The Success And Failure Of Strategic Plans

Strategic information systems may offer a variety of services for an organization, but all bolster the organization’s capabilities in some way. These systems are not self-serving, but are intended to serve the objectives of the organization which employs them. The level of complexity to which these systems are designed and their extensive integration into organizational operations, often necessitate a degree of planning on the part of the organization. To successfully integrate information systems, they must be strategically planned for, and complement the organizational objectives to which they serve. Examples of the implementation of strategic information systems planning are prevalent throughout modern culture, from the unsuccessful release of the flagship US healthcare exchange website, healthcare.gov, to the very successful delivery of Apple’s iPhone, which repeatedly pushes the boundary of mobile device capability and quality. While these two systems serve very separate purposes, they both uniquely illustrate both successful and unsuccessful strategic planning and implementation of information systems. In order to further delineate moderately successful uses of strategic planning, two additional cases will be examined to better depict the spectrum of degrees of success. Classification- JEL: