دانلود رایگان مقاله ارزیابی هزینه های فناوری اطلاعات: رسیدن به نتیجه های درست

Abstract

The use of managerial control ratios for benchmarking IT costs is widely accepted. This installment of Accounting Matters informs CIOs about IT managerial control ratios and the assumptions underlying the use of these ratios in IT cost benchmarking. Incorrect use of these ratios and violation of the assumptions can lead to faulty inferences and costly mistakes. This article proposes a technique for benchmarking IT costs to draw the right conclusions from the data.

7. Concluding remarks

Because of their simplicity, IT managerial control ratios are used extensively by practitioners to measure and compare organizational IT spending. Despite their popularity, there is often an insuffi- cient understanding ofthe ratios’ properties and the assumptions about them that are relied on in benchmarking IT costs. Our research shows frequent violations of all three assumptions. We do not suggest abandoning these ratios in totality; executives often do not have the time or necessary data for a more rigorous analysis of IT spending. Even recognizing the limitations identified here, these ratios, while imperfect, may be useful instruments; having some data to base an inference on may be better than having no data at all. However, users of these ratios are advised to: Use the median rather than the mean as a measure of the industry norm.