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A Computer Weekly buyers

guide to project management
in the digital age

SUPPORT
DIGITISATION
THROUGH
PROJECT
MANAGEMENT
AGILE AND
DEVOPS
APPROACHES
MEAN LARGE
PROJECTS WITH
A DEFINED
ENDPOINT ARE
DISAPPEARING

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FIRMS SET SIGHTS

ON DIGITAL, BUT
WILL IT FULFIL
THEIR DEMANDS?
THE EFFECTS OF
DIGITISATION
AND HOW
CIOS CAN HELP
BUSINESSES MOVE
FORWARD WHILE
KEEPING DAY-TODAY SYSTEMS
RUNNING

These articles were

originally published
in the Computer
Weekly ezine

Managing projects can be a headache for anyone, and maintaining visibility

over a portfolio of projects can be stressful for the best CIO. In the past, project
management software was sufficient for most long-running projects, ensuring
critical paths were maintained, changes to the plans mapped and tracked,
and their effect on the final outcome estimated, allowing the final delivery
date to be changed, if necessary. In this 10-page buyers guide, Computer
Weekly looks at how project management is changing, as large projects with a
defined endpoint are being swapped for an agile approach to development and
operations which features short-term goals and ongoing change.
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Firms must incorporate agile

into their strategic planning
Margo Visitacion and Gordon Barnett say firms must achieve greater levels of
transparency to create a strong link between strategic planning and execution
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SUPPORT
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THROUGH
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MANAGEMENT
AGILE AND
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PROJECTS WITH
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DISAPPEARING
FIRMS SET SIGHTS
ON DIGITAL, BUT
WILL IT FULFIL
THEIR DEMANDS?
THE EFFECTS OF
DIGITISATION
AND HOW
CIOS CAN HELP
BUSINESSES MOVE
FORWARD WHILE
KEEPING DAY-TODAY SYSTEMS
RUNNING

T
How Agile
ALM tools
shape business
agility
How can
Agile be used
with other
methods?

he drive to excel in market conditions dictated by an increasingly sophisticated

customer base is turning business on its head. Before technology management can
become an effective partner with business, the two groups of leaders must rethink
the way they plan and execute and begin to act as one.
Firms must achieve greater levels of transparency to create a strong link between strategic
planning and execution. By integrating strategic planning into execution with automation
and feedback loops, companies can build greater agility into gauging the impact of their
investments, such as how agile development teams perform.
Using agile planning practices enables firms to ignore annual project budgeting and move
towards continuous portfolio-based planning. Taking this approach brings greater value over
time, enabling organisations to evaluate demand and align work with business value while
remaining time-sensitive to allocate resources effectively.
Strategic planning must be a continual, holistic practice supported by performance data
that drives informed decision-making. Using portfolio management, as a communication tool
that aggregates strategic and operational performance, increases transparency and allows
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COMPUTER WEEKLY BUYERS GUIDE

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SUPPORT
DIGITISATION
THROUGH
PROJECT
MANAGEMENT
AGILE AND
DEVOPS
APPROACHES
MEAN LARGE
PROJECTS WITH
A DEFINED
ENDPOINT ARE
DISAPPEARING
FIRMS SET SIGHTS
ON DIGITAL, BUT
WILL IT FULFIL
THEIR DEMANDS?
THE EFFECTS OF
DIGITISATION
AND HOW
CIOS CAN HELP
BUSINESSES MOVE
FORWARD WHILE
KEEPING DAY-TODAY SYSTEMS
RUNNING

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INCORPORATE
AGILE INTO
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PLANNING
FIRMS NEED TO
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STRONG LINK
BETWEEN
STRATEGIC
PLANNING AND
EXECUTION

Firms map their key capabilities and services to show

howtechnology can best enable the business

firms to achieve corporate objectives. Using portfolio management as a decision-making tool

helps firms focus on initiatives that drive greater value instead of wasting resources on lowvalue activities. Balance requires greater visibility in an integrated demand pipeline to remove
constraints on key resources. Optimising work cadence allows companies to start fewer
efforts, but finish more, while freeing resources for innovation.
Using this approach, business and technology leaders can direct critical resources on the
necessary initiatives that will help them achieve their intended strategic outcomes. You need
a vision for strategic planning and portfolio management to advise decision-makers how they
can select and deliver the right value for technology investments at the right time.

