According to the economical gurus, the world is coming out of the recession. After a year of cutting costs, doing more with less and outsourcing IT services, what should be the best strategy for IT executives moving forward?
Obviously, the reckless pattern of costs savings has lead to huge gaps in IT processes. Especially the maintenance of IT applications has been hit hard during the recession. In the last 9-12 months almost all companies have reduced the contracts with consultants dramatically, IT services have been outsourced and support and maintenance contracts not renewed. On top of that, internal IT resources have been cut back or reorganizations have taken people away from maintenance projects. But also new, innovative IT projects have been postponed. I’m pretty sure everyone can think of one project this year that was already approved but never executed or was killed during implementation.
However, since our gurus allows us to see some light at the end of the tunnel (which could easily be a train coming towards you from the other site of the tunnel!), what should be the recommendations for IT executives?
Allow me to come with some suggestions:
- Fill out the gaps of your IT processes by implementing new processes, new application to support the processes and by hiring resources in critical spots
- Gain competitive advantage by updating your website with new features such as: news feeds, newsletters, event calendars, case studies, photo galleries, customer support features, product catalogs, blogs, social networking capabilities, and SEO improvements.
- Invest in the future by hiring young, talented people and by training the employees that kept your business running for the last 12 months.
Just some suggestions. Let me know your ideas.
Floris
