5 shifts that will shape the future of IT

Shift Happens

I have a new post up over at CIO of the Future, ‘5 shifts that will shape the future of IT’. I was reading some of the analyst views on how consumerisation and cloud are driving us to adopt new operating models. Most of the points of view I was seeing seemed to miss the point though. They were talking about how the role of the IT department might change – complete with nice charts showing as-is and to-be responsibilities – when they should have been talking about how the role IT plays in business is changing.

It’s pretty easy to sketch out the role that you would like IT departments will play in the future. However, the that role is more likely to be shaped by the trends that drive us to adopt a new operating model, rather than the preferences of the incumbents. As Scott McCloud pointed out, all the action happens in the gap between two frames, rather than within the pictures inside them.

My view is that the key to understanding where IT, and the IT department, ends up in the new operating model will be determined by the trends that drive us to adopt the new model. The interesting question then is “what are these trends?”

In the post I rough out what I think might be the five strongest trends that are shaping the future of IT in business. In summary, these are:

  1. Enterprise IT is no longer an infrastructure problem, it’s not an asset we own
  2. Consumer trends drive enterprise IT, rather than enterprise IT driving consumer trends
  3. The old core IT skills are not as valuable as they used to be
  4. How we define the value of IT has expanded (it’s a lot more than ROI now)
  5. External obligations – such as financial reporting, anti money-laundering and counter terrorism financing – will trigger the transition to new operating models (which I’ve written about before)

I’m pretty comfortable that these five trends a driving the majority of change we’re seeing in business at the moment. I’d greatly appreciate it if you head over to the article and leave your thoughts to see if I’m heading in the right direction.

Image source: Pilot Theater.