Executives and senior managers, looking to optimize existing and future IT investments for their organizations, can investigate new strategies through a pragmatic, solutions-based program to be offered June 23-27.
Created by an innovative public-private partnership, the program will explore best practices and collaborative models that enable information professionals to better align their IT strategy and infrastructure with their organizations' objectives. The benefits: improved integration of business and IT lines and heightened performance.
"The Emerging Enterprise Technology Strategist: Leveraging IT for Organizational Success" was developed by META Group, an international IT research and consulting firm; the Penn State School of Information Sciences and Technology (IST); and the Penn State Executive Programs. The program will be held at the Penn State University Park campus in State College, Pa.
Fewer than 10 percent of CIOs have fully aligned performance metrics with business objectives, according to META Group. Besides an inefficient use of resources, this can result in an inability to respond quickly to changing market conditions – a necessity in today's volatile business environment.
"Aligning IT and corporate strategies gives an organization a distinct and sustainable competitive advantage as well as enhances corporate performance - that drives the real value of IT," said James B. Thomas, dean of IST and the program's faculty director. "The real issue is pulling it off."
With a sluggish economy and tight budgets, senior decision makers in public and private organizations around the world are reviewing their investment strategies as well as organization and governance models. Nonetheless, they recognize that accurate, secure information is the life blood for all institutions and businesses.
"This program will give senior executives the resources to make those critical IT decisions using a new form of strategic analysis, Enterprise Architecture, together with a new discipline for strategy implementation, Architected Enterprise Portfolio Management," said Richard D. Buchanan, vice president and director, Enterprise Planning & Architecture Strategies, META Group, and also a program faculty leader.
Participants will engage in interactive sessions and application workshops that address the strategic issues, such as developing and implementing an enterprise-wide technical architecture, that face many organizations. Led by faculty with extensive consulting experience, they will develop a customized strategic framework and implementation plan for their organizations.
Topics to be covered include creating processes for the management and governance of IT in relation to business strategy; demonstrating the value of enterprise architecture; and exploring the technological and business challenges transforming inter-business relationships.
Other faculty leaders are Albert A. Vicere, Executive Education Professor of Strategic Leadership, Penn State Smeal College of Business; Joseph Cavinato, executive director, Center for Strategic Supply Leadership and Professor of Supply Chain Management, Thunderbird, The American Graduate School of International Management; Scott Bittler, vice president, Enterprise Planning & Architecture Strategies, META Group.
For additional information and to register, visit www.smeal.psu.edu/psep/eets.html
