8 IT Projects To Prioritize When Budget's Tight
If you're looking for places to cut IT spending due to the sluggish economy or other factors, here are 8 projects you need keep on your to-do list no matter what.
It's safe to say that 2016 hasn't gotten off to the best start from an economic standpoint. Global markets are down, consumer confidence is on the decline -- and there's a general financial concern regarding the rest of the year. Because of this, many companies are tightening spending habits. Some are going so far as to pause IT projects that were previously slated for the 2016 calendar year.
While some IT projects can justifiably be put on the back burner, there are plenty of others that should move forward regardless of the economic outlook.
Technology is an ever-increasing necessity in today's business world. Research firms including Gartner and technology vendors such as Cisco Systems have been sounding the alarm regarding how digital disruption will soon completely reshape the business landscape. A complete digital transformation may be years off, but it does highlight the absolute necessity to keep up with, or even outpace, your competitors in terms of technology prowess. Your compay's ability to use technology to pivot to emerging markets within your industry vertical could be crucial to succes in difficult times.
A sluggish economy -- and the need to spend money on critical IT projects -- puts IT decision-makers in a precarious situation. The goal should be to thoroughly vet the current list of projects, while choosing to pursue ones that provide the greatest amount of value to the company. IT projects that should be pursued include those that have the ability to cut costs, streamline processes, help the organization make intelligent business decisions, and increase employee productivity.
Create a culture where technology advances truly empower your business. Attend the Leadership Track at Interop Las Vegas, May 2-6. Register now!
Here are eight examples of projects that we think you should move forward in 2016. We'll point out why these technologies are critical for your growth, competitiveness, and ability to cut costs in the long run. While your specific IT project may not be on our list, we hope to help you to start thinking about the benefits -- and potential drawbacks -- if any of your projects are delayed until 2017 or beyond.
Once you've reviewed our eight picks, let us know what you think of our list. Which projects you are working on that you consider important enough to pursue in a stagnant economy? Tell us all about it in the comments section below.
If you have a roadmap that consists of moving data and applications into the cloud, it's wise to pursue that path without delay. Having data hosted by a service provider means you will eventually spend less on costly IT infrastructure upgrades and position your company for the changes that digital disruption will bring.
Supporting legacy applications in the enterprise is an increasingly expensive task. The sooner you can perform a forklift replacement of fat-client, outdated legacy applications, the better. Moving to more flexible and easily accessible applications can improve employee productivity, and reduce support and development costs in the long run.
WiFi is quickly becoming the most important endpoint connectivity mechanism used in the enterprise today. While wired Ethernet connections may still be used in the cubicle, WiFi-only devices have taken over the corporate landscape. In order to provide sufficient bandwidth, coverage, and capacity, WiFi networks that are a mere three to four years old might already be overdue for an upgrade.
If there is one area of IT infrastructure that can show significant gains in performance -- and ultimately gains in employee productivity -- it's WAN optimization. WAN optimization appliances can work wonders on remote sites that are connected via links that are overutilized and experience high latency. If your branch-office users are struggling to get things done due to slow WAN connectivity, WAN optimization projects should definitely get the green light.
As employees become increasingly mobile, they need the ability to leverage technology in order to collaborate with others in a virtual space. Within the past few years, collaboration tools have improved significantly. Companies are finally beginning to realize the immense power that a unified collaboration platform offers. This is one of those situations where the speed of doing business can suffer greatly without the proper collaboration tools in place.
As applications grow increasingly sophisticated and critical to the organization, the demand to fine-tune performance is at an all-time high. Network performance monitoring tools have the intelligence to analyze data traffic by using things like deep packet inspection (DPI) and flow analysis to zero in on potential performance problems, both on the network and within the application itself. If your network and application support staff people are spending a great deal of time manually troubleshooting performance problems, NPM can be a great way to shorten the time needed to identify and resolve these issues on your network.
The single largest data security threat facing enterprises today is malware. There are obviously multiple ways that malware gets propagated, but the most common methods are through visiting malware-infected websites and opening email attachments. Cyber-criminals are not only targeting your PC. They've recently put a great deal of effort into mobile malware. Secure Web and email gateways have come a long way -- and there are plenty of cloud-based options available. If your Web and email security posture is woefully outdated, it would be wise to continue the process of upgrading your solution in 2016.
One of the best ways to streamline and accelerate business processes is to use tools that automate manual tasks. If you have an automation project slated for 2016, you've likely spent a great deal of time in the previous year identifying and planning the steps for implementation. If that much work has been done, it really doesn't make sense to hold off on the actual implementation. Instead, follow the automation project through to its completion and reap the rewards for years to come.
There are plenty of instances where it's simply not wise to halt IT projects because business leaders start to get cold feet. One must carefully weigh any benefits that the project could bring against what will happen if the project is scrapped in the first place.
It's been my observation that IT budgets have remained fairly flat over the past few years in most industries, and further belt-tightening may not be the smartest decision. This is particularly true considering how rapidly we're transitioning into a purely digital world.
There are plenty of instances where it's simply not wise to halt IT projects because business leaders start to get cold feet. One must carefully weigh any benefits that the project could bring against what will happen if the project is scrapped in the first place.
It's been my observation that IT budgets have remained fairly flat over the past few years in most industries, and further belt-tightening may not be the smartest decision. This is particularly true considering how rapidly we're transitioning into a purely digital world.
-
About the Author(s)
You May Also Like