Looking back on 2017….here comes 2018

Although it’s been a long time since I posted I felt that it would be good to reflect on what 2017 has been about, my highlights, what the industry is telling us and what I am looking forward to in 2018.

Transformation for the new breed

It has certainly been a year of buzzwords but none more so than the transformation word. It must have been looked at like a word that means so much and yet why on earth is transformation so important now. Surely it’s been important to transform all year every year. Looking at it from the lens of my current company and also commentary that has been available from most of the tech conferences, this year it has been a focal point to reinforce the message that organisations cannot survive or improve bottom line revenue without transforming. Whether that be in the datacenter, in the workforce, in the security space or in the people space. I’d say these are all key ingredients to making a recipe for success. No one ingredient on its own is enough to sustain and push forward an organisation’s capability to differentiate.

If you step back and think about the word and all that this entails then it can be a scary journey to embark on especially when you are held accountable to the rest of the company. We know that without risk we don’t get to reap rewards in the future especially from a profitability stance so it’s imperative that this theme continue for the years to come.

Blockchain, IOT and Cloud

Yes the buzzword bingo hasn’t ended yet although 2017 has but all of the upcoming trends in industry will have an impact on our society.

Blockchain (not Bitcoin !!) is gaining momentum as a distributed chain of transactions that doesn’t carry the weight of middle men verifying the transactions since multiple parties in the chain all verify the authenticity and value. It has resulted in many new wacky ideas and some of these will survive to become real mainstream use cases in 2018. Watch this space.

IOT and Cloud have been around for a while but 2017 saw a raft of press and articles about how to gain insights to make your company future proof and how you should consume and deliver back this insight. This would result in a differentiated offering to the end customer which is the ultimate goal.

Cloud, cloud and more cloud. Yes we know what it is and what it’s not but large enterprises have only scratched the surface of the iceberg in 2017 and mainstream adoption of a cloud operating model is yet to embraced fully. Let’s hope we have some real customer cases using large transformation projects to deliver back to the business and they get up on stage in 2018 to showcase their efforts. This will help others realise the nirvana of a true flexible operating model allowing I.T. to be a real enabler in 2018.

2018 outlook

A difficult one to be a fortune teller otherwise I’d have retired a long time ago but here are some of my thoughts in terms of how I.T. will be a stronger enabler in 2018.

 

  • Digital Transformation – Of course this is a given and we will see more of the trends from 2017 start to materialise into real world success stories. Showcasing and explaining these to would be digital enthusiasts will be the real winner to ensuring the message isn’t lost in confusion
  • Cybersecurity – A hot topic during the latter part of 2017 but a key focus for 2018 (Even Alan Sugar’s new apprentice is starting a recruitment company focused on security professionals). With increasing attacks and downtime highlighted during 2017 especially the NHS incident in the UK more organisations will move this up their business goals to ensure they have a water tight infrastructure and they know they have their crown jewels locked up with the key in a safe place
  • Blockchain madness – I know you’ve heard me rant on a few times on this subject but once the penny drops more organisations will realise the benefits this could bring to their market. More application, more cryptocurrencies and more understanding is the bottom line
  • IOT on steroids – We touched the surface in 2017 but 2018 will be the year where IOT, AI, chatbots and all things that haven’t been game changing yet will be. It won’t suit everyone in every industry but there will be some surprising news as we find new innovations are released to market
  • Cloudy cloud cloud – Hybrid, private and the rest. Everyone wants utility based consumption and everyone wants flexibility – end of. How they get there and what’s involved should become the primary focus in 2018 and tech companies that innovate in this space will be leaders to partner with in order to get this initiative moving.

 

So what’s next for me ?????

Well I’ve continued to learn a lot this year and more importantly break out of my comfort zone of tech and learn more about business, digital, entrepreneurship and the art of developing myself to differentiate my brand. For 2018 I expect to to do more of the same with a motivation to continue to contribute to the wider community and learn more on the ways in which the new topics discussed earlier will make a difference to society. Ultimately infrastructure and the building blocks of the datacenter need to be moved to a partner who does this day in day out and more organisations will begin to get this message. I want to be the one to discuss ideas outside speeds and feeds and get more entrenched with consumer pains and how they make a difference to the profitability of their organisation. We’ll see what happens I guess…..

 

Feel free to like and share. Happy New Year to all and see you on the other side…..

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