As far as software goes, I’ve been thinking about how IT choose tools to use in their environment - whether backup, security, application delivery or email. After checking which software ticks the boxes, there should be another major factor in the decision: How long will it take before we can use this?  In other words, what is our time to benefit? The time to benefit can have a very significant impact on the ultimate ROI of a solution, even if specific figures are difficult to measure. If one option requires that you send each administrator that will be looking after it on a week long training course; whereas the other option can be installed and in use in under an hour, clearly the easier to use software is better in this regard.