Technology finding the time and how to stop flying by the seat of your pants

 So a discussion came up at Facebook at how IT staff can find the time to get it all done, and  stop flying by the seat of their pants and do things the "right" way. 

I've thought about this a bit and here are my thoughts to strategic planning for technology:
 

• Tech survey - what are the trends? What are others doing?
• Prioritize based upon need - what need does the technology address? Is it a solution? A stopgap? Is the need immediate or critical? We "park" good items that we don't have time/immediate need (see the whiteboard example above).
• What resources are needed? How long will it take? How much will cost (staff time is money, too!) Are there opportunities for collaboration?What is the projected ROI? 
• Maximize existing technology - look for tools to help manage and streamline work - especially work that has a lower ROI - for example if your Facebook page is not a big part of the web presence consider using some crossposting tools vs. spending time doing it manually; another tool maybe moving to a CMS for the website. You might also look to a ticketing system or virtual office hours to help address needs.
• Analyze - what is working? what is not? For the things which are not working do they meet a need ? If so, how and to what extent? There are some technologies that are very hard to abandon because they have such a loyal following. For those, you may want to capitalize on that to exploit potential. If you abandon technologies, what is impact? Can you scale back some technologies with minimal impact?