Successfully planning and managing IT applications in the life cycle

Making decisions is part of everyday business life.
The aim is to steadily increase the value of the company.
The decisions: always objective.
But what if it were possible to always make the right decisions?
It would simplify and speed up day-to-day business. IT product portfolio management can be such an enormous relief!

IT product portfolio management can
be decisive for success

Within IT portfolio management, IT product portfolio management focuses on application systems and products. This article explains what the decisive success factor of IT product portfolio management is. The company is aware of what the system is, what questions it answers and what concrete advantages companies can gain from implementing it.

The reality

It is regularly observed that decisions have to be made about budgets and investments in the IT sector, but that these decisions are not based on all the available key figures. Concrete statements about all costs, the effective benefits or the efficiency of the products are often lacking. For example, “must” reasons are often cited in the argumentation, in which reference is primarily made to external circumstances.

Product XY must be introduced or continued because

• … the jurisdiction makes it necessary.
• … the maintenance expires.
• … the contract conditions are attractive.
• …or, or, or.

Decision-making is made even more difficult by the fact that IT systems are becoming increasingly complex and the IT vendor market increasingly diverse. If the IT product portfolio is to be up to date and also cover the topics of digitalization and automation, it becomes clear that an extended basis for decision-making is necessary if companies want to remain competitive. After all, the use of IT also serves to increase the value of the company. As fundamental as this is, it has unfortunately been observed time and again that this fact is regularly neglected in reality.

But what does such a basis for decision-making look like, one that enables decisions to be made more objectively, quickly and soundly?

Better decisions through
IT product portfolio management

This is exactly what well thought-out IT product portfolio management can achieve. This is where IT products and their economic relevance are evaluated and their use and replacement planned and managed. Questions such as:

• Which systems block, supplement and/or replace others?
• What is the relationship between the costs and benefits of IT products?
• How are the costs of the product for Change and Run developing?
• What options are there for optimizing product costs in terms of change and run?
• Should the application be further developed or replaced?

IT product portfolio management answers all these questions and more, making it a decisive success factor when implemented in a well thought-out and sustainable manner. This is because IT product portfolio management plans, controls and optimizes a company’s portfolio of IT applications. It coordinates the tasks that are necessary to achieve the desired increase in value. As a result, it acts as a bridge between strategic and operational planning and supports faster and, above all, better decision-making to enable the highest added value for companies.

It does not matter which types of IT products are used in a company, IT product portfolio management covers them all. A distinction is made between purchased and self-developed software, as well as their hybrid forms, in which purchased software is extended by self-developed components.

Types of IT products

1. Purchased software products – if this product is offered on the market, we speak of standard software (e.g. SAP ERP).

2. In-house developments – a complete system is created from the results of IT projects as part of in-house development (e.g. OS Plus core banking system).

3. Mixture (hybrid) of purchased software and in-house development (e.g. YOURDOCeS accounts payable accounting is made up of components developed in-house and SAP FI/CO).

Procedure

The ITProdPM proceeds as follows. The IT products available in the company are analyzed with regard to usage, costs incurred, productivity and risks. Optimization options are then sought and found, which are finally implemented in concrete proposals for action and measures tailored to the company.

Advantages of IT product portfolio management

Here you will find a summary of the advantages of IT product portfolio management:

With the help of IT product portfolio management, you can identify where costs can be reduced, where processes can be standardized and where data and functions can be consolidated.

IT product portfolio management shows specifically where and how the company’s effectiveness can be increased. This makes it possible to make well-founded decisions regarding IT applications that really add value to the company. At the same time, the long-term goals and visions for the company’s development are kept in mind. And all this in less time and with a simultaneous objectification of the decision-making process. Regardless of whether this is to be done alone or together as a team.

Here we continue with the specific approach of the BAMAC GROUP’s IT product portfolio management.