Why You Should Increase Your IT Budget in 2022
In 2020 and 2021, businesses around the world had to spend money on IT to enable their work to continue remotely or through online customer engagement, whether they were planning to or not. With so much money already having been spent on IT, some small and medium-sized business leaders may be wondering if it’s time to reduce or simply maintain their IT budgets, but we think that would be a mistake.
While legitimate businesses were migrating to increasingly digital engagements, so were criminals. IBM’s 2021 Cost of a Data Breach report found that the cost of data breaches this year increased by nearly 10% and was the highest recorded in the 17 years that the report has been tracking these figures.
Hybrid or remote working, increased cybercrime, and the drive for digital transformation support the idea that it would be wise to not only maintain, but in fact increase, IT budgets in 2022.
How to structure an effective IT budget
But how much is enough? Here is an outline of some factors to consider when setting an IT budget:
Reflect - It’s difficult to sort out future priorities without first having a good grasp of the current reality. Sit with your IT team or service provider and review where investments were made in 2021, what frustrations or gaps came up that still need to be addressed, and what did and didn’t work in the past year. This will help focus the discussion on where to allocate the budget in 2022.
Honestly assess business needs:
Breaking down the different components of an IT system is important for assigning the budget correctly. If all your IT budget is allocated to buying hardware such as laptops for employees who want to work remotely, there won’t be enough available to provide sufficient cybersecurity and software to optimise the use of that hardware. Spiceworks’ 2022 State of IT report found that there was “a significant increase in the percentage of total IT budgets going toward hosted and cloud-based services — from 22% in 2020 to 26% in 2022.” These types of insights are important things to factor in when forming a budget.
Build in some flexibility:
After the uncertainty of the past two years, many businesses have learnt how to better balance planning and flexibility. An effective way to overcome some degree of unpredictability about the year ahead is to build a budget category for unforeseen or unknown expenses that will arise during the year.
If in doubt, consult an expert:
If you think a more objective, experienced perspective will help bring clarity to the budgeting process, consider outsourcing to a trusted partner to ensure your IT strategy and budget align with your overall business strategy.
Contact us if you’d like help putting together your 2022 IT strategy and accompanying budget.