Understanding and Prioritizing Technology Management Challenges

The purpose of this study was to identify the perceived relative importance of the technology issues among managers. A survey instrument that described 10 technology management issues was administered to IT managers of various organizations. The survey also included an open-ended question asking the respondents to describe what they saw as the three greatest challenges to effectively managing information technology. Data privacy, data management, meeting legal requirements and protecting systems from hackers were identified as very important by the IT managers. Less than one-half of the managers deemed employee penetration and staff training as very important IT management issues. Respondents' answers to the open-ended questions indicating major challenges yielded into three separate categories: shrinking IT budgets; need for enhanced security; and data management with regulatory requirements. Discussion and recommendations are made based on the study findings.