What should a CIO need to do to deal with finances when it comes to IT deployment in the company?

Emphasizing on it, Rajeev Batra of Ernst and Young stressed on some of the challenges being faced by CIOs at present.

In his address to the CIOs on ‘Financial management for CIO’ at the CIOL ‘C Change’ event, Batra said that, in all, only 27% of IT projects actually see the light of success. While 33% of these projects becomes challenging, 23% gets cancelled before completion and 50% are failure in terms of meeting budgets, functionality and schedule.

These projects fail because such projects have no real connection to the profit and loss drivers of the business, so no business unit has vested interest in their success.

He also said that three out of four IT initiatives taken by CIOs fail because such projects have no real connection with the profit and loss drivers of the business, so no business unit has vested interest in their success.

To cope-up with such situations, Batra suggested measuring the value of technology investment before the start of the project and added that it is only possible by improved communication, increment in organizational flexibility and streamlining knowledge.

He concluded with the quote, "When CIO stop thinking like cost centers and start thinking like business partners, IT will begin to earn its keep."

Some of the essential elements he talked about of an IT investment is that every project undertaken should have good RoI. It should be built on hard savings, have a short time-frame with accountability and low risk of disruptive failure, he added.

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