Background
There's a report around at the moment that says spending on I.T. is 3-4 times more effective than anything else. [Link to come]In the first couple of decades of commercial computing, all the "low hanging fruit" - the best returns - for I.T. were exploited. That's when 'the books', financial information and large internal databases (assets, employees, stockholders, vendors, customers, ...) were computerised.
1991 - the first IT recession - marked the end of this era. For the first time, IT staff were laid off in an economic downturn. Previously other staff could be displaced by automating their jobs with I.T.
The 2000 I.T. recession - which we are only just starting to recover from - was industry backlash (and rightfully so) to "Y2K" and the "Dotcom Bust"). The general I.T. justification before then was: "We need this, trust us". After 2000, business needed to be convinced...
