With technology change continuing to accelerate, cloud migration and digital transformation are key priorities for every business. Without making the right investments in technology modernisation, companies risk falling behind as next-generation technologies like generative artificial intelligence (AI) reshape how businesses operate.
Yet many companies continue to grapple with a range of obstacles to digital transformation. While most companies were forced to accelerate digital transformation during the pandemic, progress has stalled at many of these organisations. Here are some of the major factors that are holding digital transformation back:
Technical debt—Market research from RedHat shows that technical debt is the top barrier to digital transformation for companies in Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA), named by 28% of respondents. Their agility is constrained by outdated software and legacy systems that is hard to maintain, scale or change. Addressing this deficit takes a focused and coherent application modernisation strategy that refactors, re-platforms, rehosts or replaces legacy apps to take advantage of the scalability of the cloud.
Skills gaps—Nearly a quarter of respondents to the RedHat survey named a lack of skills as their biggest obstacle in digital transformation. In our view, this challenge is not just about access to knowledgeable ICT workers—it is also about how ready and well equipped the rest of the workforce is for digital ways of working. Resolving the skills crisis takes a multidimensional approach that includes automating processes to simplify operations and free up time; reskilling and upskilling existing colleagues; and recruiting people or accessing external skills to close gaps in specialist areas like Cloud Security and Networking, FinOps, DevOps data science and user experience.
Budget—One of the biggest reasons that digital transformation programmes are stalling is a lack of budget. CIOs are under pressure to innovate, yet many ICT teams have only enough budget to keep the lights on. Organisations need to be smarter and more creative in finding ways to reduce and optimise ICT spending, so that they can free up funds to drive cutting edge digital transformation initiatives.
Resistance to change—Many of the most significant barriers to digital transformation are organisational rather than technical or financial in nature. It can be difficult to change entrenched company cultures and ways of working when end-users and managers believe old systems and processes are doing the job just fine. It is essential to get buy-in from senior leaders down to coalface employees, then support new technology initiatives with training and change management.
Lack of alignment—Among the biggest barriers companies face in bringing their digital vision to life is misalignment between strategy and execution, and between business and technology. To address this lack of alignment, a business needs governance structures and operational teams that span the divide between the IT organisation and other business functions. Technology and business need to collaborate on a shared vision for the digital transformation, then work together on strategy, investment, and execution.
There are no silver bullets for digital transformation challenges. However, working with knowledgeable partners and putting the right enabling solutions in place can help you to overcome the barriers. Telecom expense management, for example, can help reduce wastage, so that you can free up funds for strategic investments.
These tools and processes can also help you automate processes, so that you can direct your team’s energies away from routine admin towards strategic work. At 1Nebula, our knowledgeable team has helped numerous organisations embrace DevOps, FinOps and other cutting edge practices. Contact to learn our smarter practices can help you simplify your journey.