Statistics on information technology investment report that failure rates in the range of 50 to 80 percent. Most failures occur because of an inability to appreciate the complexity of IT decision making and how IT affects nearly every other aspect of an organization's work.

CTG's Smart IT2 is the revised edition of an earlier handbook designed to help organizations make good decisions about when and how to invest in information technology. It offers a well-tested approach to reduce the risk of failure that is focused first on the service objectives and underlying business processes rather than on the technology itself. A second principle is to identify all of the internal and external stakeholders and to understand clearly their different needs, resources, and expectations. Smart IT2 is organized as a guide to a careful analytical process that culminates in a sound business case for investing in significant IT projects.