Two centuries ago, when state-of-the-art IT was the 3,000-year-old abacus and the fastest form of communications was the smoke signal, Thomas Paine's words might have made sense, but today, especially for CIOs and IT professionals, Do. Help. Or Get Out of the Way. is increasingly the formula for success, or at the very least, survival.
Yes, IT has to make sure the tools work, but if they're not the right tools, doing the right work, then just keeping the lights on will be an exercise in futility. And in business, the ultimate result of futility is a failure.
Recently, Gartner published what I thought were surprising numbers about IT budgets, reporting that growth would come in at a paltry 2.1% to $3.7 trillion. That's not very much when you consider everything going on in the 24×7 world, from explosive growth in mobility, Big Data and analysis, mobility, social computing, and security.
A new report from IDC paints a slightly brighter picture, with worldwide IT spending forecast to increase by 4.5% in 2014. In addition to smartphones, the strongest growth will come from software, including rapidly expanding markets such as data analytics, data management, and collaborative applications including enterprise social networks. IDC stated that Big Data, Social, Mobile and Cloud will continue to drive virtually all of the growth in IT spending.
This new focus on business is driving a new title of chief business technology officer, whose focus is how technology is used to win, serve, and retain customers. So get ready to say goodbye to IT and hello to BT — business technology.
According to Phil Weinzimer, author of The Strategic CIO: Changing the Dynamics of the Business Enterprise, strategic CIOs traverse a common four-phase process to transform their IT organizations into a strategic asset that enables IT and business unit personnel to collaborate in new and innovative ways to achieve significant business outcomes.
1) Deliver Commodity and Business Services Exceptionally Well.
2) Understand the Business, Focus on User Experiences, and Improve Business Skills of IT Personnel.
4) Leverage Technologies to Innovate Value.
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