State of the Industry
Over the past 20 years IT has moved from being a specialized business unit to becoming a ubiquitous part of your enterprise. In fact many organizations have seen IT investments grow to represent their largest operating expense after salaries. Many executives have begun to question whether the level of investment is justified by the amount of value being provided. Using industrial age financial metrics to gauge their investments, many have found themselves coming up short. There is good reason for this level of investment. IT investments have proven to offer more potential business value than almost any other form of investment. However, they also present great risk to damage value or create competitive disadvantages.

What is needed?
Although IT failure has often been considered a technology failure, it has become more and more clear that the failure lies at the feet of the business in the form of outdated management techniques and the measurements by which IT’s performance is gauged. Therefore new techniques are necessary to select and manage IT investments. In fact the very view of IT as an isolated entity must be overcome and replaced with the realization that IT investment is an investment in change.

Strategy
As we enter the intangible economy, in which a company’s value is more and more reliant on intangible assets, such as collaboration; knowledge, engagement, and time; business will be more and more reliant on IT. Organizations that excel at managing IT investments can increase their advantage in these areas to the detriment of their competition.

Delivery
Absolute IT Solutions has helped a number of organizations overcome industrial age management techniques to maximize the benefits provided by their IT investments.

Clients have reported
• an increased understanding and transparency of costs, risks, and benefits resulting in better management decisions
• higher return on investments visible in increased ROCE
• decreased number of project failures
• reduced costs
• decreased risk and avoidance of high-impact failure
• increased communication between IT and the rest of the business whom it serves