The relationship between business strategy and IT strategy Essay Example for Free

The relationship between business strategy and IT strategy Essay Introduction The decision of enveloping IT into a business is one of the biggest decisions which need to be evaluated for their success and long term planning. Business strategy must be broken down into thought generation process, specifically the â€Å"what of the system†, evaluating the positive and negative sides of the business after IT alignment and forecast of the future direction for its customers and suppliers would make the strategy stand for success. The modernized view of things is to typically involve to the desired extent the suppliers and customers in the design process of the product so that they get what they want. Relationship between IT and Business strategy The relationship between the IT and business strategy can be attributed for organizing the business in a planned and organized manner so that all the business functions are effectively and efficiently performed giving optimum utilization of resources. Enveloping IT for a business enhances its capability to reduce cycle costs, allow other enterprises to collaborate in product design and production. It further helps in linking all the business departments and modules so that all the various organizational functions are merged together and combined together to create an collaborative enterprise. Business strategy is a goal-oriented approach and is the synchronization of all business decisions made and propagated among the departments for further processing and operation. To ease up this process IT comes in the picture to give it a new dimension. It not only brings every process in the same page but facilitates the flow of information and timely implementation of crucial decisions which can take advantage of a business opportunity for prosperity. The major components of IT in designing the process flow in an organization are quite essential in the long road of creating an environment of efficient communication and utilization of resources to avoid wastage and evaluate productivity at every stage. Enterprises require maintaining good communication with external environment so that it is able to focus on the challenges with regard to innovation of products and services. Good consumer and supplier relations are extremely essential for business continuity and steady progress.    Were there problems with Strategy formulation? Appropriately identifying the crucial static and dynamic variables shaping in the business environment and capitalizing on those resources is the absolute geniuses of any strategist. At the moment of framing the strategy the appropriate positive and negative factors of IT implementation must be considered for an organization. The amount of association to be represented among the various departments would be quite a challenging task and would include plan and awareness on the part of the strategist. Correct identification of the business workflow and the system functionality can be made with proper evaluation and walkthrough of the business scenario. Strategic formulation is to some respect responsible for the failure of the enterprise; however it can be argued that the variables considered can be judged with different eyes so that the ultimate formulation of the ideas generated is perfectly matched with the business scenario. The scope of the business must also be defined quite well so that the analysis phase is performed well. Were there problems with strategy implementation? The implementation of strategy is utmost essential for making the planned architecture by the strategists successful. Unless the plans are implemented well they stand quite baseless in the space of ideas. Definite implementation of the agreed plans must be undertaken so that all the concepts which were built around the fence would get a representation otherwise they would stand baseless. The technology faults get visibility in the scenario where appropriate implementation of strategy is not made. If the initial stages are not taken care and given a proper representation, the implementation of the strategy is almost impossible to the extent that all the wrong elements and plans would be implemented. Were there problems with the strategic process? The problems in the strategic process keep most of the resources out of view so that they are not indulged in the process of development. The process management must be accordingly taken care so that all the appropriate business processes are managed well and all the crucial processes are enveloped. Evaluation of the positive and negative impacts of a particular decision in the business must be researched thoroughly and accordingly the strategic process would be designed so that the other businesses in the atmosphere would feel advantaged with your business scenario and supplier relations. Creating a monopoly would make other enterprises quite envy. Strategic process must also focus on the past problems, present needs and future requirements. Enough analysis of the business scenario and modularizing of the business functions would make it more advantageous to cover the entire process cycle for its success. All such smaller process cycles would combine together to meet the focus of the central objective. Conclusion The value added services like including the concept of collaboration with other companies, suppliers and customers would make the enterprise a global entity. In addition to it, appropriate identification of such strategy must be responsible for its formulation and successful implementation for the benefit of all. Bibliography Sawhney Mohanbir. B2B: Execution of the Concept Is Key to Success. See: http://www.cio.com/article/ 31078/B_B_Execution of_the_Concept_Is_Key_to _Success Worthen   Ben. COLLABORATIVE COMPUTING and True Enterprise Architecture Is Still Two Years Away. See: http://www.cio.com/article/30605/COLLABORATIVE COMPUTING_and_True_Enterprise_Architecture_Is_Still_Two_Years_Away