McKinsey just published a new premium report, Time to raise the CIO’s game. According to the report, the post downturn “new normal is marked by persistent uncertainty, tighter credit, lower consumer spending, and greater government involvement in business.”
The report continues:
“For executives who run major IT organizations, the implications are clear: they will have to make the IT function dramatically more productive, use IT more effectively to meet larger company goals, and embrace disruptive technologies that will shape the new economic terrain.”
The full report speaks to improving business-IT alignment, making fundamental IT changes, as well as embracing technology-based innovation. The report is supported by a recent survey and focuses on Europe. However, as the report states, much of the advice can be applied globally.
Finally, the “Cloud Watch” piece. In a section on “Closing performance gaps”, McKinsey shares the following:
“Since the downturn began, many CIOs have scrambled to control costs by delaying investments where possible and pushing service providers to cut prices. Some CEOs are raising cash through the sale and leaseback of assets such as data centers. But as competition intensifies, a more fundamental restructuring of IT operations will be in order.
Certain companies are rethinking their current approaches to procurement in hopes of replacing the current model of capital spending on infrastructure with a more flexible approach to operating expenditures. Cloud computing and software-as-a-service, for example, allow companies to purchase computing power and application services that scale with demand and thus to avoid large capital outlays on infrastructure capacity to meet peak loads. The cash savings from such efforts can be critical for self-funding additional IT investments: shifts in certain basic IT operations, for instance, could finance a streamlined IT architecture that will improve long-term productivity.”
[emphasis is mine]
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