Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, IT spending in the last year shifted to focus on critical infrastructure and work-from-home projects.
This coupled with increasing competition and shortened technology life cycles is pressing businesses of all sizes to modernize their IT platforms with more urgency than ever. “Moving forward, digital transformation will not be subject to the same ROI justification it was pre-pandemic as the mandate for IT becomes business survival, rather than growth,” according to Gartner’s report: IT Spending Forecast, 3Q20: Technology Trends Accelerated by COVID.
If you understand the obstacles to high performing technology systems, you can better align the solutions, wherever they may fall on the build-to-buy continuum.
Five common indicators driving decisions around platform modernization
01 - Performance can’t cope with demand
Systems initially built to support a growing business now strain to cope with daily demand. Batch processes that used to easily complete overnight are now consistently taking six, seven, eight hours or more. Capacity levels once selected based on peak times are the new baseline.
02 - Spending on maintenance outpaces innovation
Your organization is spending too much time and money on patches, backups and troubleshooting software and hardware issues. Your budget includes funding for specialized legacy resources and extended support/maintenance contracts. The opportunity cost of focusing on maintenance is time that could be better spent creating innovative systems that lead to competitive advantage. (The journey to modern, value-driving IT platforms starts here.)
03 - Platforms are spliced together by workarounds
People are spending more time working around systems than within them. It takes years of tribal knowledge to understand and execute core business functions. A significant portion of your business logic is duplicated and spread across disparate and unscalable technologies. (Get started connecting your digital ecosystem today.)
04 - Project delivery is not based on business value
You are avoiding or delaying critical projects that support new priorities because of unknown ripple effects. Duplicative phases are built into projects to reanalyze and re-document impacts to processes and interconnected systems.
05 - Security and Compliance
Upgrade paths have been abandoned due to customizations, undocumented subroutines and incompatibility with enterprise limitations. Software versions and patch levels are behind and out of date, leaving you at risk for known exploits or security vulnerabilities. You are unable to keep up with requirements needed to comply with a changing regulatory and compliance landscape.
There also can be a less measurable, but equally as real, motivation to modernize platforms — fear of missing out in a fast-moving business environment that rewards companies that are first-to-market. Software development velocity is increasing and companies that can innovate rather than focus on operations will benefit.
Next Steps
Assessing these motivating factors is just the beginning. The next step focuses on how to evaluate the right new components, optimize your existing environment and assemble it together to make the most effective investments.
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