The business demands more and more from its investment in technology. The IT department might feel as though it is running to stand still. From these seemingly opposed view points, how can IT and business leaders take practical steps towards improving the organisation’s ability to deliver its own services?

The purpose of this paper is two-fold.

The first is a simple call to action about taking a step back from the coalface to consider the value that IT brings to the business as a whole. In the current business climate many organisations will be tempted to make IT investment decisions without being in sufficient possession of the facts, in terms of either what users need, or what IT is able to provide.

The second purpose is to help organisations think about what might constitute the fundamentals of any approach for driving understanding and insight into their IT infrastructure. Here we propose a non-partisan, jargon-free ‘see the wood for the trees’ methodology. If you are going to take that step back, you need a plan, and the simpler the better.