ORLANDO, Fla.— Thousands of technology-minded executives and analysts descended on Orlando, Florida for the Gartner IT Symposium Xpo this week, focused on what technology evolutions will mean for their business.
Recession potential influenced conversations as CIOs are confronted with the need to do more with less. The question also emerged of who will be the true digital leader?
Aside from the steady stream of trends and predictions, executives shared a number of tips that support technology strategies across sectors.
Here are some meaningful takeaways CIO Dive heard from speakers at the annual event.
Consumer-led tech changes
Businesses can roll out new functionalities or applications and hope to spur natural adoption. But there are times when rapid changes in consumer behavior place the onus on businesses to respond.
This happened to Michael Kors, which realized prior to COVID-19 that consumers were starting to prefer online shopping and wanted a different experience than they have in the stores.
"We transitioned to more of an API, microservices environment ... because now the consumer has the capability of being in a store, they can buy from anywhere, whether it's online or another store," said Akhil Bisaria, VP of IT, SAP and finance applications at Michael Kors parent company Capri Holdings. "In order to be able to do that, the plumbing has to be there."
Work tools to support diversity
Technology tools can be part of the strategy for companies looking to support diversity in its ranks. After all, businesses are responsible for equipping workers with the tools they need to do their jobs — which does not look the same for everybody.
Cindy Taibi, senior VP and CIO at The New York Times, said it has become really important to her as a leader to give people tools that they feel comfortable using.
"There's racial diversity, there's gender diversity, we all know about that," said Taibi. " Well, workstyle diversity, that's a thing too. And It's something that I spend a lot of time trying to focus on."
Decode your dashboard
Analysts and CIOs have warned against adopting technology for technology's sake. When it comes to dashboard solutions, the tools should provide understandable insight, or the effort will be in vain.
Ken Rogers, deputy CIO and chief knowledge officer at the U.S. Department of State, said that while the agency was modernizing and moving to the cloud, dashboards were an important part of keeping stakeholders in the loop.
“Dashboards are only good if they’re being used by your stakeholders,” Rogers said. “If they don’t meet their needs, you got to go back to the drawing board.”
Rogers suggested creating a glossary of terms so that stakeholders can get value out of the dashboards.
This is especially important for budget planning: without relevant, understandable information, stakeholders will question how the current budget is being spent, potentially risking tech leaders credibility, according to Rogers.