What should be the nature of the relationship between the business plan and the IS plan?
What is really the nature between these two types of planning? We often identify their relationship for they both relates to businesses. Business plan and information systems plan are both decision making tools. They are quite related because they have the same purpose in which they prepare the business through planning to set out a convincing way to secure financing, internal or external or for the start-up or expansion of a business scheme. It has a goal which is to deliver the most valuable business information at the earliest time possible in the most cost effective manner.
But before I can put in plain words the nature of the relationship between the business plans and IS plan, I must first define what does these both means. Business plan as we all know is a formal statement or set of business goals, the reasons why they are believed attainable, and the plan reaching these goals. It may also contain background information about the organization or team attempting to reach these goals. The business goals being attempted may be for profit which typically focuses on financial goals or non-profit which tend to focus service goals or focuses on maximizing profit. Business plans may also target changes in perception and branding the customer, client, tax payer, or larger community. Business plan may be internally focused which target immediate goals required to reach the peripheral goals and external focused which targets goals that are important to external stakeholders, particularly external stakeholders. Having a formal, written business plan is so accepted as being crucial to success that there haven't been many studies or surveys to test this principle. If business plans were such a wonderful thing, there would be a significant and conclusive difference between businesses that have them and those that don't. Simply stated, business plan is a plan that sets out the future strategy and financial development of a business, usually covering a period of several years.
Information system plan on the other hand determines the sequence for implementing specific information systems. This kind of plan focuses on not only one information system but the entire suite of information systems for the enterprise. In lay mans term, information system plan is the end product of the information system project.
The nature relationship of the both plan is that without which there can be no exact view of the future plan of the company or shall we say it can give a hard time analyzing, solving or maybe in creating best plans for the company’s future.
Since business plan is one of the most important document of a company it is most frequently used by the managers and executives for internal planning. For a newly established business enterprise, the process of preparing a business plan serves a road map to the future by making entrepreneurs and the business owners itself think through their strategies. It can help in evaluating the basic business concepts; recognize the business limitations to avoid variety of mistakes. Thus, business plan serve as a blueprint or a guide in information systems planning.
The relationship between the two is that when the company is developing an information system plan which sometimes involves the whole organization, all members of the staff look at the overall organization to anticipate problems. This is where business plan completes the information system plan using the list of information systems needed, and many documents must be reviewed in which all the files are already been stated in the business plan. There are virtually no resources to help us set up what today’s business environment really demands. Since we are now living in a world where technologies are fast changing and the needs not just for good government services but also for better living would also continue to grow. But the sad part of it is that when the technology increases the need for new resources also increases but the availability of such resources decreases due to economic crisis. That is why effective use of information technology was viewed as a major approach that could assist government and companies in managing this change. It was also understood that well defined business planning and information system planning processes were critical success factor. That is why many companies particularly those large ones has developed a complete and inclusive technology planning procedure to boost technology project launch and approval. That is also the main reason why a continuous and ongoing planning system is really a must.
IS plan is an allied of business plan for when planning an information system, the staff under the planning team will review the strategic business plan for the company, including the statement of mission, goals, objectives and priorities that set business direction. They will ensure that the company information technology strategy is carried out and that the projects are appropriately targeted to support specific business strategies and ensures that the authorized projects are in line with business needs and direction. A common accepted theory is that for a business to survive and prosper it must be flexible and nimble. It is just like applying linear thinking to a non linear situation.
Writing a business plan without a planning system in place is a massive effort that is done very rarely. Many or mostly businesses write three to five year plan and update them annually. If a continual, ongoing process is in place, a written plan is not just important. Setting up an information system plan allows and sometimes forces the company to focus on strategy. But as we all see and as what I hear from those people living in a corporate world that a significant percentage of successful businesses don’t have written business plans. As professor Albert Shapero said, “Companies that plan do better than companies that don’t, but they never follow their plan.”
To sum it all up, information system plan is somehow connected to business plan in the development of the companies’ future success. Without which there will be possibilities that they can’t meet what the people needs for these two types of plan must work hand in hand. AJA…
hephep....HURI..
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