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It wasn’t supposed to be this way…

The new study, that looked at the current state and perceptions of the IT department
in U.K, U.S., Germany, Singapore, France and Australia, reveals that daily tasks,
such as maintaining data security and privacy and legacy systems, are taking so much
time (73% and 63% cited as taking most time respectively), that opportunities to
innovate and transform are being missed in many businesses. In addition, 72% of
respondents felt frustrated when the IT department could not readily deliver what
the business demanded.

“For the last two decades, legacy IT infrastructure held back businesses from
innovating on their terms. The IT department has found itself having to say ‘no’
to new business opportunities too often. It wasn’t supposed to be that way,”
said Christine Heckart, chief marketing officer and senior vice president of
ecosystems, Brocade. “Modern New IP technologies unlock the power of the network
as a platform for innovation enabling the IT department to be able to say ‘yes’
to all kinds of business opportunities that surface daily in today’s era of
digital transformation. The network is the critical key to unlocking the power of
digital transformation and freeing the IT department from legacy constraints that
hinder innovation.”

Freedom from legacy ‘lights on’ approach critical to future innovation and
performance

While digital transformation is a big priority, IT professionals are faced with
making trade-offs that impact their ability to embrace new technologies and
approaches. Eighty-seven percent of respondents are currently adopting digital
transformation strategies, with 94% claiming their CIO views this as vital to
achieving business objectives, yet almost four fifths (79%) state they are
restricted in their ability to support it adequately. This is due to lack of budget
(49%), security concerns (43%), the inflexibility of current systems (26%), and the
time drain of maintaining legacy systems (22%). More alarmingly, almost a third
(29%) of respondents say that the limits of legacy technology are preventing their
organisation’s IT department from delivering even on immediate business demands,
let alone enabling innovation for the future.

Unlocking the door to better future business performance

Perhaps unsurprisingly, 88% identified situations in the last year where the IT team
has had to defer or decline requests that would have clearly benefitted the
business, with over half (53%) saying that these situations resulted in missing
short-term business benefits and 72% missed long-term benefits. According to the
report, more than 70% of IT teams felt that if they had more opportunity to be
flexible in their approach to technology, there would be clear business benefits,
including increased competitiveness (36%), more time to focus on innovation (31%),
and the elimination of shadow IT (30%). Respondents also claimed that the
business’ bottom line would benefit, projecting that the ability to innovate to a
greater degree could result, on average, a 12% increase in revenue and a 10%
decrease in costs over the next 12 months.