Books Strategic Planning for Information Systems
Books and Publications Average Rating:

Rating: - Excellent Reference
I've just finished using this as a text book in my Bsc final year. It is somewhat difficult to read as the writing is not in a flowing manner but it is an axcellent reference with a multitude of tables, charts, lists and diagrams which describe the essentials of strategic IS/IT planning.

Each chapter brings a succinct set of guidelines for the strategic planning novice. A lot of work has gone into compiling this book, it is a work which I will reference again and again.

Buy it if you're into this stuff at all, you won't regret it.

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Rating: - Required for completeness of your IS/IT collection
The number of books on IS/IT has grown out of control in the previous years; most have nothing but a jumble of facts (and fictions) and the author's untested, unwise opinions. (Hence giving the field a bad reputation.) However, Ward and Griffiths have something else: they have a framework, they have put serious work into building it, and they write it from both the business and the IS/IT point of view. Their portfolio approach to IS/IT solutions is based on strategic thinking tools (BCG matrices and other product/business unit portfolio analysis tools). This makes it more amenable to integration with other parts of management and strategy.

One would be remiss not noting that there is a weak thread in the book: although the principles and ideas developed in it are flexible -- and extensible -- enough to apply in the current environment of IS/IT, it still has a flavor of centralized control and deterministic planning.

Overall, this is a book everybody who is interested in IS/IT should have read (and underlined!).