The rapid acceleration of digital transformation in response to the pandemic has resulted in a dramatic increase in complexity as organisations implement urgent innovation which can quickly create technology sprawl.
Research from AppDynamics, a part of Cisco, also validates a pressing need for full-stack observability with added business context to help technologists cut through the data “noise” and observe what matters most to their business.
In 2020, companies had no option but to shift to digital-first business models to weather the storm and minimise the commercial impact of the Covid19 pandemic, placing technologists at the forefront of their organisations’ response.
According to the “Agents of Transformation 2021: The Rise of Full Stack Observability” research report, this forced a three-times acceleration of digital transformation projects.
Unsurprisingly, technologists found themselves under considerable strain, with 89 percent reportedly feeling under immense pressure at work and 84% admitting to having difficulty switching off.
The research highlights that rapid digital transformation has added staggering technical complexity throughout IT departments, with technologists listing the following factors as key contributors:
* A new set of priorities and challenges (80%).
* Technology sprawl and a patchwork of legacy and cloud technologies (78%).
* Acceleration to cloud computing (77%).
* Multiple, disconnected monitoring solutions (74%).
This rise in IT complexity has significantly increased the amount of data created, from the application, through the infrastructure to the network and security. With this added complexity, 85% of technologists state that quickly cutting through noise caused by the ever-increasing volumes of data to identify root causes of performance issues will represent a significant challenge in the year ahead.
With 75% of those polled stating they are already struggling to manage overwhelming ‘data noise’, technologists are desperate for a unified solution to enable real-time visibility across the entire IT estate.
* 95% of technologists say having visibility across the whole IT estate is important.
* 96% point to negative consequences of not having visibility and insights across the whole tech stack.
While most technologists acknowledge that the ability to monitor the IT stack is important, the overwhelming majority (92%) say the ability to link technology performance to business outcomes such as customer experience, sales transactions and revenue, will be really important over the next year.
In addition, almost three quarters (73%) fear that the inability to link IT performance with business performance will be detrimental to their business in 2021, and 96% acknowledge that the ability to connect full-stack observability with real-time business outcomes will be essential to delivering first-class digital experiences and accelerating digital transformation.
Rather than searching through the vast amounts of telemetry data that comes with a standard full-stack observability approach, technologists recognise they need to observe what matters by applying a business lens so they can surface the most impactful information quickly. This business context will enable them to make sense of what’s relevant and act.
The report also highlights that while technologists are acutely aware that they need to contextualise IT performance with real-time business data, more than half (66%) do not have the resources and support they need, and 96% point to at least one barrier their organisation must navigate in order to adopt this new approach.