The past few years has seen an influx in technology innovation. For a business owner or IT manager, how is it possible to keep up on evolving technology and stay competitive? Every advertisement, sales pitch and a majority of emails and newsletters we receive are telling us that it’s time to upgrade or adopt new technology and that the future of our business depends on it.
This pressure for change has had somewhat of a numbing effect on businesses. We have talked to a number of organizations recently that are simply in a state of paralysis. Cloud everything, mobility, IoT, automation, predictive analytics along with massive amounts of data and security risks leave many decisions unmade. Everyone knows that something needs to be done, but nobody really wants to take the lead.
What this leads to is individual departments finding and adopting whatever technology suits their specific needs, and senior management allows this as it keeps them from having to look at the bigger picture. IT departments may also support this as it allows them to grow their support staff and keep busy. What this creates is a very complex and expensive mess of solutions across the organization.
This is certainly not the case for every company, and there are many that are tackling technology innovation with focus and excitement, but for those who feel a bit behind here is some simple advice: Ask for help. With the emergence of so much new technology, no organization should be building their strategy alone anyway. Talk to your favorite independent consulting firm about an IT Strategy session to get started. It doesn’t take long, it doesn’t cost much, it doesn’t require immense time from internal staff and it will help give some direction and confidence on how to navigate today’s available technology.
