IT departments: they could do better

More than a third of senior accountants have no idea about their firms’ IT strategy ­ or even if one exists at all.

The latest research from Accountancy Age into the attitudes of 3,000 accountants across a range of firms’ technology issues found a disturbing lack of sentiment towards IT departments and their importance to the business.

Around 15% of those questioned believed there was no IT strategy in their firms,
with a further 24% claiming that they did not know whether their organisation had one at all.

Participants in the survey were predominantly partners, managers and directors.
When commenting on IT strategy being a crucial part of a firm’s business plan, the majority disagreed with the statement.

Most people questioned believe there is little or no push from the technology department towards environmental policies such as the implementation of environmental management systems.

Participants in the survey were also unhappy with their firms’ document management; client feedback; tele-conferencing/video-conferencing; and storage applications.

However, most were very happy with the security of systems but felt that more could be done to integrate work and home/personal IT needs.

Other findings from the survey revealed that accountants want to see better remote working capabilities but not necessarily through BlackBerrys.

They felt BlackBerrys were the second least useful piece of technology ­ preceded only by the fax machine.

Out of the 36 Top 50 firms surveyed, PKF had the greatest amount of employees satisfied with their IT department.