Most organisations are not able to align business and IT objectives adequately, says EOH Global Monitoring Service GM, Rudi Barnard.
He adds that this results in gap between what businesses expect and what IT delivers. “It is therefore very important to align a company's business and IT objectives and have an ongoing dialogue between the two to clarify business needs.”
Barnard says IT is an enabling tool which allows business to realise its growth and expansion goals and it's important for businesses to use it. “IT management can then translate the business services needed into the underlying IT capabilities that support these services.”
“This alignment will allow business to report in real-time on the availability and performance of its business, and for IT to report in real-time on all the components contributing to business services”, he adds.
He further asserts businesses have to use disciplined service level management processes which will assist in identifying which specific IT services are required and what service levels are needed to support those business objectives.
“IT management can then translate the business services needed into the underlying IT capabilities that support these services,” says Barnard.
However, the benefits of IT and alignment, Barnard points out, are vast and include the mitigation of risk. If companies have enterprise level monitoring and working in a service orientated manner, they can derive trends and understanding of how each component impacts on another.
“Alignment of business objectives, will reduce time and cost wastages, and enable improvement of internal application lifecycles. This decision will be based on the impact of the entire service and not only on an individual application or platform.”
Share