Learning from Adversity

An evolution of digital transformation that probably would have taken years to naturally unfold was compressed into a year as the COVID-19 pandemic forced businesses and government to scramble to keep operating amid disruptions. So, what did we learn and how have companies grown as a result?

That was the topic of an @IDGTECHtalk Twitter chat March 4, sponsored by @ComcastBusiness and moderated by Gene De Libero, chief strategy officer of GeekHive. Participants indicated that business would need to continue to adapt and adjust their technology priorities, with a particular focus on security, cloud adoption, and further evolve the digital customer and employee experience.

IT practitioners, consultants and influencers weighed in on IT strategies and investment priorities:

Three 2021 IT investment priorities areas for organizations to rethink. #MultiCloud costs/capabilities audit. #Security for #UC, mobile app development/deployment and better #digitalfirst #Ux for customers, partners and workers
Adam Stein@apstein2

Add value by making the #employee journey as important as the #customer journey. Joanne Friedman@joannefriedman

COVID challenges everyone’s assumptions on what can be accomplished remotely & on digital collaboration. Orgs should continue to challenge the status quo & sacred cows on their biz model, customer experiences, use of data/analytics – that’s #DigitalTransformation Isaac Sacolick@nyike

Companies need to carefully listen to what IT hardware/software their employees are asking for and try to accommodate….Scott Schober@ScottBVS

Multicloud reliance is growing as organizations support more remote workers, and that exposes some issues:

Too many orgs don’t consider cloud infrastructure vulnerabilities as cloud computing poses inherent challenges. Firms must ensure secure network access when using #cloud servers, & should consider a zero trust cloud security model. Ben Rothke@benrothke

Start with asking: What problem is multi-cloud trying to solve?
Arsalan Khan @ArsalanAKhan

…and WHY. We really need to ask WHY more often. 🙂
Gene De Libero@GeneDeLibero

Were there cybersecurity blind spots revealed as a result of the COVID disruptions? Oh yeah:

Exploding amount of assets added. Used to be able to account for a laptop and maybe a phone. Now bc of WFH (work from home), people are adding multiple comps/ipads/etc. and accessing on their own networks. Need a tool that can find all assets and see if they present any danger  Nick Gonzalez@nickg1421

easy… portable and flexible IAM (identity and access management). With consumption of services, use of legacy systems, and the remote environment, a robust IAM program is paramount. Going password-less, addressing trust models, and generally unify auth and identity proofing is key.  Amélie E. Koran@webjedi

Workforce considerations will continue high on the agenda as organizations ponder how well they adapted to the work from anywhere environment:

We are still missing some of the conveniences of the office when it comes to collaboration. I am expecting new innovations in both hardware and software. Larry Larmeu@LarryLarmeu

Our research suggests between 25% and 50% of the workforce will request more work-from-home opportunities going forward, so greater investment will be needed in securing remote workplaces. Possibly balanced against reduced physical floor space rent? Steven M Prentice@StevenPrentice

Check out @IDGTECHtalk for more on that chat and weekly discussions. For more insights on how businesses rapidly transformed in the past year, check out the infographic,  “A Snapshot of Digital Transformation 1 Year Later.”