This section lists all the key metrics provided in the full report. All key metrics listed appear in Chapter 2 for the composite sample and in Chapters 3A, 3B, and 3C for small, midsize, and large organizations.
All key metrics are also provided in our industry sector and subsector chapters (Chapters 4–32), except those marked with an asterisk (*).
Demographics
In section 1, we describe the key characteristics of the sample to establish a basis for comparison with other IT organizations. These key metrics are as follows:
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- Organization size demographics, including revenue, employees, revenue per employee, and revenue per user
- IT spending demographics, including total IT spending, IT capital spending, and IT outsourcing budget
- IT infrastructure demographics, including number of data centers, network sites, and business applications
- Key metrics of IT intensity, including users as a percentage of employees, PCs per user, percentage of users with tablets, percentage of users with smartphones, users per network site, and percentage of application functionality from custom systems
Spending by Type
In section 2, we provide IT spending benchmarks by type of spending. These key metrics not only provide additional demographic information but also identify IT trends. They include:
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- Percentage of IT spending devoted to ongoing support
- Percentage of IT budget spending for running, growing, and transforming the business
- Outsourcing as percentage of IT budget
- Percentage of IT spending outside IT budget
- Cloud/subscription software as a percentage of application portfolio (*)
Budgeting Priorities
In section 3, we examine key budget priorities for IT organizations. These key metrics include:
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- Spending priorities by budget area, showing the net percentage of organizations planning to increase spending on information security/privacy, IT personnel, business applications, data center, networking, and end-user technology (*)
- Plans for IT outsourcing, showing the percentage of companies planning to increase, decrease, and maintain spending at about the same level (*)
- Spending priorities by IT initiative, showing the net percentage of organizations planning to increase spending on cloud applications, cloud infrastructure, IT shared services, data analytics/business intelligence, disaster recovery/business continuity, digital transformation, systems/data integration, legacy systems modification, and data center automation (*)
- The importance of lowering costs vs. improving service levels in the coming year (*)
Total IT Spending Metrics
Section 4 presents key metrics for IT spending, which includes current-year IT operational and capital spending, but excludes depreciation. These key metrics include:
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- Total IT spending as a percentage of revenue
- Total IT spending per user
- Total IT spending per PC
- Budget categories as average percentage of total IT spending, including spending on personnel, business applications, data center hardware/software, energy/utilities, IT facilities/floor space, cloud infrastructure, network infrastructure, IT security, voice/data carrier expenses, PCs/end-user devices, printers/printing, and other expenses
IT Operational Spending Metrics
Section 5 presents key metrics for IT operational spending. These key metrics are as follows:
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- Percentage of organizations decreasing, maintaining, or increasing IT operational spending year over year (*)
- IT operational budget percentage change from previous year (*)
- Adequacy of current IT operational budget to support the business (*)
- IT operational spending as a percentage of revenue
- IT operational spending per user
- IT operational spending per PC
- Percentage of IT operational budget charged back to business units
- Budget categories as average percentage of IT operational spending, including spending on personnel, business applications, data center hardware/software, energy/utilities, IT facilities/floor space, cloud infrastructure, network infrastructure, IT security, voice/data carrier fees, PCs/end-user devices, printers/printing, and other expenses
- Personnel as a percentage of IT operational spending at the 25th percentile, median, and 75th percentile
- Depreciation as a percentage of IT operational budget
Capital Spending Metrics
Section 6 provides an analysis of IT capital budgets, including:
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- Percentage of organizations decreasing, maintaining, or increasing IT capital spending (*)
- IT capital budget change from prior year (*)
- IT capital budget as a percentage of IT budget
- Budget categories as average percentage of IT capital spending, including spending on personnel, business applications, data center hardware/software, energy/utilities, IT facilities/floor space, cloud infrastructure, network infrastructure, IT security, voice/data carrier fees, PCs/end-user devices, printers/printing, and other expenses
IT Staffing Metrics
In section 7, we provide key metrics and trend data on IT staffing, including:
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- Users per IT staff member
- Percentage of organizations increasing, maintaining, and decreasing IT staff levels from previous year (*)
- IT staff head count change from previous year (*)
- IT staff turnover
- Annual training allocation per IT employee
- Contingency workers as percentage of IT staff
- IT staff functions as average percentage of IT staff, including IT managers, IT finance/vendor management/procurement, project management, clerical support, application development personnel, data management, quality assurance/testing, DevOps engineers, database administration, server support, network support, communications support, web/e-commerce, IT security, help desk (service desk), desktop support, documentation/training/process and standards, and other functions
Job Function Metrics
In section 8, we provide key benchmarks for six job functions:
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- IT managers as a percentage of IT staff (*)
- OS instances per server support staff member (*)
- Network devices per network support staff member (*)
- Applications per application developer (*)
- PCs per desktop support staff member (*)
- Users per help desk staff member (*)
Service Area Spending Metrics
Section 9 shows IT spending benchmarks by service area as a percentage of total IT spending. The service areas are IT management, business applications, data center, network, and end-user computing.
Business Application Metrics
Section 10 provides business application metrics, including:
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- Business application spending as percentage of IT spending
- Business application spending per user
Data Center Metrics
Section 11 covers these data center spending and infrastructure metrics:
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- Processing workload by operating system, including IBM mainframe, Unix, Linux, IBM i (OS/400), Windows Server, and other
- Consolidated data center spending per user
- Consolidated data center spending per physical server (*)
- Data center hardware/software as percentage of IT spending
- Data center hardware/software spending per user
- Energy/utilities as percentage of IT spending (*)
- Energy/utilities spending per user
- Energy/utilities spending per physical server (*)
- IT Facilities/floor space as percentage of IT spending (*)
- IT Facilities/floor space spending per user (*)
- OS instances per physical server (*)
- Users per physical server (*)
Network Metrics
Section 12 covers the following network metrics:
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- Consolidated network spending per user
- Network infrastructure as a percentage of IT spending
- Network infrastructure spending per user
- Network spending per network site
- IT security as a percentage of IT spending (*)
- IT security spending per user (*)
- Data/voice carrier spending as a percentage of IT spending (*)
- Data/voice carrier spending per user (*)
End-User Computing Metrics
Section 13 covers the following network computing metrics:
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- Consolidated end-user technology spending per user
- PCs/end-user devices as a percentage of IT spending
- PCs/end-user device spending per user
- PC refresh rate in years (*)
- Printer/printing as a percentage of IT spending (*)
- Printer/printing spending per user (*)
- Users per printer (*)
As noted above, in each chapter, the section on total IT spending and the section on IT operational budgets include a detailed analysis of IT budget line items as a percentage of the total. Line items include IT personnel, business applications, data center hardware/software, energy/utilities, IT facilities/floor space, cloud infrastructure, network infrastructure, IT security, voice/data carrier expenses, PCs/end-user devices, printers/printing, and other. An example of the presentation of this data is shown in Figure 1-14. Please note that the percentages shown here do not represent the actual data in the report, but are only provided to illustrate the format of the data presented.
As noted earlier, the staffing section of each chapter concludes with a breakdown of IT staffing ratios for 19 individual job positions, with each position provided as an average percentage of the total IT head count. IT workforce job positions include IT managers; IT finance/vendor managers; project managers; clerical/administration; application developers; business analysts; data management; quality assurance and testing; DevOps engineers; database administration; server support; network support; communications; web and e-commerce; security, help desk; desktop support; documentation, training, IT process/standards personnel; and other.
An example of the presentation of this data is shown in Figure 2. Please note once again that the percentages shown here do not represent the actual data in the report, but are only provided to illustrate the format of the data presented.