How CIOs can Build Successful IT Strategy to Sustain Pandemic Shifts?

The past two and half years have been one of the most difficult times for the businesses that operate and allocate IT resources for production. Subsequent lockdowns and global pandemic shifts have questioned the IT strategy for today’s businesses seeking transformation. CIOs across the globe are utilizing state-of-art strategies to rebuild their IT strategy for sustainable progress. However, there are still a few factors that are challenging CIOs in crystallizing their AI strategy to achieve synergy.

The adoption and integration of the newest trends in technologies like IoT, Augmented Reality, Computer Vision, etc., have seen increasing demand. CIOs have already tested these technologies at a scale before indulging them in operations. But, the question is to leveraging these technologies to work together to achieve higher business objectives at scale remains still. In this post, you will read why it is important for CIOs to rethink their IT strategy and how they can do it.

Building a crystalized IT strategy – why is it important?

1. The pandemic gates have opened the way to the adoption of a wide range of new-age technologies. We have seen increasing growth in the number of businesses opting for cloud computing and AI at the same time. The tremendous growth of indulging automation at scale has mitigated a few of the most critical challenges that businesses faced during the pandemic. However, organizations that operate manually are facing difficulties in leveraging automation at scale. and for them crystalizing their IT strategy is a considerate factor.
2. During COVID-19 we have witnessed the count of organizations moving towards adopting cloud computing has accelerated. At the same time, some businesses are still thinking of scaling their IT infrastructure with the cloud.
3. IT shifts within the scaled and Agile organizations. So it is vitally important for an organization to strengthen its IT infrastructure and adoption strategy from time to time to build sustainable business models.
4. The pandemic has proven how vital it is for a CIO to represent their organization digitally across the globe. And CIOs are held accountable for adopting technologies that benefit employees and serve best to their customers – as the workforce is called to work digitally. 
5. It is time to automate manual operating systems – as businesses across the globe are at the core of the digital transformation journey.

How CIOs can strengthen their IT strategy?

Technology plays a vital role in all areas of business. And to maximize technology outcomes, CIOs must work strategically with each business unit to understand their objectives and draft operational frameworks to achieve desired goals. Constant upgrades in technology are a must to thrive in today’s digitally transformed world. And CIOs must also shift their business and IT strategy constantly to be sustained. Below are the five steps to take on your CIO IT strategy.

1. Drive innovation to build enterprise agility

CIOs are expected to maintain the internal technology environment of an organization. And they are also expected to focus on cost reduction and driving efficiency. However, with time, organizations are demanding the integration of new technologies with a focus on insights into results and revenue. CIOs must build a robust strategy to scale and embed agile models in an organization’s infrastructure. Understanding of new technologies, their acceptance ratio across organizations’ architecture, and keen details on resource upgrades can build enterprise agility. It is the CIO’s responsibility to consider this as the primary objective to create and sustain an externally focused IT culture.     

2. Build accountability into tech innovation

Every year most organizations make significant investments in new technologies and for a few, it is a constant and ongoing process. Deployment, development, and maintenance of these technologies put CIOs in an accountable position to answer the other C-suite and board members about the ROI of said technology. By ensuring the investment in results-driven technology, CIOs are not only enhancing organizations’ performance but also creating a level of transparency in C-suite operations.

3. Always put employees and customers first

In a hurry to integrate new technologies and capitalize on business opportunities, CIOs often risk their decisions without calculating how seamlessly this technology can be integrated into the existing organization environment and how fast and accurately it can address customer pain points. Determining the existing employees’ capabilities and customer acceptance metrics can always win a competitive advantage and better progress along the digital and data journey.

4. Develop or integrate fast, accurate, secured, and scalable systems

Data processing is becoming an increasingly important factor in today’s date. IT shifts within scaled and agile organizations are integrally dependent on data processing only. And these IT shifts are defined by the factors like speed, accuracy, security, and scalability of technology that is leveraged to harness the data. It is vitally important for CIOs to strategize their IT infrastructure to perform the below-listed objectives;

1. The system should collect relevant, actionable, and timely information
2. The capability to harness humongous volumes of data in a short span
3. Data governance needs to be followed from day one

5. Human Intelligence

Even though technology is taking over and automating vital processes in organizations. CIOs should consider human expertise to optimize their technology infrastructure. It is always considered that humans equipped with better machines can be more effective than considering machine intelligence to monitor machine performance. Building agile IT talent pools can mitigate the limitations of employees who are incapable of delivering current and future IT needs. Strategically utilizing the available human resources and their intelligence can support new business opportunities.

Gartner predicts that 25% of traditional large enterprise CIOs will be held accountable for digital operational results, effectively becoming “COO by proxy” by 2024. And CIOs starting on this journey should wonder how they can make this transition effective not only for the company but also for their people, and how they can resolve not the maximum number of pitfalls, but the challenges that can drive optimal difference. And all these can simply be achieved by avoiding making the wrong data decisions. 

Soulpage, being your digital transformation journey guide can help you out in making all decisions regarding data and how to embrace modern technologies interrelated with your business at scale. We are open to free consultations.