IT leaders have traditionally shouldered the lion’s share of responsibility for protecting an organization’s data and technology, and decisions made in the past 18 months have only added to that burden. In remote and hybrid work environments, organizations have been forced to invest in technology to keep up with demands from employees and customers alike.
Those investments must protect sensitive data and technology as well as the business’s bottom line. Investments made in IT can either empower a new level of productivity or end up costing the business money.
Moosa Matariyeh, senior manager of integrated services engagement at CDW, joined CDW’s Tech Talk webcast to discuss some common IT investments organizations are making and the steps they should take to mitigate potential risk.
Cloud Solutions Offer Flexibility Without High Costs
Matariyeh said minimizing risk begins with smart investments, which he defines as those that allow for flexibility and agility. “As the market changes, we’ve gone through some crazy things over the past 18 months, and IT has been more overwhelmed than ever. They've been asked to do more than they ever have,” he said. “But I think looking forward, what we have to do is learn from those experiences.”
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“One of the biggest items that we learned was how quickly the consumer demand shifts or changes. We’ve always known that consumer sentiment can change at any time, but how they want to engage has changed dramatically,” Matariyeh continued. “I think organizations are taking a look at, ‘How do I make an assessment that meets today’s need but is going to provide me the flexibility to make that pivot as needs change?’”
Many organizations moved to the cloud during the pandemic, which provided the agility and flexibility they needed without the high price tag. Matariyeh said the justification for IT departments “is they’re minimizing the upfront cash outlay, they’re minimizing that investment. And it’s something that they can very quickly either turn up, turn down, eliminate with minimal sunk investment that would be lost with that change.”
“We’re seeing things like contact centers moving more and more to the cloud. We’re seeing backup and data recovery moving to the cloud. We’re seeing primary applications move to the cloud,” he said. “We’ve been talking about moving data to the edge for so long. Organizations are using this opportunity to start moving data into other colocation facilities out of their own data centers, getting it closer to the edge, getting it closer to where other applications reside within the cloud.”
IT Investments Should Be Agile and Drive the Business Forward
For organizations wondering how to make investments that will increase production and satisfaction, Matariyeh said to start at the end. “Start at what the goal you have is, and think of it from a business perspective. There’s business initiatives and technical initiatives that come together, and at the end of the day, it’s really about an organization being able to be more competitive in a marketplace and meet the consumer demand. It’s about driving the business forward.”
One of the key elements to a sound IT investment is agility. Matariyeh said organizations should be “looking for investments that allow for the continued use of whatever they’ve invested in and something they can grow into. I would say be on the lookout for that agility not only in the platform but in the agreement, in the contract and how you consume IT.”
Once a business has made IT investments, there are ways to maximize a return on investment, Matariyeh said. “One of the best things that you can do to protect that investment is to make sure it’s properly deployed. Once it’s out there, enable your users. It’s not about it being shelfware. We’ve always talked about shelfware. It’s those applications that are deployed that are in use, but not in use to their full potential. Once we start using them to their full potential, that’s when we start protecting that investment and getting that ROI, getting that end-user experience, and it starts fostering greater collaboration, utilization, analytics, visibility into the business, visibility into trends — it leads to a lot of great things.”
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