Business-IT alignment

Hi all, these days I have been reading several news on the Internet and I found the topic of Business-IT alignment. I want to write about it today.

What is Business-IT alignment ?

Business-IT alignment is defined as "the process in which a business organization uses information technology (IT) to achieve business objectives - typically improved financial performance or marketplace competitiveness." This makes Business-IT alignment a really important feature of nowadays business.

On the other hand, this coordination can be very disruptive. In some companies, this can be view with a lot of backslash, due to the innovative nature of the alignment.

Challenges and how to achieve ?

In order to achieve this alignment, there are several challenges that need to get implemented into a company:

• Strategic goals
  Both sides need to synchronize goals, priorities, and objectives, which should be well defined. This will help to match the expectations of business professionals and what the IT technicians deliver.
• Business Relationship Manager
  The goal of the BRM is to connect the IT tasks with the business needs.
  
• Mutual Understanding
  Both sides should attend each other seminars and meetings. To this, some job role rotation can be added to increase the understanding between both sides.
  
• The Idea of Convergence
  The idea to not only to align but also converge both groups. So each side knows some basics from the other side.
  
• Agile Development Methodology
  This will reduce the response time from the developers, and more feedback can be included at each step of the development. This will increase the quality of the final product, and the synergy between both teams.
  

Summary

I think Business-IT alignment it is an important topic that is changing how people approaches team composition and interactions. I think good products are the result of good communication, so with this alignment approach, I think companies can benefit a lot from it. It has also help me on how to complement my IT skills.

What do you think about Business-IT alignment ?