Method for accessing the business value of information technology

The method for determining the net value of at least one information technology application specific to an organization having a system with a computer-based infrastructure, users thereof, support functions, and a total IT budget, comprising the steps of:

• determining a user value contribution of said application as an internal user cost and an external user cost;
• determining a breakout of said total IT budget by assigning a number of select cost categories therefrom and for each such cost category determining a total budget value;
• determining a breakout of staffing costs and resources by deriving a select number of staff function costs and combining said function designated costs to provide an IT budget corresponding with said total IT budget;
• determining a total value for said application by deriving an uplift factor for said application, determining a base application value with respect to said internal user cost and then deriving the product of said base application value and said uplift factor and combining said product with said external user cost;
• determining an unavailability value for said application;
• determining a potential total loss value for said application;
• determining an inflexibility value for said application;
• and
• determining said net value as said total value for said application less said total IT budget, said internal user cost, said potential total loss, and said inflexibility.