Reduce tech costs with smart budgeting

Adopting new technology is often a necessary yet complicated responsibility for business owners. Because technology is constantly evolving, it can be difficult to both predict and budget for new advances. The good news is that there are ways to eliminate tech headaches and approach budgeting issues in a way that ensures your company can accomplish its goals and stay up to date; all while keeping costs in check. This approach is known as smart budgeting.

Technology is key to your operations, but you shouldn’t have to sweat every IT detail, including your budget. You need a managed service provider or partner that is invested in your company’s success and your staff’s ability to get the job done. Take a look at these five tech budgeting strategies for your small to midsize business:

5 Smart Budgeting Strategies to Increase the Value of Your Tech

1. Review Your IT Budget

If you have an IT budget from the year prior, it’s important to review it to determine where you may want to make changes. If money was spent on new equipment in the previous year (or recent years), then you probably won’t need to buy those same items again. The previous year’s budget will help you to find recurring expenses easily.

Too often, budgeting is done on a calendar basis because of convenience, not strategy. To best achieve annual goals, form your budgets based on milestones achieved throughout the calendar year.

2. Plan for IT Projects

A good smart budgeting strategy considers any projects planned for the coming year, including any infrastructure updates or migrations like a transition to cloud computing, full workstation or server replacements and other one-time adjustments to your environment that don’t occur annually. Industry standards suggest that computers and laptops should be replaced every three years and that servers should be replaced about every five years.

All strategic initiatives should be included in this section of the budget. Make sure that when budgeting for technology replacement, you also include all labor estimates.

3. Know IT Inside and Out Before You Invest

Know what you’re building before you start building it. Waterfall concepts of upfront planning have gotten a bad rap, but take the time to scope a project first to define its needs before development starts. Taking some time to plan through user experience or user interface, while working with developers to begin the process, makes dynamic, cost-effective solutions that work.

4. Budget for IT

Like a project plan or IT roadmap, smart budgeting provides direction and a holistic view of your department and its funding requirements. An article by TechRepublic tells us this budgeting approach to technology allows you to quickly determine whether resources are overcommitted in any one particular area of the business and also enables you to determine what you’re spending in comparison to companies with similar departments. Get help through a benchmarking organization, IT consulting service or simply a call to a peer at another company. You can perform this analysis on the most sophisticated and complex IT budgets to see whether you’re spending more or less than peers on a particular area.

5. Invest in IT Research and Development

Always invest in IT research and development. This is a common area that companies often overlook. Lack of R&D has blinded many IT companies and steered them in the wrong direction. The current year’s budget should include a line for research and development to improve your organization’s ability to compete with other businesses in your industry. Depending on your industry, this may include:

Sending managers to IT conferences.
Hiring coders and developers.
Improving your IT infrastructure and cyber security defenses.

Researching your future needs will make it easier for you to predict expenses and develop an IT budget that will cover more than just the current year’s spending. Peace of mind comes from a budget that sees beyond short-term costs and invests in the value of technology for the future success of your business.

Could Your IT Budget Benefit From Being Smarter?

If you’re like most business leaders who aim to reduce their IT operational costs and do more with less, then you understand the importance of what using these recommended tactics means for your business when planning and implementing a smart budgeting strategy. At ArcLight Group, we take a human approach to your questions and concerns to uncover your business needs and build a strategy around the future of your business.

Your organization’s growth can’t wait. Book an appointment with us today to start right-sizing your IT budget and create a path forward for your Tulsa business.