New research findings unveiled today reveal that the well-documented communication gap between IT executives and their non-IT colleagues may now be a thing of the past.
The research, commissioned by systems integration company Uskotec, and conducted independently by BMI-TechKnowledge, compares the attitudes and perceptions of 57 senior IT executives from South Africa`s Top 200 organisations with those of non-IT managers from the same sample.
Issues addressed include the contribution of IT toward business effectiveness, efficiency, competitive advantage and a change in business model; the extent to which IT measures up to local and global standards; the rate of adoption of new technologies among IT and non-IT management; protection of intellectual capital; and general confidence in the company IT infrastructure.
The overall response from both groups ranged from average to positive, reinforcing the perceived strategic role of information technology in business today. Significantly, in all but one area, non-IT management actually felt more positive about the role of technology than did their IT counterparts.
Key findings include:
Non-IT executives expressed as much as a 20 percent higher level of confidence in the company IT infrastructure than did their IT colleagues;
All respondents felt most strongly that IT infrastructure has contributed towards business efficiency and effectiveness;
All respondents felt that IT has given their organisation a competitive advantage;
IT executives had only slightly above average confidence in their company IT infrastructure;
IT management believed more strongly that the company IT infrastructure measures up to global standards;
IT executives were less convinced that the company has business processes in place to protect intellectual property;
Neither IT nor non-IT managers were entirely persuaded that IT enables the company to take risks such as a change in business model;
Both sets of respondents indicated that the adoption of new technology is high among IT management but less so among non-IT management;
Says Matthew Walsh, sales & marketing director at Uskotec: "It is often held that the working relationship between the IT department and the boardroom is a strained one, largely borne out of a lack of understanding of each other`s area of responsibility. Our research shows quite clearly that this is no longer the case. Consider that only a few years ago, IT managers were known as DP managers - which stood for deep pockets - and you realise just how far the industry has come.
"Whilst top management have long acknowledged the importance of IT, they are only now beginning to understand and realise its strategic contribution to the business. There are of course industry variances - for example, the full value of IT if more readily witnessed in the banking industry than, say, the mining industry.
"IT has been elevated from the backroom to the boardroom and is now an integral part of strategic business planning. Yesterday, IT was about managing experts. Today it`s the very stuff of management. Tomorrow there may be little else that needs to be managed."
Detailed Response
Respondents were asked to rank a list of business/IT issues by level of perceived importance on a scale of one (denoting strong disagreement) to five (denoting strong agreement).
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