Getting started

Strategic planning is not an isolated or annual event. It is performed as a continual

exercise,using the performance feedback information as a barometer for decision-making.
The CEO may own the strategic vision, but the C-level executives and business unit owners
jointly own the plan, and investment owners own theoutcome.
Firms map their key capabilities and services
those necessary to maintain and grow market
gile planning
share to show how technology can best enable the
business. This exercise helps firms understand the
practices focus
impact and relationship of a change to an ecosystem.
Agile planning practices focus on strategic and
on strategic
execution investment decisions that are the most
decisions that
relevant at a given point in time. Transparency of
performance measures and metrics enables balanced
are most relevant
investments across new and current initiatives more
frequently, preventing the need for once-a-year or
at a given point
half-year planning and budgeting cycles. Long-term
in time
investment strategies and short-term execution are
defined using data from feedback loops. Enterprise
architecture (EA) tools are evolving from a focus
on architecture modelling to a broader focus on planning, portfolios and assessment of
the impact of strategic change. Similarly, project portfolio management (PPM) tools are
supporting strategic planning activities acrossthe enterprise as well as execution activities
in and across projects. These separate tools are coming together to link planning inputs to
execution and provide views to support different decisions by different sets of stakeholders.

Time to end annual planning

Budgeting is completed in most firms, but it is not strategic planning. Instead of strategic
planning and transparency, human nature takes over. Driven by a spend it or lose it
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COMPUTER WEEKLY BUYERS GUIDE

HOME
INCORPORATE
AGILE INTO
STRATEGIC
PLANNING
FIRMS NEED TO
ACHIEVE GREATER
LEVELS OF
TRANSPARENCY
TO CREATE A
STRONG LINK
BETWEEN
STRATEGIC
PLANNING AND
EXECUTION
SUPPORT
DIGITISATION
THROUGH
PROJECT
MANAGEMENT
AGILE AND
DEVOPS
APPROACHES
MEAN LARGE
PROJECTS WITH
A DEFINED
ENDPOINT ARE
DISAPPEARING
FIRMS SET SIGHTS
ON DIGITAL, BUT
WILL IT FULFIL
THEIR DEMANDS?
THE EFFECTS OF
DIGITISATION
AND HOW
CIOS CAN HELP
BUSINESSES MOVE
FORWARD WHILE
KEEPING DAY-TODAY SYSTEMS
RUNNING

mentality, executives clog the demand pipeline with wish list projects. Delivery teams
waste time and resources estimating projects that may never get started because
businessunits have asked for more than their resources will support.
Technology is a differentiator, but people make it
sustainable. Key people in business, technology and
external partner roles represent your collective capacity
usiness
to take on initiatives, source them with hybrid staffing
leaders are
models, support new business and technology, and
reshape legacy IT culture such that it can support the
bypassing
needs of technology management.

Strategic execution

traditional IT

Today, businesses must exceed the expectations of

altogether
technology-savvy customers that demand a desirable
going directly
experience from products and services via multiple
touchpoints. That means transitioning from activities
to solution
designed for stability and burdensome control to
shorter, nimbler services that can adapt to changing
and service
situations.
providers
Strategic planning and execution activities lack strong
tethers to each other to create a clear value stream. In
the face of seemingly endless demand from business
leaders, some IT executives let the work pile up rather than pushing back feeling there is no
purpose in planning when business demand is changing so rapidly.
When the strategic planning activities do not prioritise effectively, execution becomes inefficient as IT executives can rarely allocate and manage available resources effectively. When
prioritisation loses its link to business value, business leaders can (and will) behave parochially and delivery teams are left behind.

Role of IT

Transitioning from technology provider to full business partner means fundamentally

changing how you use planning and portfolio management to create business-level
transparency. The need for speed is all-consuming. If you cannot pivot, somebody else
will. New business opportunities do not sit around waiting for you to act. Business leaders
are increasingly bypassing traditional IT altogether, going directly to system and service
providers. This may resolve the initial symptom, but it creates longer-term headaches as IT
learns it must fold the new technology into an already overstuffed environment.
Strategic decisions can no longer occur in a narrow-minded context. Information silos
spawn limited behaviour that defies corporate strategic intent. Business leaders who only
see their slice of the pie will act in short-sighted ways.
Transparency across strategic planning and execution
Cloud app development can reap benefits of agile
views is the antidote to this behaviour. It enables strategic
Four ways to attain business agility
management of investments according to their value to
Dual-track agile keeps requirements in check
the business as a whole and optimises the best overall use
of key resources.
Many individual practices in strategic planning and portfolio management exist today, but
are disconnected. A next-generation approach will organise them with new capabilities and
execute them collectively. This new approach places an increased emphasis on frequent
updates, balanced investments, and accurate and timely decision-making, leading to more
successful execution. n
This is an extract of the Forrester report Next-generation strategic planning must be agile and outcome-focused,
by Margo Visitacion and Gordon Barnett, both principal analysts at Forrester Research.
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How to support digitisation

