In order to be able to determine what must be done to make the necessary improvements to make better use of technology or to re-align the business and IT strategy, it is important to determine where the business is at present. This can involve communication with a variety of personnel such as business managers, users and IT professionals (in some cases this could be the same person) to determine what the business does, what the business processes are and where technology impacts (or doesn't).

This combination of business and technology audit may include some of the following:

• Macro environment, markets, competitors
• Common technologies in use in sector
• Internal processes
• Enabling technologies
• Efficiency and effectiveness of existing technologies

A part of this audit is the internal technologies which can be a useful exercise in a general audit of technology, which is useful to provide information to update ageing technology and identifying new technologies to achieve goals and objectives.