Key information technology and management issues 2011-2012: an international study

The importance of the impact of IT for organizations around the world, especially in light of a very slow recovery from the global financial crisis, has amplified the need to provide a better understanding of the specific geographic similarities and differences of IT managerial and technical trends. Going beyond identifying these influential factors is also the need to understand the considerations for addressing them in light of recognizing the respective local characteristics, especially when operating in a globally linked environment, although somehow heavily influenced locally. By comparing and contrasting IT trends from different geographies, this paper presents important local and international factors (e.g., management concerns, influential technologies, budgets/spending, organizational considerations) necessary to prepare IT leaders for the challenges that await them. It can also serve as an indicator as the respective geographies evolve from the economic conundrum. The research is based on data from four geographic regions (United States (US), Europe, Asia, and Latin America). The same questionnaire (although translated for the respective respondents), based on the lead authors well-respected and long-running Society for Information Management survey, was applied across the geographies. This paper presents the major findings based on survey responses from 620 respondents (275 US, 100 European, 59 Asian, and 186 Latin) in mid-2011. The top five management concerns were: (1) IT and business alignment; (2) business agility and speed to market; (3) business process management and business process reengineering; (4) business productivity and cost reduction; (5) IT reliability and efficiency. The five most influential technologies were: (1) business intelligence; (2) enterprise resource planning systems; (3) cloud computing; (4) mobile and wireless applications; (5) customer relationship management. Journal of Information Technology (2012) 27, 198-212. doi:10.1057/jit.2012.14; published online 10 July 2012