through project management
Agile and DevOps approaches mean large projects with a defined endpoint are
disappearing. Clive Longbottom reports on how project management is changing
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SUPPORT
DIGITISATION
THROUGH
PROJECT
MANAGEMENT
AGILE AND
DEVOPS
APPROACHES
MEAN LARGE
PROJECTS WITH
A DEFINED
ENDPOINT ARE
DISAPPEARING
FIRMS SET SIGHTS
ON DIGITAL, BUT
WILL IT FULFIL
THEIR DEMANDS?
THE EFFECTS OF
DIGITISATION
AND HOW
CIOS CAN HELP
BUSINESSES MOVE
FORWARD WHILE
KEEPING DAY-TODAY SYSTEMS
RUNNING

Businesses
lack skills
forchange
management
projects
Managing
IT projects:
when things
gowrong

anaging projects can be a headache for any manager, and maintaining adequate
visibility over a portfolio of projects can be stressful for the best CIO. In the
past, project management software such as Microsoft Project, Primavera or
Project Manager Workbench were sufficient for most long-running projects.
Gantt charts and task lists ensured critical paths were maintained; changes to the plans
could be mapped and tracked and the impact on the final outcome could be estimated with
the final delivery date changed, if required.
However, there has to be a change in the way projects are carried out. Agile and
development and operations, or DevOps,approaches mean large projects with a defined
endpoint are fast disappearing managing smaller chunks of work and seeing how they all
operate together is becoming moreimportant.
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COMPUTER WEEKLY BUYERS GUIDE

HOME
INCORPORATE
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STRATEGIC
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FIRMS NEED TO
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STRONG LINK
BETWEEN
STRATEGIC
PLANNING AND
EXECUTION
SUPPORT
DIGITISATION
THROUGH
PROJECT
MANAGEMENT
AGILE AND
DEVOPS
APPROACHES
MEAN LARGE
PROJECTS WITH
A DEFINED
ENDPOINT ARE
DISAPPEARING
FIRMS SET SIGHTS
ON DIGITAL, BUT
WILL IT FULFIL
THEIR DEMANDS?
THE EFFECTS OF
DIGITISATION
AND HOW
CIOS CAN HELP
BUSINESSES MOVE
FORWARD WHILE
KEEPING DAY-TODAY SYSTEMS
RUNNING

This should, of course, always have been the case. The eating the elephant phrase of
breaking everything down into small bits and managing each part simultaneously is how
successful projects managed have typically been managed. Yet, in many cases, it is only
the total project that is addressed; the tasks that make up the processes of the project are
hardlymanaged at all. This is most visible in the public sector, where many projects have
been set up to run over several years. As time goes on, users need change yet the desired
end result remains the same in the project plan, and the sum of the changes makesitseem
as though the desired outcome will never be reached.
In the end, what should be a highly flexible approach
turns in on itself, attempting to bring in the required
project takes
changes but still aiming at what is now the wrong result
and the actual result is a failure of the project at high
time and the
cost totheusers and, in the case of the public sector,
thetaxpayer.
end result may
What is now required is a means of managing at the
task level with a mechanism for aggregating the tasks
be an attempt
into the processes and seeing what the impact on
to solve
any end result will be. This requires more intelligence
than just project management it starts to fall into the
problems that
project portfolio management (PPM) space. Indeed,
incertain circumstances, if the project team can regard
have changed
what it is doing as a product, then the better tool to
or are no
choose could well be a product life cycle management
(PLM) one. The key things to look for when choosing a
longer there
tool are as follows.

High levels of granularity

A project is made up of a set of smaller functional processes. Each of these processes

is made up of tasks. Tasks can be carried out by individuals; processes may require
interaction between individuals to work together as teams; the result of the various teams
output will be the project itself. Therefore, the software chosen must be able to deal not
only with individuals and teams, but the interactions between them.

