Poor software damages a company's public image and has a
negative impact on turnover and staff productivity according to new
research from analyst company IDC in conjunction with Mercury
Interactive.
The survey of 450 IT directors across UK,
Germany and France found 73% saying their company had suffered
major faults with their IT systems.
Lack of quality in software had a direct
impact on business performance, the IT directors said, with 36%
believing IT failure led to "considerable reduction in
turnover".
Some 43% said poor software quality led to a
substantial drop in staff productivity and 45% believed poor
software quality damaged the company's image among clients and
prospective clients.
The most likely software fault experienced by
the IT directors surveyed was a slowdown in the application (63% of
respondents). But the IT directors admitted they had experienced
more serious errors such as problems with functionality (59%),
application unavailability ie crashes (38%) and improper
representation of business processes in applications (19%).
The survey also highlighted the problems of implementing business
goals within an IT strategy. While UK IT directors had a strategy
to align IT with the business, 63% felt they were being held back
because of difficulties their management colleagues had in grasping
the constraints and challenges faced by IT departments.