IT Managers Fight Back For More Budget

Dynamic Markets and Numara Software research demonstrates European IT Managers are fighting hard to reclaim lost budget and more optimistic in 2010

Reading, UK, 30 June 2010:  Numara® Software, Inc., a leader in service management and asset management solutions for IT professionals, today announced independent market research that reveals the state of IT funding across Europe and the consequences of a lack of IT investment. Against a backdrop of increased use of sophisticated software that is more flexible, more scalable and easier to use than it was five years ago, the research explores the impact of managing a plethora of software solutions in today’s cash-strapped economy and the requirements for solutions that are both joined up and automated.

The “Rebirth of the IT Budget” quantitative research by Dynamic Markets is based on 300 interviews with senior IT decision makers in large companies with 250 or more employees in the UK, France and Germany who were not Numara Software customers, but a randomly selected group of organisations using service desk solutions.

The results of the “Rebirth of the IT Budget” research are of significant interest to IT and support managers who are concerned about being able to maximise and stretch their IT spend. This is particularly the case with many companies now beginning to gear themselves into investment rather than retrenchment mode. Service Desk, IT Service Management and IT Asset Management are currently particular areas of interest, The research reinforces the need to automate your processes and have single centralised solutions that are truly integrated will be key for those that are now in buying mode, while senior IT professionals insist how important it is to have flexible asset tracking systems. In a business environment which is increasingly dynamic and constantly changing, IT managers are finding themselves under pressure to more effectively track their assets.  

The research found that 82 percent of IT managers in UK, French and German organisations say that IT funding has been affected in some way over the past two years and this was notably more so in the UK. 52 percent claimed that the financial value of the IT budget has been affected, where it has been frozen at previous levels (18 percent) or, more commonly, the total amount of money on offer has been reduced (34 percent).  However, the majority of respondents in companies where IT funding has been affected expect investment to improve in 2010/2011. Over half (60 percent), think this improvement will happen in the second half of 2010 and 29 percent think it will be in 2011.

Impact on IT funding in the last two years

Issue	UK	France	Germany
IT budget values have been affected in some way	65%	46%	47%
IT budgets have been reduced	42%	28%	33%
New IT projects have been affected	55%	32%	33%
More senior people are involved in sign-off	35%	19%	21%

The research highlighted that across Europe, the UK has suffered more than France and Germany.  More say IT budget values have been affected in some way (65 percent), compared to France (46 percent) and Germany (47 percent).   More IT managers in the UK say IT budgets have been reduced (42 percent) compared to Germany (33 percent) and France (28 percent) and they say that new IT projects have been affected (55 percent) compared to Germany (33 percent) and France (32 percent).

The consequences of this financial hardship on the IT department is already damaging with IT infrastructures becoming overburdened and unable to respond effectively to business needs.   Alarmingly 63 percent of respondents think the rest of the business may have become so used to the reduced spending that IT budgets across Europe may continue to suffer.  But senior IT professionals feel it is their job to fight back. 33 percent claim that they will keep chasing the board for IT investment.  This may be fuelled by the fact that one in four (23 percent) think that if things go wrong due to lack of investment, it will be the IT department who picks up the blame and has to deal with the consequences.

When compared to 2009 research¹, this year’s findings show that little has changed, with the exception that more new IT projects have been refused funding in the UK: specifically, more UK IT decision makers in 2010 (55 percent) say this has happened in the last two years, compared to in 2009 (31 percent). Therefore even with this hint of optimism, the focus will still sit squarely on cost containment, optimising the existing IT infrastructure and this means you need a laser-like focus on the management of your assets to control your IT environment.

However, in an environment which is increasingly dynamic and constantly changing, IT managers are finding themselves under pressure to effectively track their assets, with 92 percent of respondents stating that this is an area of concern for them at the moment.

The most common key pressure for those surveyed is being able to resolve users’ technical problems quickly enough (69 percent) (71 percent in the UK).  This is followed by 54 percent (69 percent in the UK) who say keeping track of IT assets in an ever-changing technical landscape is a challenge.  40 percent say they find that asset tracking is a time-consuming and labour-intensive task and 28 percent say that it is difficult to obtain meaningful data from disparate technologies.  One in four (26 percent) say tracking mobile data outside the company perimeter is difficult.  It is therefore not surprising that almost all (96 percent) of these senior IT professionals say it is important to have flexible asset tracking systems in the current business environment.  

Delivering his insights as a highly experienced IT service management and IT asset management thought leader, Andy White Managing Director EMEA and APAC for Numara Software and EMEA, says “In today’s tough economic climate, hidden costs simply aren’t acceptable, and knowing an organisation’s ‘real’ costs in relation to hardware and software assets is key.  In order to do so, organisations need to have an idea of what’s in their IT estate and ensure that they have an asset discovery tool in place as part of their overall solution.  Recent economic circumstances have also forced many IT departments to save costs by sacrificing the human organisation.”

White adds, “As a result, post-recession, we won’t have an army of technicians to throw at the problems anymore. Automating your processes and having single centralised solutions that are ‘joined up’ and truly integrated will be key.  Plus flexible, easy to customise software is also an imperative.  A good indicator on flexibility and customisation is how much time and effort is required from your vendors’ professional services team to make small tweaks and adjustments in line with business demands.”

About Numara Software, Inc.

With more than 55,000 customer sites worldwide, Numara Software is a global leader in delivering practical, flexible solutions that allow IT organisations to improve service to their end-users. Our integrated IT service management and IT asset management software platforms enable organisations to efficiently automate a wide variety of IT related tasks and processes using interoperable solutions from a single, proven vendor. Widely known for our dedicated focus on ease of use and affordability for our customers, our IT solutions deliver fast time-to-value, increased control, and reduced risk for small businesses to large companies.

About Dynamic Markets Ltd

Dynamic Markets is a research consultancy in its 10th year of trading. It serves a wide variety of blue-chip B2B and B2C clients across a wide variety of industry sectors. For more information visit www.dynamicmarkets.co.uk

¹Source: “Flexible Service Desks?” by Dynamic Markets Limited 2009, for Numara Software.