category of outsourcing is probably the least costly because what you’re paying for is remote expertise. In this model, you own the equipment and physical environment it sits in. What you don’t have is a bunch of hardware engineers on your staff. You get those experts sitting at your partner’s site. In this environment,…
According to a Computer Economics assessment of IT spending patterns during the previous two recessions, IT spending growth will remain flat through 2009 but will begin to recover in 2010. The IT research and advisory firm said that its analysis of IT spending trends shows that businesses began restraining spending in late 2007, in anticipation…