Matching IT strategy to business requirements

As a start-up or spin-off business, you may have little or no IT capability and need IT systems to operate with low initial costs. You also want to make sure that the demanding business objectives are not hampered by IT and that the system is reliable and flexible to support the business as it grows.

Often, the IT solution is more than just an enabling platform. It is essential to the business proposition, such as web-based facilities for business acquisition, interfaces to business partners and systems to support regulatory compliance.

Putting the appropriate time and effort into developing your IT strategy now can ensure your money is well spent and that your IT solution will be capable of supporting your business when it grows. Every investment is critical and the last thing that you want is a rigid IT solution that can’t scale and flex with your business.

Whatever size or complexity your new business may be, in order to develop an IT strategy to deliver your business objectives you will need to consider the following topics:

Services to be provided to staff / partners / clients

What IT services do you need to provide to users within your business and possibly to users within your partners and clients?

Examples of such services provided for external users (partners & clients) could be:

• a portal for sharing data on collaborative projects
• a transactional web site for providing quotations, taking orders and tracking delivery
• a web site / portal for showing availability and making scheduling requests

Examples of services provided to internal users could be:

• e-mail
• file storage and printing
• IP telephony
• specific applications such as finance, manufacturing, project management, document management
• remote working capability

Once you have determined what services you need to provide, you need to consider how these systems need to interact with each other to deliver your business processes.

Capacity of the services

What level of demand will your IT systems need to be able to service when the new business starts, and how do you expect this to scale over the next few years?

The capacity required will be determined by a number of factors such as:

• number of internal users
• number of external users (partners & clients)
• volume and type of business

It may be that only the core services will be required at the outset and that additional services will be planned to be added at a later stage determined by progress against the business plan.

Having a good understanding of the services and capacity required at the beginning and how you expect these to grow over time is key in allowing the design of IT systems that can start at the appropriate size and then grow flexibly with the business.
 

Strategic value to the business

All businesses need IT in some shape or form: some businesses have only very basic requirements from IT; whilst for others a capability provided by their IT systems is a key differentiator.

A number of services and business processes may combine to embody a strategic advantage for a business or represent Intellectual Property for example.

If IT or some specific IT systems are of strategic value to your business then you will probably want to give special thought to how they are provided, managed and protected.
 

Regulatory Compliance

What industry regulations if any will your business have to comply with? Examples are Sarbanes-Oxley for companies that are listed on the US stock market, Basel III for banking, Solvency II for insurance and PCI for retailers.

Complying with applicable regulations will place additional requirements on your IT systems and constraints in the way that they are designed, delivered and maintained.
 

Delivery and Management of IT systems

How do you want to deliver and manage your IT services? Do you want to build / develop an in-house IT capability and own your own systems or do you want to buy everything as a service and outsource the management of the overall service? These are the two extremes of the spectrum and there are a myriad of options which span these extremes.
 

Cost of IT

What is the cost of providing the required services for the start of the business? What is the cost of the ongoing provision and management of the services? What are the cost implications of providing additional services / adding capacity? What cost profile do you want to achieve?

All the above considerations will be a factor in determining the optimum IT strategy to deliver your business objectives.

If you would like help with developing or reviewing your IT strategy please e-mail us at startup@northdoor.co.uk . Northdoor has been helping Senior Management teams / Entrepreneurs develop and implement IT strategies for start-up / spin-out businesses for many years. We have an enviable track record in this field and as importantly have helped a number of these clients achieve and cope with strong business growth.

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