Last week, our Chief Marketing Officer, Chris Boorman announced the launch of Informatica 9 and said, “Imagine a world in which the business and IT are collaborating together – imagine a world with Informatica 9.”

Collaboration feels like a touchy feely word, something nice-to-have. But honestly, this is THE cornerstone for IT and Business alignment. Without IT-Business collaboration, there is no chance for IT to add strategic value to the business. It’s mandatory.

Business leaders expect IT to add more strategic value, transforming itself from a mere supporting role to a partner with equal stakes in business success. In an article entitled “I for innovation” PriceWaterhouseCoopers described how, in 2013, 55% of business executives expect IT to play a strategic partner role to business. In 2008, only 27% of business executives observed that IT is playing a strategic partner role. This is an unprecedented shift in expectation in the role of IT.

Of course, the vision must be translated into execution at the points of impact. IT must increase its productivity by empowering the business to be more self-sufficient. Business and IT must use the same data and rules to ensure alignment. As your planning process for 2010 and beyond kicks into high gear, we encourage you to think about the future but act now by answering: Where do you see duplicate, unproductive effort in handing off data between business and IT? How can you close the information gathering and analysis cycle? You may find answers to these questions now from Informatica customers and the upcoming advancements in Informatica 9.