A good IT architecture plan improves efficiencies. When IT architecture includes consolidation and centralisation of technology resources, particularly in the data centre, resource use, document recovery, security, and service delivery will be improved; data availability will be increased and complexity reduced. Elements that can be consolidated or centralised include:

• IT personnel: Consolidate IT personnel into centrally managed, focused support groups based on need and skill sets.
• Servers: The number of physical servers can be reduced by implementing virtualisation or simply eliminating redundant functionality.
• File storage: Get local file repositories off multiple file servers and onto a centralised storage solution such as a storage area network (SAN).
• Directory services: Provide a common directory service for authentication or implement a single sign-on or federated authentication solution to bridge multiple directories.