How to Create an IT Strategy:

Getting Started
An IT strategy deals with big IT and digital transformation
questions. You likely need to formalize your IT strategy if
your company is struggling to define questions like these:

What is our IT vision?

What digital opportunities should we pursue?
What’s the best way to use our resources to create
organizational value?

Today, let’s look at IT strategies, including how to create an

IT strategy and real-world examples and tips.

What is an IT strategy?
An IT strategy is a component of IT capability. Comprised of
the four components, shown in the table below, IT capability
refers to your organization’s ability to use IT to:

Meet organizational needs

Improve business processes
Provide maintenance and support for IT systems.

More importantly, it defines your organization’s ability to

create value using IT business assets and technological know-
how.

Formally, your IT strategy is a document that defines how your

organization will increase its IT capability. This document
defines your IT vision and creates a strategic roadmap for
using IT to create organizational value (i.e., its strategy).

Your IT strategy answers this important question for your

organization: What IT changes are demanded to align IT with
our organizational goals, support our business strategy, and
create value for the organization?

IT strategy drives IT capability to create organizational

value. But what does an IT strategy consist of and how should
you create one?

Writing an IT strategy
Even though it deals with technical issues, an IT strategy is
a business document, not a technical document. Your strategy
should be created in conjunction with, and approved by,
organizational management. The strategy must document how your
company uses Information Technology to advance business goals.

There are many ways to write an IT Strategy. The figure below

is a mock table of contents (TOC) I created for writing an IT
strategy document. Use this TOC as a starting template for
creating your own IT strategy document. Feel free to add or
change sections as needed.

Here’s how each section in my mock TOC defines how an IT

strategy drives your organization’s IT capabilities and future
directions.
Section 1: How IT aligns with
organizational goals
An IT strategy must always align with your organizational
strategy. In this step of your IT strategy document, list all
your business goals for the next five years. Then, explain how
your IT strategy will help meet those goals.

If you’re writing an IT strategy for a video streaming

provider, for example, you’d explain how your IT strategy
enables their streaming, content production, and membership
goals. If you’re creating a strategy for a car company, you’d
explain how IT will help them increase production efficiency,
enable self-driving vehicles, or sell more cars.

Use this section to tie in how your IT capability will

increase organizational value, using your organization’s
existing goals.

Section 2: Coverage period

This section defines how long your IT strategy will be in
effect. Write your IT strategy for a period no shorter than
five years, and rewrite your strategy every year. This allows
you to create a long-term plan with a process for making
annual course corrections.

Best practices for your coverage period include:

Avoid IT strategies that cover only one year. It’s

difficult to create meaningful value and IT
transformation in less than a year. Companies
implementing one-year strategies usually find themselves
employing tactics, rather than strategy, as they attempt
to meet short-term deadlines.
Don’t let your IT strategy get dusty. An IT strategy is
a process, not a one-time event. Allow resources and
budget for strategy rewrites and updates each year.
Section 3: Relevant assumptions,
limitations, and requirements
Use this section to explain what considerations went into your
strategy. Is a merger on the horizon? Are you covered under
regulations such as SOX or PCI DSS? Are some product lines
coming online or going away in the next few years? Do you
expect significant marketplace disruption? Include any
considerations that affected or shaped your IT strategy.

Section 4: Your IT vision statement

Tell the reader what your organizational vision is for
expanding IT capability and creating value. Given what you’ve
previously outlined, what needs to change in IT to meet those
goals?

Remember that your IT strategy is strategic, not tactical. It

should describe and deal with the whats and whens of your
capabilities, rather than with the hows of getting things
done.

In our streaming video service example, you might have a

vision for providing an IT infrastructure capable of handling
60 million subscribers in five years, downloading 100 million
pieces of content each day, and posting ten new pieces of
content a year. By contrast, our car company might have a
vision of providing information to 500,000 self-driving cars a
week.

In this section, commit to what you see IT doing for the

organization, rather than how it’s going to get done.

Section 5: Critical project and

initiative description and prioritization
This section lists out the projects that have been considered
and the priority implementation of each project. Recommended
projects should bring your IT vision to life and align IT with
your organizational goals. These are the big deliverables. Put
in the high-level justification for each project to be
implemented.

Be sure to account for changing priorities due to discovered

projects. How will the strategy react when new projects are
mandated from the top or become necessary when working on
project items? Going back to our streaming example, what
happens if a new technology is immediately needed for
streaming that you don’t currently offer?

Remember, an IT strategy is a process. Plan for change while

your working your project plans.

Section 6: Timelines for significant

projects
In this section, discuss the timelines for project delivery.
As this IT strategy is a five-year plan, your timelines should
be more specific during the first years. Explain when the
reader can expect to see results.

Section 7: Necessary resources

Detail what employees, partners, skills, and structures will
be needed to implement your vision and strategy. Tell them who
is going to do the work and what human resources you
anticipate needing.

Section 8: Significant processes,

technologies, and infrastructures needed
This section should answer: What infrastructure will be needed
to complete this strategy and when will it come on line?

If your company is on an acquisition tear, for example, how

many new servers, telecommunication lines, network
infrastructure, devices, email seats, etc., will be needed for
each new IT client? Are you moving infrastructure to the
cloud? List out what infrastructure, technologies, and
processes you will need to support strategy items, along with
when and how you’ll expect to deploy each item.

Section 9: The business of IT: how will

IT be managed?
Detail the plan for managing this strategy. What personnel,
management, departments, and human resources will be needed
for managing your IT capabilities?

Describe your IT structure during this plan’s implementation:

What’s the IT structure?

How is each piece managed?
Are staff and departments fine as-is? Should
additional staff be added, repurposed, or
inherited?
Consider internal, external, cloud, and vendor
management
Will AI technologies automate different aspects of
your strategy?

Any large-scale IT initiative is a separate business unto

itself. Describe how that business will be managed.

Section 10: Projected budgets and costs

for strategic initiatives
Address projected budgets and costs for digital and IT
transformations over the next five years. Budget and costs
should be detailed in years 1-2 and estimated for years 3-5.
This will help the reader understand what the actual costs are
for implementing your strategy.
Signing off: the final step
The last step in creating an IT strategy is getting management
sign-off. Sign-off should be easier if management has been
involved with strategy creation throughout the process. Once
you’ve created a relevant IT strategy, you can use it to guide
your ongoing IT management throughout its effective period.

Additional resources
For real-life examples and tips on creating and using your IT
strategy, see these BMC Blogs:

IT Strategic Plans: Why Is an IT Strategy So Important?

IT Strategic Plans: 5 Great Examples from Higher
Education & Why You Should Read Them
Creating an IT Strategy Communications Plan: 5 Keys to
Success

Ready to make your IT strategy work for you? Explore BMC

Helix, the only end-to-end ITSM and ITOM platform that your
company will ever need.