For Vendor Strategy Professionals

Addressing Diverse Stakeholders In The IT And Business Services Buying Process

Planning For 2010 Requires A Clear Understanding Of Roles

by Chris Andrews, November 20, 2009

For years, Forrester has written about the evolution of information technology (IT) into business technology (BT) — an idea that is rooted in Forrester's view that technology is becoming more relevant and strategic to business processes. This trend, which . . .

For CIOs

Forrester's Best Practices Framework For BT Leadership Maturity

Use Our Self-Assessment To Accelerate Your BT Transformation

by Bobby Cameron, Tim DeGennaro, November 6, 2009

As CIOs help their firms succeed with business technology (BT) — pervasive technology use with increased direct control by the business — they struggle to answer two deceptively simple questions: 1) How are we doing? and 2) what should we do better? These . . .

For CIOs

Catalog Of Technical Services  (66 KB XLS)

by Alexander Peters, Ph.D., Wolfgang Benkel, November 6, 2009

The workbook defines 10 generic profiles of technical services and associates provisioning processes and activities with each of them. The activity-based descriptions enable IT executives to establish the link between technology assets, resources, and . . .

For CIOs

A Catalog Of Technical Services Improves The Manageability Of The BT Service Portfolio

by Alexander Peters, Ph.D., November 6, 2009

Business technology (BT) changes IT's roles within the enterprise, forcing IT leaders to deploy business service processes and technology demand management. CIOs are embarking on the IT-to-BT journey by concentrating their efforts on the consolidation . . .

For CIOs

CIOs: Business Alignment And BT Enablement Require Business Capability Maps

At Your Level, You Can't Rely On Any Other Single IT Business Model

by Bobby Cameron, October 30, 2009

CIOs are aggressively tackling their planning and management challenges, deploying tools and building models to address a wide variety of functions like asset management, IT services management, application rationalization, business process efficiencies, . . .

For CIOs

IT To BT Transformation: Threats And Opportunities For CIO Reporting Lines

by George Lawrie, October 26, 2009

CIOs face many threats and opportunities as they grapple with the IT to BT transformation — including the risk of being sidelined by their line-of-business peers. Forrester surveyed 47 enterprise IT decision-makers to understand CIOs' level of confidence . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

Aligning With Business Customers Requires Strategy, Stakeholder Focus, And Metrics

by Chris Andrews, October 20, 2009

Creating greater alignment with business customers is an incredibly hot objective for technology strategists and one that is supported by powerful long-term market trends. Our recent survey of strategy professionals found that 91% of respondents say that . . .

For Application Development & Program Management Professionals

Smart Grid Technologies: Coming To A Utility Near You

Modern IT And Communications Systems Are Transforming The US Power Industry

by Roy C. Wildeman, October 19, 2009

Today's energy companies face an unprecedented quandary of regulatory requirements, market pressures, and public scrutiny that, in combination, act to disrupt traditional approaches to cutting costs and servicing consumers. With the recent federal stimulus . . .

For Enterprise Architecture Professionals

What's Next For The IT-To-BT Transformation: The Contractualization Trend

by Henry Peyret, October 14, 2009

The combination of the current economic climate and business globalization is accelerating the evolution of business models toward a networked model, where businesses focus on their core competencies to add value and engage with other external and internal . . .

For CIOs

Driving Value With Process Improvement

CIOs Recommend Nine Best Practices For Business Processes Management

by Alexander Peters, Ph.D., October 6, 2009

Senior business executives recognize the value of technology in supporting business operations and expect CIOs to help drive process improvement efforts — all while tuning and elevating IT's relationship with the business. CIOs from various industries . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

Lean: The New Business Technology Imperative

Lean Thinking Is Central To The Shift From IT To BT

by Connie Moore, Clay Richardson, John R. Rymer, Ted Schadler, Dave West, September 29, 2009

Everyone wants to be lean these days, whether when stepping off a scale in the morning or reviewing the cost of running a successful business. But just how do you define "Lean" — especially in the context of business and technology? Do you think of Lean . . .

For Business Process & Applications Professionals

From Information Technology To Business Technology: An Interview With George F. Colony

by Connie Moore, George F. Colony, September 16, 2009

For the past four years, Forrester Research CEO George F. Colony has been preaching the gospel of converting information technologists into businesspeople. The number of converts has been lower than we hoped, but a generational change in IT and business . . .

For CIOs

Market The BT Service Portfolio To Fuel Innovation And Utility

by Alexander Peters, Ph.D., July 24, 2009

As businesses become infused with technology, CIOs are expected to provide portfolios of business technology (BT) services, which sustain the competitive advantage of their firms. To improve IT's responsiveness to this increasingly complex and dynamic . . .

