CA Interactive IT Executive Forum speaker shares his take on current market conditions, cloud computing and economic realities IT leaders face in 2010.
IT organizations can’t pass up the opportunity to innovate that an economic recession represents, according to industry watchers who report that financial uncertainties will play a part in IT and technology investments in 2010.
Rough ride expected on the road to IT recovery?
Ken Blackwell, vice president and chief architect for the Service Assurance Business Unit at CA Technologies, will take the stage at tonight’s CA Interactive IT Executive Forum, an event set to be broadcast across 25 cities. Blackwell will appear with moderator Michael Friedenberg, president and CEO of IDG Enterprise and MIT Sloan School’s Peter Weill, chairman for the center for Information Systems, who co-authored the book “IT Savvy: What Top Executives Must Know to Go from Pain to Gain.”
The event promises to help IT executives “evaluate the state of business service performance, risk and quality across physical, virtual and cloud computing environments.” And the panel of experts will also provide insight into how IT managers can “deliver an exceptional application experience that protects and grows revenue, increases customer satisfaction and maintains loyalty.” And lastly attendees of the CA Interactive IT Executive Forum will learn more about how to “manage service quality proactively across the IT infrastructure of networks, servers and databases and optimize delivery of applications and services.” All of these planned discussions are based on information posted about the event.
Blackwell shared a few thoughts via e-mail with me prior to the event regarding the reported economic recovery, IT investments and how CA Technologies can help guide high-tech customers toward revenue growth and recovery.
In 2010, how far along are tech companies since the recession in 2009?
It is a mixed bag. There is still a huge amount of uncertainty with customers, and they are reluctant to buy software because they don’t have the people/bandwidth to implement. Suppliers, like CA, who have a really good time to value are doing better than most.
Is an economic recovery under way or are CIOs taking IT investments slowly still?
I would not be so bold to say that an economic recovery is under way. The jobs data just yesterday shows that is not the case. However, companies are starting to make strategic investment decisions in IT on a more aggressive footing than a few months ago when everything was almost completely halted.
Are any new IT service delivery models garnering interest?
Using cloud technologies internally is gaining steam to reduce costs, cut energy usage etc. Utilizing external cloud resources is not on many radars yet.
How did last year differ from previous financial downturns for the IT industry?
Past downturns have largely been localized to IT (i.e. Internet bubble). This one is more broad-based. In the past, there was a technology paradigm shift that pulled IT suppliers out of the muck and back into growth mode. The most promising thing on the horizon as a major paradigm shift is cloud computing. CA is in a good position to ride that wave.
Also over the past 10 years, there has been a train of thought that IT needs to be more responsive to the business. Now, I think many enterprises that IT IS the business. As IT gets thought of as more strategic, then I think this will reduce the allure of wholesale outsourcing as enterprises will be giving away the keys to the kingdom if they do that.
What advice can you offer CIOs and IT leaders to succeed this year in rebuilding and recovering?
CIOs have to stop thinking about servicing the business and get more involved in defining the business. Automating stupid stuff just means that you will execute stupid things faster in the future. For instance, you make the same mistakes at a higher rate. They should read the book “IT Savvy” and live by it.
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