How Information Technology Transformed British Telecommunications

How Information Technology transformed British Telecommunications

Introduction

Technological advances are not just the products of scientific progress. They are created by organisational and social determinants, demand-pull. They happen because they satisfy a need, whether business or personal. Sometimes these needs are long-standing, perhaps having been dormant because no technology existed to satisfy them. They arise because of social, economic or political factors. Organisational IT is changing and IT departments increasingly see lines of business building their own fixes and applications.

Corporate IT is driven to provide architecture within which the business operates but lines of business are gaining more flexibility in terms of the applications they deploy and operate. Corporate IT has number of key drivers:

• Improving operational effectiveness through standardization, rationalization and offshoring of suppliers and infrastructures;

• Improving employee productivity. IT recognizes the need to provide flexibility and agility;

• Adhering to regulatory constraints, protecting company assets and increasing return on investment.

The paper aims to describe how British Telecommunications (BT) has transformed the way it conducts business with IT and how ICT has been the major driver behind its growth, improving operational effectives, changing work culture, providing flexibility and agility with critical analysis of benefits, inadequacies and key learnings. Applying IT approaches to its processes information is central to cost reduction, efficiency improvement and revenue generation. BT adopted new metrics to measure performance of ICT and is probably the industry leader.

BT is one of the world's leading providers of communications solutions and services operating in 170 countries. Its principal activities include provision of networked IT services globally; local, national and international telecommunications services for use at home, at work...