Executive Summary (This is a document excerpt)

Whether the economy slips into recession or not, many firms are starting to tighten their budgets. Although this means even more limited resources than usual, the business will continue to expect application development teams to deliver high-quality, business-value-adding software. But you are likely to have fewer people and smaller budgets to accomplish your mission. Paradoxically, that can make this one of the best times to improve the business of IT. Whether it means just being smart about managing your portfolio of projects, using open source software to cut costs, or rationalizing your application strategy, you can no longer afford the luxury of business as usual. Application development professionals should exploit Forrester's research to leave the status quo behind and learn what strategies work best to deliver the "lean" transformation the business is seeking.