IT resources are still not being effectively shared or
measured across IT organisations because tracking IT assets remains
difficult, according to research by
Vanson Bourne on behalf of
Morse.
Over half of respondents (52%) said their organisation struggled
to track assets, and 74% said they avoided asking individual
departments to try to predict what server or storage capacity they
might need in the next few months.
And over half (59%) of the 100-strong survey sample said their
business doesn't share the capacity of its IT assets nor has it any
way to demonstrate savings.
The research found 45% would allows IT equipment procurement of
storage and servers on a department by department basis; while 52%
blame departmental interests for refusing to relinquish control of
assets. Other reasons for not sharing resource capacity were little
perceived return on investment from sharing capacity (33%) and the
process for sharing capacity being too complex (33%).
When questioned further about purchasing strategies, 58% said
they would let one department with urgent additional storage or
server needs purchase its own devices if it came out of its own
project budget. This practice is even more widespread in the
financial sector, with 86% admitting they allow point purchases at
a departmental level.
Neil Ward-Dutton, research director of IT advisory firm
Macehiter Ward-Dutton, said the survey highlighted an all too
common symptom of business-led change that is imposed on the IT
department, which does not allow for a holistic view of the IT
impact of those changes.
“IT is generally brought in to the change programme quite late,”
he said.
He added that asset and configuration management products and
services would be helpful here but did not address the underlying
problem. “The business will continue to pull IT in different
directions unless the two really engage to get the decision making
process to involve a broader understanding of the role technology
can play in enabling business change.”
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