CMGT/578 v12

Week 4 Assignment Instructions

CMGT/578 v12

Page 2 of 3

IT Budget

This is a two-part assignment. For this assignment, you are the Chief Information Officer, or CIO, of Reynolds Tool & Die. To complete this assignment, you will:

1. Create a Microsoft® Excel® spreadsheet proposing the Reynolds Tool & Die company’s IT operations’ annual budget, including maintenance, licensing, and any proposed new investments, such as hardware, software, cloud services, and/or outsourcing.

2. Create a 1- to 2-page executive summary defending your budget choices in terms of innovation and efficiency.

Part 1: Spreadsheet

The example spreadsheet that begins on page 2 is a rough suggestion of an annual, itemized budget. You will create your budget in Microsoft Excel. Your budget headings may vary, but your budget needs to be as specific as possible. Within each category, you should include purchases for the IT strategic plan. For example, if, as the CIO, you are contemplating moving applications to a cloud solution, your budget needs to reflect that process. If you are implementing or expanding VMWare as a virtualization solution, your budget needs to reflect those purchases.

The actual numbers can be approximate. A little research can point you in the right direction. For example, desktops run about $200-$300. You can use approximate figures for items such as licenses, maintenance agreements, servers, etc. Just make sure you have some justification (i.e., references) for the numbers you use.

Part 2: Executive Summary

Your executive summary needs to explain your budget. Possible headings include:

I. Predictable Annual Expenditures

Simply put, fixed operational expenditures keep the lights on. They are mainly hardware and software maintenance items, licensing, etc. These are expected costs of doing IT business. If, however, you are purchasing more hardware or software that will require additional annual maintenance and license agreements, you’ll need to defend those purchases and the annual expenditures that will remain for the company.

II. New Purchases

Any new purchases you recommend need to be justified. Why are you purchasing them? What benefit do you expect from the purchases? You’ll need to justify the purchases relative to the previous week’s assignments—Reynolds’ business situation and goals. For example, how will a new investment in hardware, software, or services achieve a competitive advantage for the company? What do you think the company needs to purchase to achieve its expansion goals? How much will outsourcing cost?

III. Special Projects and Long-term Strategic IT Investments

As CIO, you need to look at technologies in the context of long-range strategic planning. Think of this section as your wish list. The investments in this category may not help the organization achieve its short-range goals, but they’re considered a long-term investment in innovation to remain competitive. For example, a manufacturing facility may consider artificial intelligence and robotics as a long-range plan.

Example Spreadsheet

Your spreadsheet should look, roughly, like this:

Annual IT Budget for Reynolds Tool and Die

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Copyright© 2021 by University of Phoenix. All rights reserved.