Too many cooks spoil the broth in IT strategy

Businesses across Europe are unable to form a clear strategy on IT because there are too many people involved in the decision-making process, said a recent survey.

Some 82 per cent of senior business and IT decision makers surveyed in the HP survey felt there were too many influencers, stakeholders and external consultants, with 79 per cent saying there were too many people making decisions. Another 64 per cent thought that there was not enough expertise in their IT staff to put a single team together.

One of the conclusions was that the growing number of middle management personnel becoming IT literate in the last ten years had become a problem. Many now felt qualified to make decisions for their own individual departments and this was overlapping with the responsibilities of chief information officers.

"I think this has been a very gradual process," said Ian Miller, director of application services for HP consulting and integration. "It started with the development of IT literate business users almost a generation ago. It has led to the devolvement down from centralised bureaucracies to strategic business units that are more empowered to take decisions."

Nearly half (49%) felt that their businesses did not have a clear strategy for moving forward in IT. One of the conclusions was that this was because CIOs often did not have enough control of the different IT strategies employed in their businesses. It meant the company as whole could not move forward.

"With more stakeholders involved in IT decision making it is more critical than ever for the CIO to lead and develop an applications strategy," said David Concordel, director of HP services marketing and strategy.

"This can govern the selection of new applicants and can ensure that the needs of middle managers are addressed while at the same time maximising the return of IT investments for the business as a whole."

"I think this has to come from the CIOs themselves," added Miller. "We've seen a number of companies that are high profile that have decided to cancel the CIO position. That says that they are not demonstrating their value. IT is such an important part of business life and a strategic asset. If there's no CIO it would be the only strategic asset that businesses won't have someone in charge."

It was agreed by the majority of decision makers that web-based applications was the way to go. Indeed, 84 per cent agreed that it would have a great or fair impact on their businesses' IT strategy. At the same time, the same percentage had worries about security when implementing it into their systems.

The results were part of the 2008 pressure point index survey, which consisted of 234 interviews across senior business and IT decision makers from companies with over 1000 employees across the UK, France, Germany and Italy.

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