The future of corporate IT and IT leadership is part of a sensitive debate today. These are intense and reactive times where changes and new management ideas are being given serious consideration. A new Forrester Research report states that more than half of the IT executives surveyed are planning to upend the status quo and institute a new IT model within three years. That’s a lot of change! The argument for restructuring is based in improving services, reducing costs and increasing consistency of business processes and IT systems. The area with greatest priority: the applications organization.
The Corporate Executive Board (CEB) recently published a study, The Future of Corporate IT with a stunning prediction: by 2015, the IT function “will bear little resemblance to its current state. Many activities will devolve to business units, be consolidated with other central functions or be externally sourced.”
It also states that less than 25 percent of employees currently working in IT will only remain and CIOs will “face the choice of expanding to lead a business shared service group, or seeing their position shrink to manage technology delivery.” Business leaders “are frustrated with IT’s ability to deliver the business capabilities requested or required” and that is why IT as we know it is coming to an end.
Of course that context matters in this discussion: Cloud computing has made its way, mobile and social media have changed customers expectations and IT workforce is particularly more technology-enabled and extremely demanding.
What do you think about these upcoming challenges and this particular solution? Are you preparing to evolve your IT organization into a scalable, integrated, business connected technology practice?
Sources:
Apocalypse Soon: 52 Percent of CIOs Plan to Blow Up IT Groups