Benefits Management

John Ward is Emeritus Professor at Cranfield University, School of Management. He was previously Professor of Strategic Information Systems and Director of the Information Systems Research Centre. Prior to joining Cranfield, he worked in industry for 15 years and continues to be a consultant to a number of major organizations. As well as publishing many papers and articles, he is co-author of the book Strategic Planning for Information Systems. He is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants and has served two terms as President of the UK Academy for Information Systems. Elizabeth Daniel is Professor of Information Management and Associate Dean of Research and Scholarship at the Open University Business School (OUBS). Prior to joining OUBS in 2005, she worked in the IS Research Centre at Cranfield School of Management. Elizabeth's research has addressed a number of areas including benefits management and IS in marketing and supply chains. Recent work has included studies of home-based online businesses and the uses of consumer and employee data. She has published many papers in leading academic journals and a number of management reports.

• About the authors xiPreface xiii1 The challenges of IS/IT projects 1Dissatisfaction with current approaches to benefits delivery 4The need for a fresh approach: benefits management 8Benefits delivery 9A focus on value 10A business case linked to organizational strategy 11The importance of change management 12Commitment from business managers 13IS/IT sufficient to do the job 13Involvement of stakeholders 14Educated in the use of technology 15Post‑implementation benefits review 16The importance of a common language 17Summary 192 Understanding the strategic context 21The external and internal perspectives of business strategy: the competitive forces and resource-based views 22Resources, competences and capabilities 23Ends, ways and means 26PEST analysis 28Industry attractiveness and competitive forces analysis 28External value chain analysis 34Internal value chain analysis 37Alternative internal value chain configurations 40Balancing the external and internal contexts: the dimensions of competence 44Linking business, IS and IT strategies 47Managing the portfolio of IS/IT investments 49Organizational information competences 56Summary 593 The foundations of benefits management 61The gaps in existing methods and the implications 62The origins of the benefits management approach and process 67An overview of the benefits management process 68Step 1: Identifying and structuring the benefits 69Step 2: Planning benefits realization 73Step 3: Executing the benefits plan 75Step 4: Reviewing and evaluating the results 78Step 5: Establishing the potential for further benefits 79What is different about this approach? 80Summary 834 Establishing the why, what and how 85Why: identifying business and organizational drivers 86Establishing investment objectives 91Linking the investment objectives to the drivers 93What: the business benefits 94How: the benefits dependency network 95Measurement and ownership 103Benefit and change templates 111Worked example: improved control within a food processing organization 111Summary 1215 Building the business case 127Arguing the value of the project 129Maintaining dependency: benefits are the result of changes 132A structure for analysing and describing the benefits 133Quantifying the benefits: the major challenge 136Ways of overcoming the quantification problem 137Financial benefits 144Cost reductions 147Revenue increases 148Project cost assessment 150Investment appraisal techniques 150Variations in benefits and changes across the investment portfolio 152Risk assessment 156Completing the business case 161Summary business case for the FoodCo project 163Summary 1666 Stakeholder and change management 169Assessing the feasibility of achieving the benefit 170Stakeholder analysis and management techniques 173From analysis to action 178Completing the benefits plan 182Approaches to managing change 184Matching the management approach and stakeholder behaviours 185The nature of IT-enabled change management: is it different? 186Alternative change management strategies 193Summary 1977 Implementing a benefits management approach 199Rationales for introducing benefits management 200Initiating and managing a benefits-driven project 204The project sponsor 206The business project manager 207The role of project management offices (PMOs) 209The first workshop 211Activities between workshops 212The second workshop 212Inclusion of the benefits plan in the management of the project 217Monitoring the benefits after implementation 223Fit with other methodologies 224Organizational benefits management maturity 225Summary 2348 The importance of context 235Factors to take into account 236The public sector 237Small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) 241Multi-unit businesses: replicated deployments 242Variations across the applications portfolio 245Problem‑based: key operational and support investments 247Innovation‑based: strategic and high potential investments 248Different application types 252E‑commerce and e‑business 252Information management (IM) 253Customer relationship management (CRM) systems 256Enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems 259Infrastructure investments 263Non-IT projects 266Different IS/IT supply arrangements 267Summary 2719 From projects to programmes to portfolios 273Defining programmes 274Planned and emergent programmes 276Programme dependency networks 276The management of programme benefits 282Managing the IS/IT project investment portfolio 284Governance and portfolio management 285Setting priorities 287Links to drivers 290Benefits management lite 293Project portfolio management in practice 295Summary 29510 Creating a better future 299The continuing challenge of IS/IT projects 300Characteristics of the benefits management approach 300The value of the process 301Using benefits management to formulate and implement strategy 303Incorporating benefits management into strategic thinking 308Examples of benefits-driven strategies 311Future trends in IS/IT and their implications for benefits management 312A final word or two 323Glossary 325References 329Index 337