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February 8, 2024Reasons you need a business IT strategy
Do I really need a business IT strategy?
You may have asked yourselves this question many times, especially as reliance on IT continues to increase across all industries and sectors. But with so many suppliers keen to offer advice and sell you their wares, it can be hard to know where to start.
While it can be tempting to take a more casual approach, a well-thought-out business IT strategy is essential for both SMEs and large corporations. Here’s a look at five key reasons why you should have one, and the benefits they can offer your organisation.
Five BIG IT strategy benefits
1. Alignment with your business goals
So, you have a successful, growing business and you’re already using IT to underpin many of its functions. But it’s likely that your application portfolio along with your IT infrastructure has grown organically and, consequently, your applications have limited, if any, integration. In turn, this could be causing business-wide inefficient processes and providing a fragmented view of how your business is operating.
With tech readily available to solve pretty much any operational challenge, it’s imperative to step back, take stock, and identify potential opportunities for solving these issues. By taking a "36,000 feet” view and gaining a deep understanding of your current systems and their functionality, you’ll start to map out a plan for change. This exercise may also enable you to compare trends within your business against your plans for future growth, so you can build an IT strategy that will flex and respond to your changing needs.
2. Manage IT investment costs
One important benefit of IT strategy is that it details precise capabilities you need. This means you can explore your options for new investment in an informed and targeted way, focusing on functionality rather than being led by sales patter and glitzy marketing.
This doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t be aware of optional, additional capability that you might want to deploy in the future... but it does mean that you’ll have a plan for when to make that extra investment.
Ultimately, your decisions should be made on a return on investment (ROI) – and you’ll only be able to assess that if you have a robust IT strategy.
3. Improve efficiency and productivity
There’s no doubt that optimal IT capability - driven by a properly evaluated IT strategy - can significantly improve:
- Workflow
- Performance
- Logistics
- Product/service quality
- Employee/customer satisfaction
- Your bottom line
Automating manual tasks and interfaces between processes can free up talented resources for added business value and enables improved communications and data management, ultimately driving better business decisions.
4. A framework for creative thinking
An IT strategy will identify existing capability, whilst also highlighting latent capability within applications that could be deployed relatively simply, and at low cost. Within this framework your teams will be able to think creatively about how new ideas could be implemented quickly, driving your business forward with relatively limited additional investment.
To support this, your IT strategy should not be static but continually develop with a roadmap-based approach considering:
- Projected business growth
- New business opportunities that might require upgraded or new applications
- The availability of new technology that could transform existing processes
5. Safeguard data, enhance security, maintain compliance
Identifying the right tools to protect and secure your data is key to maintaining your reputation and protecting you from falling foul of legislation and financial penalties.
Robust processes and systems in these areas aren’t just a necessary evil, they can also drive opportunities. Many organisations will be looking to obtain appropriate accreditations, such Cyber Essentials, ISO 22301 for Business Continuity and ISO 27001 for Information Security. Your IT strategy should be designed to facilitate these types of accreditations, giving you a competitive edge
Maximising your IT strategy benefits
These big IT strategy benefits seem sensible enough but it’s not always as simple as it sounds once you head into the deeper details.
While many companies have operational IT teams, they can sometimes lack the resources to create and develop an IT strategy that is thorough, bespoke and truly fit for purpose. If this is the case for you, bringing in outsourced expertise in the form of a fractional Chief Information Officer (CIO) could help you bridge that gap while keeping a handle on your budget.
If you’d like more information on building a business IT strategy - or to explore how Economit’s virtual CIO services could help you unleash big benefits - please get in touch.