Cutting costs, but where?

Of course, in IT projects. This is the common oppinion out there. Of course, business projects are cut as well, but if it comes to planning and delivery you, as the IT project manager, need to deliver double as much for half the money.

KPMG has just released a new article about „Cutting costs on IT projects“ and is talking about the fact that the business shouldnt just look into saving money by reducing the head counts in their IT projects but also investigating the quantity of projects.

If any business seriously wants to look at trimming costs from its IT budget, its project portfolio is what it should be looking at, not considering whether a reduction in headcount would do the trick.

and further

I think that many businesses could quickly realize that there are potentially a lot of savings to be made in this area — and that’s because it’s an area which has been previously managed in a less than rigorous fashion. At any point in time, businesses can have a large number of projects ‚in play‘, all at various stages of development. The question to ask is just how many of these projects really could be classed as business critical?

And these are the times where the business NEEDS to think about that as there is not enough money to everything you have on your plate. Look at the benefits that are realized by that project, have them defined SMART and measure them post the implementation. Create a culture where projects are not just ticked if they sound good but also bring be the benefits that are expected from them. If some of you have tried hard to implement Enterprise Wide Prioritization of projects, now is the time.

Read the full article here.