Resource management

Projects are dependent on resources. These resources will include money, people, time
and the physical availability of goods such as servers, software and space and power in
the datacentre. Each resource must be understood by the project software as well as the
context between them. This means that when a change is applied to a task, the impact of
this at all levels of the project must be understood. But does this mean that more people,
money or time will be required to complete the task? And what does this mean to the
overall project?

Change management

Putting together a project that solves your issues now is fine. The problem is that a
project takes time and the end result may be an attempt to solve problems that have
changed or are no longer there. Therefore, any change requests must be seen as being
a core part of any project, and the project software chosen must not only be capable
of embracing these changes, but also of calculating what this means at the resource
level andproviding sufficient feedback to CIOs, project leaders and team members so
decisionscan be made over whether the change can be adopted or if there is too much
risk to the overall project in adopting it. This is known as consequence modelling, and
may include such aspects as Monte Carlo modelling, probability encoding, risk tolerance
estimating and so on.
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INCORPORATE
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SUPPORT
DIGITISATION
THROUGH
PROJECT
MANAGEMENT
AGILE AND
DEVOPS
APPROACHES
MEAN LARGE
PROJECTS WITH
A DEFINED
ENDPOINT ARE
DISAPPEARING
FIRMS SET SIGHTS
ON DIGITAL, BUT
WILL IT FULFIL
THEIR DEMANDS?
THE EFFECTS OF
DIGITISATION
AND HOW
CIOS CAN HELP
BUSINESSES MOVE
FORWARD WHILE
KEEPING DAY-TODAY SYSTEMS
RUNNING

Integration and auditing

Any project software must be capable of acting as a central control module to other
systems. For example, in an IT project, using project software to initiate a code
implementation through a software management tool, such as IBM Rational or Eclipse,
means the action can be fully audited as part of the project, rather than as part of the
development process. Integrating the project software into any trouble ticketing system
again means that an audit can be carried out in one
central place, rather than across multiplesystems.

Reporting is essential

Actions taken at the individual, team and overall

project level must be able to be logged and reported
on. Reporting is a key area, as only through suitable
reporting can the impact of any task slippages or
changes be seen. Advanced project software should
be able to provide some form of predictive capability,
along with advisory information for example, if a
change is adopted and has an impact on the project
dates, then what does this mean to the project in hard
costs, and what does it mean to the business as well?

Support for rolling projects

The concept of
an IT project is
changing, and
many project
management
software
suppliers have
struggled to

keep up with
Many projects will still have a hard endpoint, where
the desired outcome is reached, but in todays more
what has been
flexible agile/DevOps world, it is more likely that
various projects will remain interlinked and will
happening
change as time goes on. Being able to manage a full
portfolio of projects on an ongoing level is more of a
requirement than it has been in the past and it does mean project managers and CIOs
need to change their attitude to projects as well.
At the PPM level, Microsoft has built a lot of the required capabilities into its Project suite
to create enterprise project management, which can be seen as a true PPM offering. CA
Technologies, with its Clarity PPM software, is a major player in the space. Oracle has a range
of offerings, including Primavera. Deltek, which is more focused on non-IT projects, has a
strong offering that can be used by IT for managing its projects.
PLM often brings in better resource capabilities. As PLM is more often used where a
physical product is involved, it is used to dealing with bills of materials (BOMs). These BOMs
provide full lists of what is required to make the product. With the right information included
in the models, these provide the details needed to estimate how much the product will cost
in terms of components. They also allow a full supply chain model to be built up that reflects
the other resources of time and people availability. Taking a soft project such as an IT
project, and using code stubs and functional components as basic feeds into a BOM, gives
highly granular capabilities in managing an agile/DevOps project.
Main suppliers in the PLM space include Siemens Software, PTC and Aras. Most
companies in the CAD/CAM space including Dassault, Bentley and Autodesk have
capabilities in the PLM space, but their systems may be too focused on the CAD/CAM and
product space to be used as an IT PLM tool. The concept of an IT project is changing rapidly,
and many of the project management software suppliers have struggled to keep up with what
has been happening. However, there are many options available to the IT project manager
choosing the right strategic solution to support a highly flexible and dynamic IT environment
based around agile and DevOps approaches just requires a little more thought than before. n
Clive Longbottom is services director at analyst Quocirca
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INCORPORATE
AGILE INTO
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Firms set eyes on digital, but

will it fulfil their demands?
Cliff Saran looks at the effect digitisation will have on enterprises and how CIOs
can help businesses move forward while keeping day-to-day systems running
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HOME

SUPPORT
DIGITISATION
THROUGH
PROJECT
MANAGEMENT
AGILE AND
DEVOPS
APPROACHES
MEAN LARGE
PROJECTS WITH
A DEFINED
ENDPOINT ARE
DISAPPEARING
FIRMS SET SIGHTS
ON DIGITAL, BUT
WILL IT FULFIL
THEIR DEMANDS?
THE EFFECTS OF
DIGITISATION
AND HOW
CIOS CAN HELP
BUSINESSES MOVE
FORWARD WHILE
KEEPING DAY-TODAY SYSTEMS
RUNNING

How to
support
digitisation
through
project
management
Financial
companies
leading race to
digitisation

igitisation could change ITs value, but is IT ready? New products and services
often promise business value, but more often than not they simply offer a slight
improvement over what came before. On the one hand, they are responsible for
the IT infrastructure businesses rely on, but they are also being asked to support
technology-powered business initiatives. When the web started to become popular, every
company wanted a presence on it. Now every company wants a chunk of the digital pie. IT
may not be able to deliver business value but it can facilitate those initiatives.

Changing the rules of engagement

How can CIOs keep day-to-day systems running while helping businesses move forward
with digitisation? In the McKinsey paper, Competing in a digital world: Four lessons from the
software industry, consultants Hugo Sarrazin and Johnson Sikes write that, in the past, IT
and business have tended to operate as separate functions in many organisations, making
it harder for those trained in one discipline to cross over to the other. The article describes
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INCORPORATE
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PLANNING AND
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SUPPORT
DIGITISATION
THROUGH
PROJECT
MANAGEMENT
AGILE AND
DEVOPS
APPROACHES
MEAN LARGE
PROJECTS WITH
A DEFINED
ENDPOINT ARE
DISAPPEARING
FIRMS SET SIGHTS
ON DIGITAL, BUT
WILL IT FULFIL
THEIR DEMANDS?
THE EFFECTS OF
DIGITISATION
AND HOW
CIOS CAN HELP
BUSINESSES MOVE
FORWARD WHILE
KEEPING DAY-TODAY SYSTEMS
RUNNING

why companies should become more like software companies. Along with the need for IT
to become more business-savvy, the authors recommend business unit leaders become
software-savvy.
A base level of software fluency will be required for all levels, including upper
management, to understand not only the core technologies, but the dynamics of working in a
quick-turn, more connected and digitised marketplace, states the report.
If digitisation will force enterprises to become more like software companies, IT will
need to adapt, because traditionally organised enterprise IT has been constrained due to
working practices. Analyst Gartner predicts that by
2015 the speed of change in business will outpace ITs
ability to support those changes. As a result, Gartner
expects IT organisations will need to embrace a
he idea of
bimodal IT architecture to make the transition to an
agile infrastructure, which is required to address the
becoming more
proliferation of data generated by digital business and
agile has been
the internet of things.
Bimodal is Gartners terminology for splitting work
popular in the
that needs to be done quickly from long-term projects,
such as those that relate to core IT infrastructure.
industry for
Complex projects should be split to make them more
manageable. Ideally, each part should deliver a tangible
several years
business benefit.
Quocirca analyst CliveLongbottom says breaking
everything down into small pieces and managing each
part in a joined-up manner is among the key attributes of successful project management.
Yet in many cases, it is only the total project that is addressed; the tasks that make up the
processes of the project are hardly managed. This is most visible in the public sector, where
many projects have been set up to run over several years. As time goes on, the user needs
change yet the desired result remains the same in the project plan, and the sum of the
changes makes it seem that the desired outcome will never be reached, says Longbottom.
The idea of becoming more agile has been popular in the industry for several years. In
October it arrived at VMworld Europe, when VMware CEO Pat Gelsinger described the need
for agility in the enterprise. In Gelsingers vision, virtualisation removes hardware constraints
in the datacentre, allowing businesses to become more dynamic and agile.

