The Future of IT: Never Has the IT Organization Been More Crucial to the Future of the Enterprise
This IDC Perspective provides a response to The Wall Street Journal article "It's Time to Get Rid of the IT Department" published November 27, 2021, and written by Joe Peppard, principal research scientist, MIT Sloan School of Management. Peppard argues that technology and the business are becoming so inextricably entwined that the IT organization as a separate entity has become a hindrance and a bottleneck for the business rather than a source of value. The author concludes that technology resources should be embedded in business groups and that IT should become a distributed network of resources. While aspects of Peppard's vision are compelling, we believe his analysis is overgeneralized and oversimplified and it fails to acknowledge the complexity of digital transformation and the inroads many IT organizations have made on the quest for digital maturity."Understanding the evolution and future of the IT organization requires a clear vision for the future of the enterprise. The organizations that will compete most effectively in the digital economy will be those that master the prioritization and management of investments in nine emerging digital domains of strategic relevance. A reinvented and centralized future IT organization will be the most logical and productive path forward for most enterprises." — Christopher Goodhue, VP, CIO Strategy and Executive Advisory Services
Please Note: Extended description available upon request.
- Executive Snapshot
- Situation Overview
- Pandemic Challenges and Digital Transformation: CIOs and IT Organizations Had to Step Up to the Plate
- IT Organization Under Fire?
- Joe Peppard Is Wrong, But the Challenges Facing the IT Organization Are Real
- "No Man Is an Island, and the IT Department Shouldn't Be One Either"
- "Leaving IT Decisions and Activities to a Department That Is Figuratively and Sometimes Physically Far from the So-Called Core Business Is a Recipe for Disaster"
- "The Partnership Model Also Assumes That It's Possible for the Various Corporate Units to Define Up Front and Many Months in Advance Exactly What They Will Need from the IT Department"
- "This Model Inevitably Means That the Metrics by Which the IT Department Is Measured Are Often Irrelevant to the Success of the Business"
- "Having an IT Department Is Exactly What Will Prevent Companies from Being Innovative, Agile, Customer-Focused, and Digitally Transformed"
- Future Enterprise and Future IT
- Advice for the Technology Leader
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- Related Research
- Synopsis
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