A recent article in Baseline Magazine reports some very concerning news regarding how Chief Financial Officers (CFOs) view the Return on Investment (ROI) they receive from their technology investments.  http://www.baselinemag.com/c/a/IT-Management/One-in-Nine-CFOs-See-High-Return-Benefits-from-IT/.  The study conducted by Computer Science Corporation (CSC) and the Financial Executive Research Foundation (FERF) captured the views of 629 CFOs and revealed several alarming pieces of information. 
 
Select survey results include:

• Only 9% said they received a “high” return on their technology investment
• More than half of CFOs reported they received a “medium to high” return
• The article did not indicate how the remaining 32% rate their return on investment
• Overall, that article indicated that only 57% believe they are getting “acceptable” return from their technology investment

If these low rates of "high" or “acceptable”  returns are not bad enough, the survey also indicated:

• 34 % of respondents indicated that achieving expected returns is still a critical issue for their organization
• Despite low reported returns and the persistent criticality of achieving expected returns, only 41% of respondents indicated they conduct post completion audits of their IT projects. 

These results raise many concerns and questions that the C-level executives (including CEOs, CFOs, and CIOs) can no longer afford to ignore.  For example:

• Why do C-level executives continue to invest vast amounts of funding into IT projects without requiring monitoring and measurement to ensure forecasted benefits are achieved?

• Who is ultimately responsible for ensuring that IT systems actually deliver the expected benefit?  Is it the responsibility of the CIO?  CFO?  CEO?  Or should it fall to the senior executive responsible for the performance of the business unit(s) that actually use the system? 

• What changes are required to IT project implementation methodologies, project team membership (including required skills), and other parts of the organization to ensure that technology is utilized effectively and that the forecasted ROI is realized?

The results of this survey highlight key issues that many organizations have either misunderstood or flat out ignored for far too long.  Organizations that want to increase the value that IT delivers need to start to consider and address the following:

• C-Level leaders need to recognize that while process mapping, technology design, and system development are still complex, many of the tools and methodologies are relatively mature.  The biggest area for increasing the benefits that IT delivers is to focus on improving what happens after the system is delivered.  Quite simply, organizations need to improve the way in which systems are used.

• Clear accountability, along with the corresponding authority and required resources, must be assigned to those who are responsible for ensuring ROI is actually achieved.  Organizations may need to get creative in determining who should be accountable for ROI, and they may need to find new ways to share accountability between IT (which delivers and supports the systems) and the business (which actually use the system). 

• Organizations need to shift from a mentality of “deploying systems” to ensuring “IT delivers value”.  IT project methodologies need to expand from the standard System Development Life Cycle (SDLC) to also include activities that create and sustained full and effective system adoption.  This will require effort that begins before the system goes live and continues periodically throughout the entire period in which the system is used.  Only when the system is fully decommissioned do you need to stop ensuring it is used effectively.

• Organizations need to recognize that traditional “change management” approaches, which typically rely on communications and training (often only provided at the initial deployment) are necessary, they are not sufficient for driving long-term, effective user adoption. New approaches that incorporate principles and practices of organization development, organization behavior, individual behavior, and group dynamics are necessary to shape user behavior and deliver expected results. 

Quite simply, this survey of CFOs (along with numerous other surveys about IT failures and disappointing IT ROI) indicates that what we are currently doing to get maximum value from our technology investments is not working.  We need to try something new.  They say that recognizing you have a problem is the first step to recovery.  Let’s hope the results of this survey prompt C-Level executives into taking action.