As we flip the calendar to 2014, new opportunities await. Yet, despite all the potential gains, here’s how a lot of organizations will feel the pain during the coming year:
- Underestimating consumerization: Most executives recognize that there’s a pressing need to spruce up interfaces and usability. Unfortunately, many organizations do a mediocre job of making their sites, systems and apps as usable as they should be. Business and IT executives must get a better grasp on how customers actually use Websites, apps and other tech tools. Analytics is your friend: Understand your user.
- Eschewing big data: There’s plenty of hype associated with big data, but, in reality, data sets can be as big or little as an organization requires. It’s more about using data creatively and putting it in play in a more three-dimensional way. Alas, most IT departments aren’t all that creative, which points to the need to develop new skills.
- Perpetuating top-down thinking: There’s no question that senior executives possess experience and know-how that’s crucial for the enterprise. However, in an era of mind-bending change, there’s a growing need to bring in expertise from every source, including entry-level employees, customers and even competitors. Most organizations need to get a lot better at social collaboration, crowdsourcing and other initiatives that connect people and ideas.
- Minimizing security: Yes, you have firewalls and intrusion detection systems in place. You have deployed encryption and endpoint protection tools. Why, you’ve even instituted MDM and MAM. But you’re still not covered. The weakest link is your staff, ranging from clerks up to the CEO. Increasingly sophisticated social engineering attacks put your organization at risk, which necessitates the need for fake phishing attacks and greater education throughout the enterprise.
- Getting Metrics Wrong: Far too many businesses—and the IT departments that power them—depend on the wrong metrics to measure results. As a result, while everyone is busy toasting success, organizational performance deteriorates and revenues decline. Check out this Harvard Business Review report for a more complete picture of the problem.
Let us know your thoughts on what IT gets wrong and what should be done to remedy the situation.
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