Does your business need an IT health check?

In an age of data mining and analysis, companies with a disparate collection of IT platforms can find themselves falling behind. While it might have once made sense to buy the “best of breed” system, the result is a patchwork of old IT systems that do their intended task, but can’t talk to each other.

That’s putting businesses at a disadvantage, with competitors that have invested in technology that allows them to dig into their data to extract insights on customers, products and staff, and to run predictive analysis to help make decisions.

New cloud-based systems can pull out information from across the business. They can tell you who your most valuable customers are, how you can upsell to them, and how they react to price changes.

Human capital management systems can reveal which staff are the most successful and whether investment in training will pay off in increased sales.

Businesses often have a valuable store of data built up over years, but they need an integrated IT system to draw it out of the different units, says Oracle APAC Senior Director, HCM Strategy and Transformation, Andrew Lafontaine.

As older, legacy systems come to the end of their lives, Lafontaine says investing in IT is becoming more strategic. Business owners are asking not what can it do, but, “What can we pull out of it? How will these systems help us move forward?” he says.

Getting started

Lafontaine advises anyone planning to replace legacy platforms to take a step back from thinking about IT in terms of process and instead identify the business outcomes they want in terms of their people, processes and technology.

“You need to be very clear about that,” he says, adding that owners can then evaluate possible technology in terms of how it will help decision-making.

Evaluating your options

“You can then look at the business case,” says Lafontaine. “Can you keep the technology that cannot deliver on the outcomes against the cost benefit of upgrading by putting in a digital platform that can?”

“People need to take a robust business approach so they understand what the technology is going to give them.”

Choosing your provider

Lafontaine says the technology not only needs to be fit for purpose but also robust enough to keep pace with the rate of development in IT. He believes this is as important as the technology itself.

“Technology is changing so rapidly that you need to consider which provider is investing in the research and development to future-proof your solutions.”

It’s also important to be confident about the level of support you will get in transferring from an old system. A high level of engagement is needed to ensure you capture the possibilities of new technology.

Lafontaine suggests decision-makers think about where they see their business in five and 10 years and consider the road map to get them there.

“Once they are clear on where they are headed, organisations are much more willing to make strategic decisions on what they want their technology to deliver, rather than spending money upgrading old systems.”