Forrester

Why Read This Report

Many companies are keen to benchmark their IT costs and operations against other peer companies. Using survey-based benchmarks or hiring a benchmarking consultant can help, but both approaches have limitations. The ideal IT benchmarking approach is to organize a group of companies in an industry to share data on IT metrics. This approach ensures that companies get accurate and highly relevant IT benchmarks at an affordable cost. However, it is not easy to pull off. Forrester interviewed representatives of one of the most successful industry benchmarking efforts: the UNITE project among US electric and gas utilities. Based on this case study, we have identified five factors that CIOs should use for successful industry IT benchmarking.