For CIOs

Priorities Shift As Business' Grip On Technology Tightens

CIOs Can Drive Better Tech Decisions — Even When Business Is Making Them

by Bobby Cameron, Sharyn Leaver, July 17, 2009

In Q4 2008, Forrester surveyed 1,104 IT decision-makers to find out how they set their budgets and allocated funds to different software types and initiatives. As part of this study, Forrester asked where the ultimate software decision control resides . . .

For B2B Market Research Professionals

Vendors: Leverage How Decision-Makers Use Web 2.0 Technologies To Tailor Collaboration Offerings

by TJ Keitt, July 2, 2009

Web 2.0 technology's use in business is very new, making the success of these initial deployments hinge on how well IT and business leaders understand their value and create implementation plans. We have seen that the more successful deployments have . . .

For Enterprise Architecture Professionals

Next-Generation IT Requires Next-Generation EA

EA Makes The New Core Processes Of IT Work

by Alex Cullen, Gene Leganza, Jeff Scott, Jost Hoppermann, June 30, 2009

What business wants from IT is changing, and that means IT has to change how it manages itself and the IT-business relationship. Building on current project delivery and operational management competencies, CIOs are adding new core management processes: . . .

For Enterprise Architecture Professionals

Case Study: EA Aligns IT With Business' Emergent Strategy

by Gene Leganza, June 10, 2009

Enterprise architecture (EA) programs are becoming more business focused and helping IT to deliver greater value to business. Business-focused EA teams are developing the "next practices" for interacting with the business, collecting and analyzing data, . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

Capgemini's TechnoVision Framework Translates Emerging Technologies Into Business Value

by Chris Andrews, June 4, 2009

At Forrester we see continuing evidence that technology vendors are incorporating the needs of business users into their strategy, offerings, and go-to-market approaches. While many vendors target business customers simply as a way to reach stakeholders . . .

For CIOs

The IT To Business Technology Transformation — Learning From Utilities

by Alexander Peters, Ph.D., June 2, 2009

Evolving business, political, regulatory, ecological, and financial challenges are accelerating the utility industry's transformation to a new business technology model. As the industry adapts to these pressures and new technologies such as X Internet . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

Sun Is The Center Of The New Oracle Universe

How Cisco, HP, And Oracle Are Shaping IT's Future

by Jean-Pierre Garbani, May 21, 2009

There are defining moments in IT where all the stars align to create a big bang. Twenty years ago, IT vendors faced clients wanting application and service value, not technology. The market dominance of IBM mainframes forced these smaller vendors to find . . .

For Infrastructure & Operations Professionals

BT For I&O: Make IT Easy For The Business

BT Changes IT's Operating Model

by Simon Yates, May 12, 2009

IT's role is changing. As business units become ever more reliant on technology and more comfortable with implementing it themselves, IT is becoming an advisor and a service integrator rather than the direct manager of all technology assets. Forrester . . .

For Vendor Strategy Professionals

Technology Populism Shapes The Collaboration Vendor Landscape

A Bottom-Up And Top-Down Selling Approach Is Required

by TJ Keitt, April 28, 2009

The transition from IT to business technology (BT), technology populism, and the down economy are changing businesses and the collaboration vendors that serve them. The door has opened to new vendors that appeal to the less technically savvy users in . . .

For Enterprise Architecture Professionals

Enterprise Architects Should Lead Business Service Portfolio Definition

by Alex Cullen, March 26, 2009

CIOs rank improving IT value communications as a top priority — and many are realizing that a strategy of organizing IT assets, capabilities, and costs around business-relevant services may be the best approach to doing this. Business services connect . . .

For CIOs

IT Must "Get" Business Satisfaction

Measuring And Improving Business Satisfaction Requires A Framework

by Alexander Peters, Ph.D., March 20, 2009

Today's business execs have high expectations for technology's contribution to their organizations, but they tend to be dissatisfied with IT's delivery. In order to close this gap, IT must be able to understand the components of business satisfaction . . .

For Infrastructure & Operations Professionals

Hollow Out The MOOSE: Reducing Cost With Strategic Rightsourcing

Operationalizing BTaaS And Determining What Infrastructure Services Not To Do Yourself

by James Staten, March 19, 2009

Leading IT shops are leveraging today's recessionary climate to transform their organizations and the portfolio of services they manage and maintain. A new business-technology-as-a-service model, put forth by Forrester in July 2008, established a strategic . . .