We are not trying to be profound, but in an economic climate shrouded by a lack of clear optimism it is essential that we promote and recommend projects and activities that drive differences for our organizations. Crucial IT projects can be missed through some simple language that ties those with budgets and those with the expertise together. Technology matters even more in an environment like this, so we have to be super sensitive to discovering needs.

Purchasing beyond just replacement needs will still happen. The ability to reach out and understand the users ROI needs is a critical bridge to build consistent value for IT in the current world. Bridging that language gap is essential in an economic environment that we are all not used to. For example, in Server purchasing we can see how much increased application performance drives demand for new servers. That is a tough conversation to have with a business person, however it is key in order to get the right decisions made. IT must act as a translating agent for what will not necessarily be the most articulate expressions of needs. We might want to talk about cool new features on laptops and the user groups who use them. Practical language for servers, cool and new language for laptops. These bridges are very different depending on the situations. Here is a recommended mantra for eight technology buy situations in the largest US corporations:

Laptop - "Cool new features"

Desktop - "Pain of getting new users established"

Server - "Application performance helps business"

Storage - "Capacity facilitates growth"

Network Hardware - "Zip up applications performance"

WLAN - "Work better out of office space"

Unified Communications - "Squeeze costs and up automation"

Security - "Up the ante on protection, data matters more"

Our recommendations are quite simple and we are increasingly seeing this play out even in markets like PRC or Brazil or India.