Chapter 1

1. Chapter 1 The Information Technology Challenge

2. Overview • IT Strategy is STRATEGY • The fundamentals have not changed • Tactics change frequently • The pace of change provides cycle time dangers and opportunities • Good IT strategy does not insure survival • Poor strategy is a ticket to oblivion • It is just a choice of how we go

3. IT is a new and evolving field • Tremendous changes over the last decade • New players and technologies • IT investment and deployment can impact firms of all sizes • Necessary-but-not-sufficient for success • Pervasive - Now goes beyond the IT department • Older managers may have had no contact with computers during their education • Data Processing (DP) was not considered a good career path • Many can not type

4. Even IT managers find that the landscape has changed • Only in the early 1980s did IT management decide to coordinate their goals with the organization’s goals • Many non-IT MBAs may have more experience with current technology than older IT managers • IT knowledge shelf-life is very short • 3-6 months to become obsolete • Requires constant education and refreshers

5. Strategic Relevance Corporate Culture Contingency WOAPC BOAPC MLPC Technology Transfer Organizational Diffusion vs. Fiefdoms IT Management Concepts

6. Challenges in Managing IT • Young Technology • Technological Growth • Leaps in Cost Performance • Quick transition from market leader to obsolescence • End-User Coordination • Interdisciplinary focus of MIS vs CS • Specialized vocabulary • Specialization • Outsourcing • Shift in Application Focus

7. The It Environment Primary target Justification/ Purpose Era I Organizational Productivity/Efficiency Individual / Group Effectiveness Era II Individual Enterprise & Industry Integration Value Creation Era III