Five IT Strategies for Business Agility
It’s easy to see the connection between success and agility in sports. Those that can quickly respond and adapt to unexpected opportunities quickly pull ahead of their competitors. Business agility plays the same role, and, in an environment where customer experience is everything, enterprises need clear strategies for pulling ahead of the competition.
Responding quickly to changes in customer preferences, new available technology, and opportunities for improving productivity are just a few of the ways an investment in business agility can propel enterprises forward. Here are a few broad approaches to embrace that will help any enterprise significantly improve agility:
A Hybrid Cloud Environment: While just a few short years ago, enterprise IT had big plans to shift entire systems to the cloud and watch the tumbleweeds roll across their on-premise data center, the ideal situation is a bit different than expected. Enterprises are finding that a hybrid cloud environment provides the right mix of cost savings and innovation from public cloud platforms – with the security and control of a private cloud solution. The result is the ability to optimize workload placement that is mindful of cost, performance, compliance, and other factors.
Software-Defined Technology: A software-defined architecture offers a virtualized version of your networking, storage, and compute services – with all of these resources managed as if they were software. It not only saves time for IT, but it also centralizes control over these functions and improves visibility of infrastructure for speedier changes that support fast-moving business goals.
Composability: Enterprises prioritizing business agility are embracing composable infrastructure, which makes data center resources readily available. When composable infrastructure is used, the computing, networking and storage are all abstracted and then managed via software in a web-based platform. This is an ideal way to organize private and hybrid cloud infrastructure.
Pay-as-You-Use: Also referred to as as-a-service, these solutions are becoming central to business agility strategies. From IT management to software, desktop, and contact centers, the shift to solutions that offer a subscription-based pay model supports increased agility. Enterprises can consume services in the most cost-efficient way possible, freeing up resources for other projects. These solutions also make it easy for enterprises to switch providers and features as their business objectives require.
Infrastructure Management: Investing in an infrastructure management tool allows enterprises to remain well-informed about how resources are distributed and consumed, but without dedicating too much time to analysis and data gathering. A good management tool makes it easy to examine network performance, efficiency, and bandwidth demands in order to make informed decisions about investing in additional resources.
Driving business agility is central to any enterprise’s success. Contact us at Clarksys for more information about adopting one or more of the above approaches to support your pursuit of a competitive edge.