Most CIOs face mounting cost pressure, driven by the business. Forrester’s Business And Technology Services Survey, 2025, found that 48% of business leaders rank cost reduction as a top priority. Many organizations have already chased quick savings: 76% have renegotiated vendor contracts, yet the strain persists. In the same survey, 22% still report insufficient budget for critical in-house work — a sign that reactive, one-off cuts often shift cost and risk rather than sustainably funding what matters.

The real issue is context. Cuts made without a clear view of what the business values can erode relationships: When IT reduces spend without understanding the capabilities that stakeholders depend on most, confidence drops and alignment weakens. Over time, CIOs risk being pulled into an order-taking role instead of shaping outcomes as strategic partners. A business capability lens restores that context. It clarifies the IT investments that directly enable revenue growth, customer experience, and operational efficiency — and those that can be reduced with minimal business impact. Our research shows how to apply this lens to turn cost optimization from a blunt instrument into a strategic advantage.

Business Capability Views Unlock Multiple Cost Optimization Opportunities

Aligning IT investments with business capabilities unlocks multiple optimization opportunities. This includes revealing hidden inefficiencies, prioritizing transformation investments, and rationalizing vendor spend. Consider one common scenario: Multiple autonomous teams build similar features across different products. When these features are mapped to business capabilities, project management offices and product owners discover the overlap, revealing opportunities to eliminate redundancy and create natural synergies.

Make Smarter Spending Decisions Using Forrester’s Framework

Our six-step spending optimization framework provides a repeatable method for using capability insights to drive cost decisions. It supports continuous reprioritization with visibility into the factors that matter most — value, risk, cost, and dependency — so that capability mapping becomes a living management system rather than a one-time exercise. For enterprise architects, the business capability map becomes a practical tool for IT estate optimization, grounding cost and investment decisions in business context.

Why This Matters

Effective cost optimization requires surgical alignment of spend to business priorities. Business capabilities provide that alignment so that CIOs can move beyond reactive cuts and make proactive, value-driven trade-offs that strengthen resilience and accelerate transformation.

Want the full playbook, including detailed steps, scoring rubrics, and capability cost models?

👉 Forrester clients can read the full report: Use Business Capabilities To Optimize IT Spending

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