NEWS: Intel route to surviving hard times

KUALA LUMPUR: It is normal for businesses to cut budgets during tough economic times but they should not stop investing in information technology, said chipmaker Intel Corp.

Instead, companies should look at how IT can help make their business operations more efficient and leaner so that they can weather the economic storm.

“IT is the central nervous system of any organisation today,” said John Johnson, vice-president and chief executive officer of Intel. “Even a short breakdown in IT can disrupt company productivity.”

The reality, he said, is that no matter how limited the funds a company has, it will still need to spend on technology.

That said, it would do any business good to understand its goals and to get its IT team working with the other company departments to reach those goals.

“They need to meet and agree on how spending a part of the company’s limited funds on technology can help push the business forward despite the difficult times,” Johnson said.

He said chief information officers (CIOs) and heads of the IT departments at companies should be mixing with those running the business, so that they can better understand what kind of technologies are needed to drive operations.

“This way, organisations can be more focused on reaching the goals they have set for themselves,” Johnson said. “Gone are the days when IT personnel were only called upon to solve computer problems.”

An IT department cannot work in isolation. “It needs connections to the business side of things so that it understands the business conditions and goals, and can orient its resources to achieve these,” said Johnson.

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According to him, IT departments need to be trustworthy and prove that their suggestions can be beneficial to their companies.

“The more you’re able to suggest and if you execute the technologies that result in success, the more the company heads will listen to you,” he said, adding that it is also vital to have clear goals and priorities for boosting business productivity.

Companies, whether big or small, can take a leaf out of Intel’s book on how it coped with the current global economic crisis, he said.

The decisions Intel made in the face the recession, Johnson said, required funds but it was the clear direction and highlighted priorities that made the expenses worthwhile.

Like most companies, he said, Intel drew up a budget plan for various verticals in the organisation before the crisis.

However, it did not throw away this plan when the global recession hit and budgets were cut. Instead, it prioritised its goals and invested in technology that could help lessen the blow of a drawn out recession.

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Among the steps taken by Intel was the consolidation of its datacentre to save on energy costs and to replace old, inefficient PCs to help drive productivity.

It also looked at newer ways to interact between colleagues and customers when the business travel budget was chopped.

Intel invested in a videoconferencing network, placed in strategic locations, to enable employees and clients to interact.

“We saw high utilisation of this in the company and it helped employees get their work done without having to attend face-to-face meetings,” Johnson said.

The vendor also considered social networking facilities, like chat clients and sites like Facebook and MySpace, to improve communication with its customers.

“Some companies may think such tools are merely for fun but they have to consider that that is how younger employees communicate today,” he said.

For Intel, Johnson said, such options helped create a collaborative platform for its people to communicate and work.

In what ever way companies decide to take to stay afloat in tough times, Johnson said, it is best for companies to take a step back and look at the value of those decisions.

This is especially critical when considering new technologies, especially those more popular with the younger generation, he said.

“Our chief executive officer, Paul Otellini, was shocked that I suggested Instant Messaging among company employees but now, Intel employees feel that they can’t be productive if that network is down,” he said.

Johnson said technology keeps marching forward and CIOs need to constantly evaluate how it can fit in with and benefit an organisation.

“Sometimes these technologies may not seem beneficial on a corporate level, but many times they really are,” he added.