10 essential tips for customers entering into IT contracts

Analysis

Every day businesses, both big and small, fall victim to the pitfalls of IT procurement. For those organisations which have been through the process before, the risks may be all too familiar. The aim of this article is to help those who are less familiar with IT procurement to avoid making some of the more common mistakes. For ease, this article refers to procurement of an ‘IT Solution', which could be software, hardware or a combination of the two.

Decide what you want at the outset

Failing to set out fully to the supplier what you want to purchase is one of the most frequent root causes of failure in IT contracts. Without a clear set of requirements it will be more difficult to judge if what the supplier has given you is what you asked for.