KEY ISSUES FOR IT EXECUTIVES 2007

The responses to the 2007 Society for Information Management (SIM) survey; showed that "Attracting, developing, and retaining IT professionals" is no it, the lop managerial concern, followed by "IT and business alignment." Since 2004, these two have consistently been major IT management concerns and have been in the top 10 since 1994. However, there are six new entries it? the 2007 list of top-10 concerns-" Build business skills it? IT" "Reduce the cost of doing business," "Improve IT quality," "Manage change, " "Making better use of information," and "Evolving CIO leadership role." The top-ranked technology was "Antivirus protection," which entered the list of top key technologies for the first lime. Other new entrants in the top five were "Networks" at No. 3 and "Continuity planning and disaster recovery" at No. 5. "Business intelligence remained at No. 2, and "Business process management " remained at No. 4. Of the 65 key applications and technologies included in the survey, 28 were, new, in 2007. The 2007 survey found that IT budgets are continuing to rise, with headcount accounting for 31% of spending (down from 41% in the previous two Years). 77% of IT organizations are centralized, 31% of CIOs report to CEOs, and 60% of CIOs have at least four years in their current position. Respondents report that the role of the CIO is changing as they spend more little on non-technical issues. The lop three enablers of alignment-"Senior executive support for IT" "The IT organization understands the firm's business environment," and "Close partnership between the IT and business"-have remained consistent since 2003, though the order has changed. However, the ranking of inhibitors has changed considerably. No. I in 2007 is "Lack of senior executive support for IT" up from No. 9 in the previous survey "Business units' lack of understanding of the firm's IT environment" jumped to No. 2 from No. 14, and No. 3-"Business units lack of support for corporate-wide IT initiatives was previously No. 12.