This suggests that strategic information systems planning is by no means universal in large organisations, but there is a strong trend for organisations to commence such planning. If this trend continues it is likely that strategic information systems planning will eventually become the norm in most large organisations. By comparison, there was a marked fall off in the percentage of medium and small organisations which prepare information systems plans as part of organisational strategy. Of the organisations in these two groups who stated that information systems planning is a specific part of their organisations' strategy processes, between one third and half actually prepare an information systems plan. As a percentage of all respondents, the percentage of medium and small organisations that plan for their information systems is very low.
Most organisations conduct quite frequent reviews of their information systems plans.
Aalthough in its infancy in many organisations, considerable effort is being expended to plan and control information systems needs. Many of the organisations which purport to undertake strategic planning for information systems are really not viewing their systems strategically, rather a shorter term, tactical view is being taken. One of the objectives of the study was to gauge to what extent information systems planning is considered to be a part of organisational strategy. Information ranked as the most difficult to manage and finance was considered to be the least difficult by all three groups. This suggests that information management is of concern to managers with diverse backgrounds and employed in a wide variety of management and executive positions irrespective of organisation size.