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Looking into IT’s future

The CDW IT Monitor is trying to figure out what effect the presidential election is going to have on IT spending.

Federal News Network Staff

September 11, 2008 6:06 pm

3 min read

By Dorothy Ramienski
Internet Editor
FederalNewsRadio

The CDW IT Monitor is trying to predict what’s going to happen in terms of IT spending after the election.

The survey quizzed 1,000 IT honchos from businesses of all sizes and all sectors, including federal, state and local government IT officials.

On Thursday’s Daily Debrief, hosts Christopher Dorobek and Amy Morris spoke with CDW Vice President Mark Gambill, who says that change is the word du jour.

I think that IT decision makers are expecting change, it’s just a matter of which way things will go. We’ve got a very fascinating, interesting time right now because we do have a very challenging economy, and that, of course, inhibits the decision makers in terms of their desire or willingness to spend because of the uncertainty, but when you couple that with the presidential election . . . it just adds to that change.

Gambill says he feels the differing perspectives of the two presidential candidates when it comes to making the economy grow is going to effect how budgeting decisions are made, which means IT will be [effected], as well.

While the survey didn’t simply look at the federal marketplace, Gambill says CDW did get a good sense of what federal decision makers are thinking.

Six in ten . . . expect that this is going to effect how they look at IT — the presidential election. Depending upon the sector, it’s going to effect them in different ways. Again, if you’re a small business and you hear talk about tax increases to be able to compensate for other areas, obviously that’s going to have an effect. On the other side of the coin, there’s principles put forth where maybe there would be a corporate tax rate reduction. So, again, for the federal government, it doesn’t affect them quite as much, simply because their budgets tend to be a little bit more consistent and [don’t] fluctuate as much with respect to the economy. But they still think about these things.

The impact of the election, however, won’t directly impact agencies right away, simply because the incumbent, no matter his party affiliation, will inherit the FY 2009 budget.

Thus, the entire IT industry is looking at what might happen in November, after having already suffered through what Gambill calls the ‘barbell effect’.

All the IT projects at the lower end of the spectrum, they’re still doing. On the very, very large end — on the other spectrum, they’re still doing. But those projects in the middle that tend to make up the majority of IT spending, those are the ones that everybody’s kind of got on hold or moving slowly around.

CDW’s goal, Gambill says, is to understand how to help IT managers make all of their projects a reality.

Security is a big issue in the federal space. Encrypted security, cyber security, so our people work with the federal IT professionals in terms of talking about how we can help them with that during these tough times.

Gambill adds that regardless of who is elected, security and data protection will remain paramount.

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On the Web:

CDW – IT Decision Makers Believe Presidential Election Will Impact Tech Industry Budgets and Staffing