The IT department as a driver of business competitiveness

The IT department has evolved from being an early driver of competitiveness to being seen as a cost. Recently, with the advent of cloud services, digitalization, and the growing automation driven by artificial intelligence, it has once again become the primary enabler of competitiveness for organizations.

Therefore, it is important to maintain proper planning of the financial resources required not only to sustain the IT department’s operations but also to capitalize on technological advancements and enhance business outcomes by implementing innovative projects.

What should be considered when creating an IT budget?

First, as with all cases, align the IT department’s vision with the organizational strategy. What are the organizational goals? How does the IT department contribute to achieving them? And most importantly, how can the IT department leverage its role to support strategic objectives in the near future?

Answering these questions will guide you in determining which activities are priorities and therefore should receive more attention and resources, and which activities might be reduced or eliminated. It will also help identify the projects to be developed.

With this information, you can establish an initial budget, which can then be reviewed and refined with the organization’s executive team and your own team to finalize it.

Main costs involved

As a general guide, the main costs involved in an IT budget are:

• Human resources costs
  • Internal staff expenses
  • Recruitment, selection, and turnover costs

• Hardware
  • Servers
  • End-user computing equipment and peripherals
  • Network infrastructure
  • Support contracts

• Software
  • Licensing
  • Subscriptions
  • Maintenance contracts

• Projects
  • Consulting
  • General Expenses (temporary staff, workspace, etc.)
  • Hardware
  • Software

Many of these costs can be delegated to facilitate their management or optimized through a business partner.

Ideally, you should have a specialized provider to help you define, plan, and implement your innovation and improvement projects.

At icorp, we can assist you in aligning your efforts to achieve significant results and enhance your business competitiveness.

Want to learn more? Contact us.

This article has been translated using AI and may include errors.