As companies increase their competitiveness through information technology? After studying the practice of IT management in various companies, the authors identified three assets that they consider most important in order to become and remain competitive: human assets, technology assets, and the ratio of assets. Human assets of IT staff, who constantly solve business challenges and address the business opportunities with the help of IT. Technology asset - a joint technical platforms and databases - is essential for the integration of systems and applications makes it cost effective. Firms must specify the type of data to be shared, how to store them where to find the server, and how to support the applications and technologies. They should also establish standards that limit the number of technologies, IT staff must support. Assets entails risk and responsibility for the effective application of IT, business and IT have to share. Top management must be involved in the creation of IT priorities and forming a steering committee that set the tone for collaboration IT-business relationships. The authors discuss the relationship between the three assets, using examples from their research. They believe that IT and business leaders need to continually assess the state of the IT assets in their firms from the questionnaire provided. Further, they must determine a plan of action based on their position in relation to competitors. "Hide
by Dale L. Goodhue, Jeanne W. Ross, Cynthia M. Beath Source: MIT Sloan Management Review 14 pages. Publication Date: 01 Oct 1996. Prod. #: SMR023-PDF-ENG