Information Technology Strategy and Enterprise IT Planning
What this domain tests
This domain tests whether you can translate business direction into an IT strategy, an enterprise architecture and a funded, sequenced portfolio - and defend the choices. Items usually describe an organisation's business change and ask which planning artefact, architecture phase or prioritisation method applies, or what the planner should do next.
Core rules
- Strategy is not a plan. IT strategy states target capabilities and the choices (what to invest in, what to stop, which trade-offs); the IT plan states initiatives, budgets and dates. A three-year schedule with no business driver is a distractor.
- Alignment chain: business strategy → IT strategy → capability and architecture → portfolio → programme/project → operations. An answer that skips a layer is wrong.
- Analysis tools: SWOT (internal/external), PESTLE (macro environment), Porter's five forces and value chain (competitive position), CSF → KPI → metric (measurement).
- Enterprise architecture: the TOGAF ADM runs Preliminary → A Architecture Vision → B Business → C Information Systems (data and application) → D Technology → E Opportunities & Solutions → F Migration Planning → G Implementation Governance → H Architecture Change Management, with Requirements Management at the centre. Zachman is a taxonomy (What/How/Where/Who/When/Why versus planner/owner/designer/builder), not a method.
- Portfolio: classify applications on the McFarlan strategic grid (strategic, turnaround, factory, support) and fund run/grow/transform buckets. Rank candidates by NPV, IRR, payback and risk, not by sponsor seniority.
Worked example
A bank's mobile payment app is essential to winning retail customers but currently underperforms. On the strategic grid it is strategic (high current dependence, high future impact), so it earns transformation funding and Phase B/C architecture work. A stable internal ledger tool with low future impact is factory - keep it, minimise change. Two projects compete for cash: A costs 2m and returns 2.6m over three years; B costs 5m and returns 6.6m. Both have positive NPV, but they are not comparable on totals alone - timing of cash flows, risk and the constraint on capital decide, so the planner needs discounted cash flows and a portfolio view, not just the payback ranking.
Traps that cost marks
- Calling the ADM "preliminary phase A"; Preliminary is a separate, ongoing phase.
- Treating architecture as a document set rather than enforced, governed standards.
- Using Zachman as a delivery method or TOGAF as a project methodology.
- Ignoring the "stop doing" half of strategy - exam answers reward explicit de-investment.
- Confusing an IT strategy (choices) with a technology roadmap (sequenced delivery).