Management of IT portfolio is the process of rationalizing and organizing IT applications in your company to meet specific business needs. The main responsibilities of portfolio managers for IT projects include analysis of current and future applications as well as projects within the organization.
With this analysis, managers then identify gaps and shortcomings, devising ways to make improvements in the IT portfolio. On a regular basis, the IT department or organization is allotted fixed funding to accommodate maintenance, as well as support and operations of IT applications.
Main goals of IT portfolio management
The main organizational goals of IT portfolio management include identifying the best combination of multiple applications and projects to enable and optimize business processes, accommodate decision making on an executive level, providing more visibility to IT projects and so on. Other goals of IT portfolio management include creating a single source for all IT portfolios including potential investment, initiatives as well as assets. Management of IT portfolio also allows you to manage budgets and prioritize projects based on the overall budget.
IT portfolio management is considered very similar to stock portfolios as it requires considerable preparation and analysis of risks and rewards. Based on the IT budget allotted by your organization, it is important to adopt a management system that allows your IT manager to alter, defer or cancel projects that are showing low return on investment in terms of business benefits. Additionally, it allows your company management to study their assets in the portfolio and make informed decisions. Proper management of portfolio helps managers understand the needs and necessities of specific projects before jumping into implementation.
Main benefits of portfolio management
There are several benefits your organization can enjoy from streamlined portfolio management. Thorough portfolio management of IT projects allows managers to monitor costs and reduce expenses wherever necessary. IT portfolio management also allows executives to centralize project details and other pertinent information to improve their knowledge and understanding of current portfolio assets. This process can help smoother communication within the team and organization and help with day-to-day functioning of the business processes.
Thorough portfolio management allows you to detect redundant projects and minimize scope for repetition, ensuring that all resources and assets are being utilized in the most efficient manner. This management also allows you to combine or modify redundant projects to fulfill more than one initiative. IT organizations can use IT portfolio management to their advantage by adopting a data-driven process to compare costs and business values of projects and make informed decisions instead of assessing each project separately.
