Technology strategy

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Technology strategy (information technology strategy or IT strategy) is the overall plan which consists of objectives, principles and tactics relating to use of technologies within a particular organization.^[1] Such strategies primarily focus on the technologies themselves and in some cases the people who directly manage those technologies. The strategy can be implied from the organization's behaviors towards technology decisions, and may be written down in a document. The strategy includes the formal vision that guides the acquisition, allocation, and management of IT resources so it can help fulfill the organizational objectives.^[2]

Other generations of technology-related strategies primarily focus on: the efficiency of the company's spending on technology; how people, for example the organization's customers and employees, exploit technologies in ways that create value for the organization; on the full integration of technology-related decisions with the company's strategies and operating plans, such that no separate technology strategy exists other than the de facto strategic principle that the organization does not need or have a discrete 'technology strategy'.

A technology strategy has traditionally been expressed in a document that explains how technology should be utilized as part of an organization's overall corporate strategy and each business strategy. In the case of IT, the strategy is usually formulated by a group of representatives from both the business and from IT.^[3] Often the Information Technology Strategy is led by an organization's Chief Technology Officer (CTO) or equivalent.^[4] Accountability varies for an organization's strategies for other classes of technology. Although many companies write an overall business plan each year, a technology strategy may cover developments somewhere between three and five years into the future.

The United States identified the need to implement a technology strategy in order to restore the country's competitive edge. In 1983 Project Socrates, a US Defense Intelligence Agency program, was established to develop a national technology strategy policy.^[5]