IT Alignment Essay

The purpose of this article is to illuminate the need for any organization to have its IT strategy and business strategy properly aligned. While many organizations view IT and business alignment as an event – it is actually an on-going process, or continuous journey. Therefore, the main problem is that many organizations of today still hold these two principles (business mission & IT strategy) as two separate entities. However, in the Information Age – collaboration is key to capturing and retaining market penetration. To not have alignment with the IT and business strategy together is not a matter of want it is a matter of survival. This report will expand upon the need for business and IT strategic alignment as well as examine what happens in lack of a comprehensive plan. This will be done by examining the Vermont Teddy Bear company prior to and after the arrival of Bob Stetzel, the Vice President of Information Technology. This document will view it findings and make recommendations on the immediate and future operations of the company.

Business Plan Alignment: aligning plans of the use of the software with the organizations business plans.

In order to leverage IT for the benefit of the whole organization enterprise architecture must be developed to oversee IT strategy. Centralizing IT strategy at the start of the new business strategies will be important to make sure IT and business are working together with common goals that deliver the most value. The following steps are to be completed within each department:

V., Pratt, R. E., Byrd, T. A., Outlay, C. N., & Wynn, J. E. (2012). Enterprise architecture, IT effectiveness and the mediating role of IT alignment in US hospitals. Information Systems Journal, 22(2), 97-127. doi:10.1111/j.1365-2575.2011.00379.x

In the market today, business is showing growing interest to partner with IT to make sure they get the value for investing huge in technology. But, still there is a gap between the two departments and the IT folks think that they do not have enough support from the business to ensure the value is realized for the organization. A good example of deep integration of IT and business is the recent firing of the Apple maps chief. The ill-fated Apple maps was the failure of both the IT folks who couldn’t develop an efficient app for maps and also the business who couldn’t gather all the requirements and couldn’t manage the project to achieve the desired output. As a result, the Apple exec Richard Williamson was blamed and fired for the disastrous project and humiliation for the organization.

Alignment of an enterprise’s goals with its IT1 and IS1 systems has been a challenge ever since IT became a business enabler. Proposing an IT alignment requires a thorough understanding of the business goals of the enterprise and the knowledge that alignment is an iterative process which requires constant measurement and honing (Chan, 2002). Enterprises often face the problem of balance of priorities between IT and Business objectives. This report deals with one such case that faced alignment and prioritization hardships resulting in an unclear approach to achieve a corporate strategy.

There are communication concerns between business and IT sectors. The relationship confidential the whole association does not work adequately, Hefty does not arise up with a composite way that initiatives both IT and commercial organization, hereafter ignoring to proposal a solid IT methodology.

In Bottler Company the processes should facilitate the alignment of the business goals of the company with the Information Technology goals.

This portfolio focus on what I have learned during the whole IT Strategy and Control paper, a critical reflection of this paper would be provided. This reflection includes the key points, support reference and the demonstration of my own understanding about the paper itself and all of my personal understandings are based on the learning outcome of this paper. In the first part of this portfolio, I would discuss all the key IT Operations Management framework which have been introduced in the paper, the analysis of the processes based on my own understanding would be given. In the second part, analyze processes required for aligning IT infrastructure and operations with the business goals of an organization would be talked about, and I would focus a business organization which has been mentioned in the caselets as a sample. In the third part, some critical evaluate operational IT organizations and their processes against the studied models would be listed and analyzed. In the last part, the recommendations and analysis of my own would be given against those organizations (caselets) which have some problems and current issues arising from the implementation of the IT framework.

If one is looking specifically at the market, there are a lot of factors to consider to determine whether the business will be successful or not. One of these factors is competition which is important because it will impact the amount of customers and could also pose a barrier to entry. For instance, if there is an established pho restaurant in Charlottesville one has to consider their market power and ability to outprice your restaurant or if they’ve been in the market for a while they may possess a competitive advantage over your future restaurant. Slightly related to competition is demand for pho which determines the price and number of customers willing to purchase pho at that price. One has to ask in relation to demand how many people in Charlottesville are willing to purchase pho at $4, is that price optimal? Demand also has sub-factors which must be considered such as are there substitutes for pho and what is the demand for those products (i.e. ramen restaurants). Furthermore, in the context of markets, it is important to consider supply costs. Are the supply markets for inputs volatile? Would I be able to handle a sharp increase in input prices and for how long?

The rapid globalization of today’s economy requires business leaders to pursue innovation to cater the increasing statistics of consumers’ expectations and demands. The diverse market which resulted from migration, multiculturalism and tourism opens business to creative ways to make ones business acceptable to the market. The pursuit of business success lies on its ability to adapt, sustain and create new business ideas in order to compete in the continuously changing market needs. Such business not only has to make radical changes to make products and services appealing to the consumers to increase profits and revenues but also ensure that internal transformations are well accepted and communicated to all incumbent

The enterprise transition plan provides a competitive advantage that maximizes the latest IT technologies from partnering organizations, suppliers, human capital investments, and government funding sources. Competitor forces require a consistent reassessment of new and emerging technologies. The Michael Porter Forces Model illustrates the combined forces that support USAID’s strategy to gain a competitive advantage over market competitors as seen in Figure 3 below.

IT alignment is crucial for the growth of businesses and in the case of Volkswagen with several independent units, the alignment of their business with IT is more needed. This is because with the implementation of IT, it would be more conducive for Volkswagen to record and comprehend sales figures. Also the communication between these units is needed as they are not integrated throughout the enterprise so a technology based communication platform is required to align their business strategies. This alignment was achieved to some extent by the establishment of the Business Process, Technology and Organization (BPTO) which was an internal IT department to manage and prioritize IT projects in coordination with the IT steering committee (ITSC) which comprised of senior business and IT representative to guide the approval of the process. I feel that the workshop conducted by the

I have chosen to do my research in small business. I want to know what it takes to build a successful business. What are the skills needed to start a new business? What are some of the steps to building a business model and plan? I am working on getting my degree in business. I am a general manager and will be soon help the company expand in opening two new stores in the next few months. This is something that is exciting to be able to expand the brand. This experience will help me when I am ready to own my own business. I know a small business is a big responsibility. As an owner, one has to dedicate lots of time and money to grow the brand and create customer loyalty. I know that simply being in love with an idea or product produced is not enough to survive in the business world. What are the key elements of a successful business? I want to learn more about creating a successful business plan and the logistics it takes to start a small business. I want to learn as much as possible about becoming an entrepreneur.

Frenzel (2004) claimed that to be successful, a firm’s IT management team must take action on the following critical areas: business management issues; strategic and competitive issues; planning and implementation concerns; and operational items. If for any reason, the organisation experiences difficulties in the above areas, the manager will need to set goals and objectives to overcome and prevent these issues.