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Measuring Return on Technology Investments Is Hard Work
9/1/2004
Discovering the “Hard” Truth About Returns
Challenging economic times require rational economic decision making. For college and university administrators, technology investment decisions are going to require better performance measures. And for that to happen, those measures are going to have to be rewarded.
While reduced printing and mailing costs and staff avoidance do have a financial impact, it would of course take some time for these savings alone to recoup the investments in these large-scale technology solutions. Clearly, these systems are having a positive impact on business processes and services to end-users. But the dollar value of these improvements is still unclear.
Over the past decade, the Internet has proven to be a truly transformative agent of change. And administrators have clearly understood that Web-based services make it easier to do business.
While many schools can point to recognizable financial efficiencies, there is still more work to be done by department heads and business officers in calculating the “hard” returns associated with decentralized budgeting and improved recruiting, admissions, and financial aid productivity. When that happens, real returns will yield real rewards.
Peter Stokes, Ph.D. (pstokes@eduventures.com) is executive vice president of
Eduventures, supporting the growth of K-12 and higher education.
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