"A lively and enlightening seminar that revealed some very practical tips on aligning IT to the business. I learnt some effective ways that business and IT can work together towards a single goal of creating solutions that add value. This seminar exceeded my expectations."Leighton Keenan, ICT Manager, Bron Afon Community Housing
Why you cannot afford to miss this seminar:
Did you know that "the world’s largest 500 companies lose more than $14 billion* every year from failed IT projects alone. Only companies that receive focused board direction on IT-related risk will have a competitive advantage over those that don’t.”
Successful alignment requires companies to have a clear view of strategy and operations, the plans and the activities. Only with increased visibility they identify the barriers to alignment and close the gaps that will keep them from competing more effectively. Ineffective use of information technology combined with a separation of business and IT will make company performance suffer. In today’s new economy, taking business decisions without consideration of IT will have damaging outcomes and introduce significant risk (*Taming Information Technology Risk)
Below you find a summary of what will be covered in the seminar and why you should attend
Survival in today’s complex business climate demands effective and decisive action. Organizations can only remain competitive if they can keep up with the challenges of the new economy and are capable of continuously adapting strategy, operations and IT investments. While Business executives are confronted with new paradigms like the consumerization of technology, cloud computing, big data and the rise of the mobile customer, they increasingly wonder how to fit IT into the equation.
Technological and social trends become a real management concern as they risk to affect business strategy and operational execution. In the current business climate, IT not only has the potential to evolve towards a ‘strategic’ role in support of the chosen business strategies, it also bears the promise of shaping new business models.
Untapping the hidden potential of IT
IT-savvy organizations that understand how to leverage investments in technology to their advantage continue to outperform their competitors with double-digit figures.
Strategic alignment of IT exists when an organization’s goals, activities and information systems that support them remain in harmony. Alignment is a true management concern and not a ‘one and done’ activity - it is a journey towards a new way of doing business where IT is managed in a way that mirrors the strategic priorities of the organisation.
Who should attend
This is the one-stop-shop for Business, Finance, Marketing and IT executives that want to learn how to effectively improve the relationship between Business and IT. This seminar address both the business and IT concerns and makes the delegates familiar with the current thinking and essentials in the field of business/IT alignment. IT professionals will learn how to incorporate best practices and improve IT leadership and alignment capabilities. Business professionals will benefit from the mechanisms that ensure IT-enabled investments pay off in the short-run and long-run:
Learning objectives
In this two-day workshop, you will discover everything about the essentials of alignment and how to put these into practice. Thanks to a blended format of teaching and group assignments, you will get a better insight into the crucial enablers for Business/IT alignment. Throughout the sessions, delegates get the opportunity to share their personal experiences and concerns while learning from their peers. After two days, delegates will be able to build their own business/IT alignment roadmap based on the following fundamentals.
- Intelligent IT steering
- Portfolio Management
- IT budget control and reporting
- The evolving role of CIO
- IT leadership and communication
- Project Governance and management methodologies
- Enterprise Architecture
- Integrated business/IT planning
- IT marketing: a quick win to improve the relationship between business and IT
Program outline and modules
Module 1: Seeing the signals of misalignment
- Why Business/IT alignment is the primary concern of business and IT executives
- The barriers to alignment
- The evolving role of the CIO
- Technology trends and the future of the IT department
- How IT can reshape business strategies and create sustainable competitive advantage
Module 2: A shared responsibility
- The alignment trap
- Why alignment should be a shared responsibility
- Why IT people should think like business people (and vice versa)
- From Enterprise Architecture to Business Architecture
- Intelligent IT governance: integrating business and IT planning
- IT-portfolio thinking: moving beyond the cost of IT
Module 3: Culture, competences and IT marketing
- Overcoming the barriers to alignment
- Building a new (IT) culture
- It is not about communication, it is about IT marketing
- Relationships do matter: how to get the right skills on board
- The hybrid organization: adapting to an evolving business and IT landscape
Module 4: The alignment journey
- Managing IT like a business transformation program
- Building an alignment roadmap
- Choosing the right IS strategy to support the business transition
- The long tail of IT: Enterprise 2.0 puts the users back into the driving seat