Before we close the book on another year, it’s important to take a look back at the big trends that influenced the industry and use it to inform our strategy for how we approach the year ahead.
For Markley, here are three of the most defining trends from 2017:
Cloud is becoming more personalized – when the cloud first emerged as a new IT solution, it was perceived as something that could be easily implemented and would immediately start providing value. But in the past year, we’ve seen more organizations carefully consider what cloud solutions they implement – whether it be public, private or hybrid – to ensure they’re addressing their exact business needs and getting the most ROI out of their cloud investments as possible.
Security remains top of mind – 2017 provided an endless number of headline-grabbing data breaches, from Yahoo to Equifax. This has put data security at the top of priority lists for organizations across a wide range of industries. For service providers, it’s going to be more important than ever to work directly with customers on transparent, comprehensive security strategies.
The IT skills gap persists – The technology skills gap continues to be an issue for almost every technology company, and it’s a challenge that many will struggle to overcome in the year ahead. As such, it’s imperative that organizations select third-party partners and services providers that can work as a true extension of their businesses in order to achieve the business agility and continuity demanded by today’s consumers.
What trends had the biggest impact on your business in 2017? How is that impacting your decision-making for the year ahead? Share your thoughts with us here, or start the conversation with Markley on social (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn).
