IT shifts into business gear

In an environment of intense competition, economic upheaval and consumer-driven technology, enterprises have to switch from being IT-centric to business-centric - or get left far behind.

This was the message from Bill McCracken, CEO of CA Technologies, at the opening session of CA World 2011, in Las Vegas, last night.

He stressed that cloud is a reality, despite lingering doubts about whether the promise lives up to the hype. “It's not a fad, it's not a trend; it's really what people - especially people who are competing effectively - are doing.”

He noted that change in the industry occurs when three conditions converge: technology, economy, and a strong business need.

“We're standing on the edge of a perfect storm of five converging technologies: 4G, the proliferation of thousands of applications, cheap bandwidth devices, social media, and GPS devices. Social media, in particular, is changing the way we talk to one another, how businesses talk to customers, and how we deliver services.”

According to McCracken, demand is even stronger from the business side, which puts companies under constant pressure to change - and do it quickly.

This is one of the CEO's biggest problems, he said. “You see what you want to do and know what you have to do to change that, but you can't change fast enough. And often the reason why you can't change fast enough is because of IT. This puts a strain on the competitiveness of the business.”

He added that fundamental shifts in the business model will change both companies and technology itself. “In today's world, if you don't change, you're writing your epitaph. It's about change, but more importantly, it's about the speed of change.”

“If we look at the great economic stresses in the world today and take a step back, these conditions are actually driving innovation in technology. Today's business world is all about doing more with less, and this technology [cloud] allows us to do just that. The economy is fuelling the transition from where we were to where we're going.”

In the new business environment, he said, one can monitor a problem, describe its location and determine what can be done about it. “You set the rules; you decide where the company is going and where the industry is going.”

Speaking during a forum discussion as part of the opening address, Michael Cappella, chairman of VCE (a joint venture of Cisco and EMC), said policy was emerging as the new cloud challenge.

“If you look at the barriers to cloud adoption now, technology isn't the barrier, policy is. What happens when the cloud spans a global grid? How do you deal with those policy considerations?”

He believes that in future, both private and public cloud will have a role to play - private cloud for some applications and public for others, essentially resulting in a hybrid model, with security policy defining what goes inside and what can move outside.

McCracken said determining what goes where depends on the core service offering. “What's the agenda of the company? What drives the company to ensure they prioritise to the right level? What's important and can it be done at speed?”

Former US federal government CIO Vivek Kundra said it starts from the top. “The CEO has to be able to understand how IT changes the business. Across the board we are seeing that in companies in an interconnected world, technology is a huge competitive drive.”

According to McCracken, measuring success in moving a company to the cloud depends on the specific firm: is it going to lead in cloud or is it catching up?

Kundra also noted the importance of tapping into social networking resources. “If I look at the last three decades, we've begun to abstract away from a pure efficiency model and actually think of social, and how to tap into the ingenuity of people to solve problems.”

Getting third parties to contribute is moving technology to the edge - which is where it needs to be if it's going to keep up with the rapid changes in business.

* Lezette Engelbrecht is being hosted by CA Southern Africa.