Why is Speed Important to IT and Sourcing?

Business is all about timing, and in our current high-paced technology world, IT needs to be faster than ever. In order to deliver the best value to business units, IT must fundamentally shift its model, focusing not on optimizing and building new solutions at the pace of years, but at months, weeks, or even less. Companies need greater flexibility and new innovations to ensure the business is fully supported by the latest efficiencies, features, and services available. This helps the business work faster, deliver better service and reduce costs. To stay competitive, IT leaders must work with key stakeholders and build an organization that can implement new initiatives rapidly. Today, there’s only one right speed for IT: faster.

Customers demand innovation

The driving force of the need for rapid IT is the end customer. Consumers and clients are constantly making a value judgment about which company to give their business. The player who gets to market with a good product solution service first often emerges as the market leader. Sometimes it doesn’t even matter if a superior solution comes out later. If a company has already captured a large segment of the service or product category, it can be very challenging for new competitors to take that away.

Speed drives business value

Every new feature, service, or system that the IT team rolls out should drive business value (meaning increased revenue and decreased cost). The faster the company can begin benefiting from that value, the more savings or profits the company can achieve. The time spent implementing a new initiative represents a opportunity-cost loss that may never be recovered. In order to maximize their speed-to-value, companies must constantly be looking for ways to optimize their project process and get solutions to market faster. Today’s competition dynamic demands it.

Vendors should be speed-oriented

One of the primary goals of outsourcing should be to deliver great business value quicker. However, many companies are still stuck in overextended procurement cycles that last a year or more. In today’s competitive world, that simply doesn’t work. The operating model that your partners use has to be foundationally designed with speed in mind in the same way IT seeks to operate faster. The IT department needs to stop thinking about the procurement cycle as a long process, but as a means to develop, optimize, and solve problems faster.

Long RFP processes also inhibit flexibility. Because goals, requirements, and challenges can change incredibly quickly, the organization may need a different solution, operating model, or service provider mix in the near future. It can take more than a year to build a relationship with a new vendor. In order to be effective in today’s climate, sourcing strategies need to put speed at the forefront.

How Wavestone US can help

At Wavestone US, we believe every IT organization can dramatically increase their speed, and that sourcing can get done without the bloated RFP cycles of the past. Our team is made up of veteran IT advisors and consultants with decades of experience in the industry. We can help you leverage speed-driving technologies like automation, and match your needs to the right vendors in a matter of weeks, not years.

If you’d like to learn more about how Wavestone US can help your company reduce sourcing cycles and increase speed in IT, visit https://www.wavestone.us/capabilities.