How’s this for a conundrum inside an enigma wrapped around a puzzle.

How do you, as an IT chief, justify the benefits of IT projects to the bottom line if your business colleagues stubbornly refuse to feedback value? How do you convince these same colleagues of the merits of measuring, tracking and then communicating the business benefits of their IT project - if they have been, shall we say, ‘over optimistic’ to their Board about the business benefits of said IT project.

Answers on a post card please?

As a starter for ten, IT chiefs discussing this thorny issue in a recent Forum workshop put together the top tips below. We’re putting together a stream of activities around this topic and would welcome your input as to the issues we should cover. Please give us your thoughts in the response section.

Ten tips to improve benefits realisation:

1. Present a framework and governance solution for benefits identification and delivery to the executive Board - using evidence of current performance against external best practice.
2. The business case: Challenge claimed benefits based on realism and experience and document the assumptions on which benefits are based.
3. Make project funding stages dependent on benefit ownership.
4. As projects progress, increase the level of detail required on how and when benefits will be delivered, measured, and reported.
5. Clarify the ownership and accountability for benefits delivery for each project at an operational level.
6. Provide support through Business Change and Business Project implementation managers.
7. Create a benefit hierarchy covering primary (measurable) secondary (non measurable) and enabling (other projects).
8. Put time and effort in to getting a solid baseline for benefit measurement.
9. Recognise the lack of management information may create the need for a project to provide it.
10. If necessary, start small with a limited pilot to prove the value of the approach.