ITL28019 IT Strategy (Spring 2025)

The course is connected to the following study programs

Mandatory course in:

• Bachelor in Information Systems - Software Engineering 

Elective course for others.

Lecture Semester

6th semester (Spring).  

The student's learning outcomes after completing the course

Knowledge

The student

• gains a solid understanding of strategic challenges and is able to identify and analyze which components are crucial for an organization's ability to create value over time.
• will learn about sustainability, social responsibility, ethics, and what is required to make strategic decisions influenced by internal and external conditions.
• will learn about a variety of strategic approaches and discuss the consequences of these approaches for structure, choice, and implementation.
• will understand how strategy is linked to other subject areas such as financial management, logistics, marketing, and organization, as well as the role of digitalization."

Skills

The student can

• identify and understand the challenges a business faces both internally and externally, as well as the elements that are crucial for creating value for a business.
• perform a strategic analysis of a business.
• be able to discuss issues related to strategic choices, so that the student can see the connection between implementation and organizational challenges related to sustainability, social responsibility, and ethical issues.
• be able to present a strategic project to a board or a management group.
• understand the business's social responsibility and how ethics, stakeholder values, environment, sustainability, and value creation are interconnected, including digital problems.

Content

• IT strategy as a part of the overall business strategy

• IT strategy and objectives

• The IT function - enabling the business ecosystem

• Processes, applications, infrastructure, people

• Strategy execution and governance

• IT Governance: business and IT alignment (ISO 38500)

• IT service management (ITIL)

• Control and monitoring (COBIT)

Forms of teaching and learning

Lectures, project work and supervision.

Workload

Approx. 250 hours.

Examination

Portfolio and individual written exam

A final individual grade is awarded on the basis of a two partial exams. Each partial exam must be passed in order to pass the whole course.

Partial exam 1: a portfolio (individually or in group of 2-3 students) comprising of up to 3 deliverables that counts 60 %. The deliverables must be delivered within given deadlines and according to specifications given by the course instructor. A grade will be awarded on the basis of an overall assessment. An individual grade is given using grading scale A to F.

Partial exam 2: individual written exam that counts 40%. Duration 2 hours. No support materials permitted. Grading scale A-F.

An overall individual final grade is awarded for the course using grading scale A to F.

Examiners

One external and one internal examiner, or two internal examiners will be involved in the assessment.

Conditions for resit/rescheduled exams

In the case of resit or rescheduled examinations, each part of the examination may be retaken. 

In the case of resit and rescheduled examinations, the content of the portfolio must be agreed with the course instructor.

Resit/rescheduled exam must be taken in connection with the next ordinary course examination. The department management may, however, decide to arrange a deferred examination in the following semester for students with valid absence from the regular examination.

Course evaluation

This course is evaluated by a

• End-of-term evaluation (compulsory)

The responsible for the course compiles a report based on the feedback from the students and his/her own experience with the course. The report is discussed by the study quality committee of the faculty of Computer Sciences.

Literature

The current reading list for 2024 Spring can be found in Leganto