HOW LEGAL & GENERAL EMBRACED AGILE

Legal & General (L&G) moved a project to agile development after using traditional methods,
which became unmanageable due to scope creep. It is often difficult for IT to say no when
a new project sponsor comes on board and has different requirements. This is the cycle L&G
found itself in after it began a project to speed up the process of delivering enhanced annuity
quotes for pensions. Previously, the turnaround for such a quote would be around 48 hours.
L&Gs Russell Evans says the company began the project in 2011 to take advantage of the Origo
standard, which enables customers to receive enhanced annuity quotes through pension portals.
The project would enable L&G to drive business through the pension portals but progress
was slow. Changes in sponsorship and changes in the leadership team meant people leading
the project would come in with a different focus, says Evans. L&G generally took a traditional,
risk-averse approach to projects. But to gain a competitive edge, it needed to rethink the project.
We took the massive project scope and chunked it into something that could deliver in a few
months, says Evans. L&G subsequently worked with TCS to rework the project in a way that
would enable parts to be delivered in stages.
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INCORPORATE
AGILE INTO
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BETWEEN
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SUPPORT
DIGITISATION
THROUGH
PROJECT
MANAGEMENT
AGILE AND
DEVOPS
APPROACHES
MEAN LARGE
PROJECTS WITH
A DEFINED
ENDPOINT ARE
DISAPPEARING
FIRMS SET SIGHTS
ON DIGITAL, BUT
WILL IT FULFIL
THEIR DEMANDS?
THE EFFECTS OF
DIGITISATION
AND HOW
CIOS CAN HELP
BUSINESSES MOVE
FORWARD WHILE
KEEPING DAY-TODAY SYSTEMS
RUNNING

Many people regard agile as a way for businesses to be more responsive to change. Rather
than spend months or years creating a formal specification for a project, IT can become
lightweight. This is how online recruiter Reed.co.uk introduced bitcoin as a payment system,
when CTO Mark Ridley encouraged his team to develop ideas in a Google-like initiative.

What agile can do?

Ridleys developers were given a day every fortnight to work on their own project. One
of the teams took an interest in bitcoin and presented their idea at a meeting. Within a
few weeks there was a working implementation showing Reed.co.uk accepting bitcoins.
Given the financial implications, the project needed CFO oversight, but even the senior
management had to accept the timescales dictated by fortnightly sprints in the Scrum
project management methodology.
Thanks to the rapid development and deployment
process, Reed.co.uks bitcoin system was ready after
eam members
three project sessions. The company has integrated
bitcoin payment by converting currency to pound
are not in the
sterling at the point of transaction. Bitcoins are then
converted to a currency the companys CFO and
best place to
accounting system can understand. But agile should not
set corporate
be considered a panacea for developing apps faster.
All methods are flawed, some are useful, says
or regulatory
Manav Mehan, principal agile consultant at TCS.
Problems with agile have nothing to do with process.
standards
Its about people.
Barbara Roberts,
In fact, unless the people in the organisation
understand what is achievable with agile, such a
DSDM Consortium
projectcan run into trouble just as catastrophically as
one that takes a traditional waterfall approach.
Barbara Roberts, DSDM Consortium director of
product innovation, says: It is all about changing peoples perceptions.
In any organisation there will always be people who are difficult to change, while some will
come with an open mind. Roberts says the challenge is how to manage this. She says agile is
not about throwing away the work that has previously been done. Instead, she recommends
looking at areas of a project that are not working.
Project management is a good thing. But if the style of project management is wrong, look
at how you can change the style, she says.
Agile project management helps teams work more autonomously, but there will always
be constraints. Team members are not in the best place to set corporate standards, says
Roberts. She says agile projects work well when people have a natural team culture. But it
can be disruptive for someone who is naturally introverted.
A project manager may need to divide the work up so
Firms must use agile in strategic planning
this individual is able to concentrate on a distinct part of
CIO briefing on agile development
the project using a more traditional approach. You make
Can IT survive digitisation?
compromises where it isnecessary, says Roberts.

Continuous development

Forrester analysts Margo Visitacion and Gordon Barnett saidIT must adapt to deal with
continuous change. Transparent performance measures and metrics enable balanced
investments across new and current initiatives more frequently, preventing the need for
once-a-year or half-year planning and budgeting cycles. Long-term investment strategies
and short-term execution are defined using data from feedback loops, theanalysts said in
a report. Arguably, continuous development and delivery will become the norm for CIOs
managing the demands for business that will arise from digitisation. n
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