The actionable guide for driving organizational innovation through better IT strategy With rare insight, expert technology strategist Peter High emphasizes the acute need for IT strategy to be developed not in a vacuum, but in concert with the broader organizational strategy. This approach focuses the development of technology tools and strategies in a way that is comprehensive in nature and designed with the concept of value in mind. The role of CIO is no longer "just" to manage IT strategy—instead, the successful executive will be firmly in tune with corporate strategy and a driver of a technology strategy that is woven into overall business objectives at the enterprise and business unit levels. High makes use of case examples from leading companies to illustrate the various ways that IT infrastructure strategy can be developed, not just to fall in line with business strategy, but to actually drive that strategy in a meaningful way. His ideas are designed to provide real, actionable steps for CIOs that both increase the executive's value to the organization and unite business and IT in a manner that produces highly-successful outcomes. Formulate clearer and better IT strategic plans Weave IT strategy into business strategy at the corporate and business unit levels Craft an infrastructure that aligns with C-suite strategy Close the gap that exists between IT leaders and business leaders While function, innovation, and design remain key elements to the development and management of IT infrastructure and operations, CIOs must now think beyond their primary purview and recognize the value their strategies and initiatives will create for the organization. With Implementing World Class IT Strategy, the roadmap to strategic IT excellence awaits.

Enterprise architecture defines a firm's needs for standardized tasks, job roles, systems, infrastructure, and data in core business processes. This book explains enterprise architecture's vital role in enabling - or constraining - the execution of business strategy. It provides frameworks, case examples, and more.

For you as an IT manager, changes in business models and fast-paced innovation and product lifecycles pose a big challenge: you are required to anticipate the impact of future changes, and to make rapid decisions backed up by solid facts. To be successful you need an overall perspective of how business and IT interact. What you need is a toolkit, enabling you to manage the enterprise from a helicopter viewpoint while at the same time accommodating quite detailed aspects of processes, organization, and software lifecycles. Strategic IT management embraces all the processes required to analyze and document an enterprise’s IT landscape. Based on the experience of many projects and long discussions with both customers and academic researchers, Inge Hanschke provides you with a comprehensive and practical toolkit for the strategic management of your IT landscape. She takes a holistic view on the management process and gives guidelines on how to establish, roll out, and maintain an enterprise IT landscape effectively. She shows you how to do it right first time – because often enough there’s no second chance. She tells you how to tidy up a IT patchworks – the first step towards strategic management – and she gives you advice on how to implement changes and maintain the landscape over time. The book’s structure reflects the patterns that exist in strategic IT management from strategic planning to actual implementation. The presentation uses many checklists, guidelines, and illustrations, which will help you to immediately apply the content. So, if you are a CIO, an IT manager, a business manager, or an IT consultant, this is the book from which you’ll benefit in most daily work situations.

History has shown that having a competitive advantage is critical to the success and long-term viability of all organizations. However, creating and sustaining such an advantage is a challenge. Organizations must formulate a winning strategy, surpass competitors at implementing and executing it, and excel at adapting in response to internal and external events. Although organizations have applied numerous best practices to help them succeed in their strategic endeavors, they still face serious difficulties, which they can only surmount by adopting business architecture. The goal of this book is to describe what business architecture is; how it can help meet the challenge of formulating, implementing and executing an organization’s strategy; and how to build and exploit a superior strategy management system that leverages business architecture.

Defining the various types of IT architecture in the industry, this one-of-a-kind resource highlights the rewards of becoming an architect and explores the details of the deliverables, project structure, and how to approach their creation. --