Planning IT

Book excerpt: Planning IT provides a framework for assessing and improving the practice of information management in organizations. It describes the ways in which senior managers can diagnose the situation in their enterprise and generate an appropriate action plan. The book thus helps the manage, to make a more proactive and informed response to the opportunities of modern information technology and information systems. Comprised of nine chapters, this book begins with an introduction to six guidelines for information management: establish an information management partnership; distinguish the potential benefits of information technology and information systems; think strategically about information management; identify the benefits and their value; manage the achievement of the benefits; and prepare for the future. The next six chapters address each of these guidelines in more detail, and each chapter ends with a set of questions which the manager should consider in the context of himself/herself and his/her enterprise. This will produce a score, and some action points, as part of an information management audit. The eighth chapter explains how to produce a consolidated action plan, structured according to the time scale of the individual actions (short- or long-term) and according to whether they are personal or team actions in the enterprise. The last chapter consolidates the book's main points and exhorts the manager to action. This monograph is intended for both senior managers and non-specialists in information technology.