1. Plan ahead for IT budget changes

Whether your IT department is a staff of 2 or 20, you’re likely operating under a shoestring budget and don’t have the flexibility to offload certain tasks to new staff or temporary workers. Though the current mood is more positive than in previous years, IT departments often have to weather abrupt budget changes or flat growth, notes a report by Computer Economics, Inc. When you an consolidate or simplify your IT systems, you gain greater visibility into your organization’s operational needs, which can help you be more flexible under a limited—or suddenly reduced budget.

2. Balance your routine IT tasks with your strategic IT activities

Up to 80% of IT budgets can be tied up with managing routine maintenance tasks, according to Forbes. Many of these IT tasks could be automated with cloud-based deployments, migrated to new systems—and evolved beyond the processes that are keeping you stuck in the past. So, in order to remain competitive, you need to consider what activities are consuming too much IT time and could be offloaded to free up IT for more strategic activities. Consider tasks like implementing backups, upgrades, and security patches. When you can automate many of these processes, your IT department can spend more time creating new opportunities for value and innovation.

3. Stay on top of software upgrades to enable real-time information flow

When your systems don’t communicate with one another, you run the risk of making ill-informed decisions that can slow down your production processes and leave you open to security flaws. Non-integrated systems, or ones that don’t even allow for integration, often require more challenging upgrades. Meaning, the specific vendor for each solution needs to upgrade and maintain updates. Because of this hassle, many organizations adopt an “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” mentality and avoid updates, as ZDNet has observed. There is a twofold danger in this. First, your systems should be talking to each other, sharing and collating data—not hoarding data that other parts of your organization need. Across the board, you need to be working from one trusted set of data so you can make better decisions, faster. Second, software support is a critical. When you’re relying on old systems that are no longer supported or getting updated, it becomes easier for hackers to exploit bugs—leaving you open for attack. A modern solution will deliver easy upgrades, security, and seamless integration—so you have the right information, at the right time, all the time.

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4. Use your data wisely

Inadequate IT systems prevent 33% of businesses from doing more to improve their supply chain, KPMG has found. Your business is already generating data about your timelines, seasonality, budgets, price, promotions, costs, and merchandizing—you just need to harness this data, analyze it, and make it work for you. Big data and sophisticated analytics can help you track all of your resources—from your production capacity, to your transportation and delivery operations, and everything in-between—so you have the information you need, when you need it. You’ll be able to make better decisions about the total cost of quality of your manufacturing operations, stay on top of your maintenance needs to reduce time spent on unplanned repairs, and gain real-time insights into potential production defects. Additionally, demand planning tools can help you with your production forecasting—from lots to individual SKUs—so you can optimize your supply chain.

5. Stop customizing applications to get the functionality you need

Customization is a hassle. Worse, it wastes time and money. There are so many layered configuration options available that with each new customization you’re often creating new challenges for yourself, instead of making your life easier. Just when you’ve got a tool organized how you need it to be, a mandatory upgrade will come along and break your customized workflows. If you’re in the middle of a critical project, re-installing your customizations is time you can’t afford to spend. To avoid these headaches, choose systems that include industry-specific functionality right out of the box. You’ll get best practices and workflows suited to high tech built in, so you won’t have to spend time on customizations. You’ll have what you need, when you need it—without having to start fresh after each upgrade.