I am the CTO of a small financial services company. I read this book to see what recommendations the authors were making about IT organization and use in larger firms, ostensibly as a roadmap for where to take my department. Many of the ideas within the book (change controls, division of labor, alignment with business goals) can be found elsewhere, but Baschab and Piot have pulled it all together created a reference guide for IT managers.

Based on my personal experience, many of their recommedations are on target. Most small- and many medium-sized organizations can benefit from their recommedations, although not without modification. It can only benefit an IT manager whose department is growing to be alert for instituting the ideas Baschab and Piot discuss, especially concerning controls, risk and organization.

One final note: it would have been interesting for the authors to discuss how small IT departments should implement their recommendations as they grow.

The author's depth of experience in optimizing corporate IT departments clearly shines through in this well-written guidebook. Their philosophy for optimizing the IT function is unique and is a refreshing break from many of the "how to boost ROI" books frequently found in this genre. The text is obviously written from a perspective of a CEO/CFO/CIO, but the information is applicable at all levels in corporate IT departments and is particularly useful to IT consultants advising executives responsible for corporate technology.

In addition to their unique perspectives and philosophy, the book is loaded with pragmatic advice and methodologies that can be used immediately to put their advice into practice. For example, I found the chapter on vendor selection especially useful and immediately actionable. Using their comprehensive methodology, I was able to help my client effectively move through what would have otherwise been an arduous and oblique process while avoiding some potentially very expensive pitfalls. This chapter alone was worth the price of the book.

Overall, I highly recommend this book.

The Executives Guide to Information Technology is an excellent resource that is a must have for IT managers and top executives that want to get the most out of their IT investments. Every IT manager and executive should read this book to understand how to effectively manage information technology for business value. Likewise, non-IT managers and executives will learn a great deal about the inner-workings of IT and how to work with their IT brethren in the most effective way for the greatest benefits to their company. (CFOs specifically will find this book incredibly illuminating and useful).

The book is extremely well organized and presents a well-balanced mixture of academic analysis and tested practices. The sheer knowledge and hard earned personal experiences of the authors comes through in every chapter. The descriptions of the challenges facing IT will resonate clearly with anyone who has ever held an executive position within an enterprise IT team. The solutions presented are equally clear and easy to follow. Overall, the book is simply packed with techniques for recognizing challenges, accurately assessing the current state of any component of IT, comparing that state to a target benchmark and developing actionable improvement plans. Finally, the CD-ROM included with the book contains all the spreadsheets, documents and checklist tools needed to put Baschab and Piot's sage advice to immediate use.

In addition to being a highly informative volume, this is ultimately, as the title implies, a guidebook loaded with recipes for IT investment optimization success. After reading it, I suggest placing it on or near your desk where I am sure you will refer to it again and again. Also, I think that buying a copy of this book for each of their key IT managers would be one of the wisest investments a budget-squeezed CIO could make. I highly recommend it.