What’s in the Budget? 7 Investments for CIOs to Prioritize

I am getting ahead of the curve and sharing with CIO and IT leaders several
priority investments they should consider for 2023.

My perspective: Many SMBs and large enterprises have invested in digital
transformation for several years. Whether we’re heading for a recession or a
correction, leaders must sense the shift in financial winds and refocus their
digital transformation visions and roadmaps
to reflect how the economy impacts their businesses and industry.

Digital Trailblazers
will seek
force multipliers
in their digital transformation priorities. Investments in force multipliers
have some of the following attributes:

With these attributes in mind, I asked several technology partners to provide
insights on 2023 investment priorities. I share their perspective and
follow-up with why I believe the investment is a digital transformation force
multiplier.

7 Priorities for CIOs

1. Leverage observability data with AIOps

“The biggest trend in AIOps right now is the companies feel they have enough
observability data. For the past 10-15 years, they have acquired more tools
that give them visibility across their applications, clouds, containers, and
legacy environments. Most companies are arriving at a tipping point where they
have so much data and don’t look to generate more. They look for tools that
allow them to turn that data into something that’s actually actionable and
insightful. And we see that a lot of the center of gravity AIOps technologies
is moving towards the kind of data analysis, data insight.” – Elik Eizenberg,
co-founder and CTO of BigPanda 

* Why AIOps is a force multiplier: AIOps enables IT Ops
to support more apps running in hybrid clouds, more frequent deployments, and
improve customer and employee experiences.

2. Establish and enrich customer data and analytics

“As companies face the reality of an economic downturn, team leaders will be
tasked with doing more with less. While this will be challenging, economic
circumstances like this can also provide clarity on which priorities CIOs
should be focusing on. Improving operational efficiency is, of course, top of
mind for many, but maximizing customer data should also be near the top of the
list. In short, creating connected customer experiences should be a top
priority for every organization. Having the tech framework in place to break
down data silos and give teams a holistic customer 360 that will allow them to
market with truly personalized messaging will be the difference between
companies thriving or just surviving in today’s economic climate.” – Kazuki
Ohta, co-founder & CEO of
TreasureData

* Why a CDP is a force multiplier:
CDPs
establish a centralized view of a customer, their interests, and activities.
Product management and DevOps teams use CDPs to improve customer experiences,
and they also simplify work for marketers, customer support, and compliance
functions.

3. Improve customer and employee collaboration with AI-enabled search

“Employees feel stifled and frustrated as they struggle to track down
mission-critical information in today’s increasingly complex hybrid workplace.
Intelligent search makes all company knowledge findable from anywhere and
delivers a more empowering and rewarding experience by tailoring it to each
person’s unique needs at any given moment.” – Nicolas Bordeleau, vice
president of products at Coveo

* Why intelligent search is a force multiplier: Retail, ecommerce, and
subscription-based media sites can see increased revenue from
intelligent search capabilities, and all companies can improve customer support functions and employee
productivity.

4. Enhance hybrid working capabilities

“CIOs should prioritize budgeting for tools that make their post-Covid
workplace model work. If you choose a hybrid strategy, with different people
coming into the office on different days and using different desks, they need
the ability not only to book desks but also to have visibility into who’s
meeting where and when, so they can connect with teammates. And they need
advanced collaboration tools to tie in with remote staff. Periodic analysis of
how workplaces are being used is also key for space optimization, real estate
needs assessment, and overall post-covid strategy tracking and adjustment.” –
Nadir Ali, CEO of Inpixon

* Why hybrid work is a force multiplier: Improving hybrid work is not a
single technology or investment but represents a new way of working for many
organizations. What worked through accelerated rollouts to support remote work
during the pandemic now needs a more thought-out strategy for improving
collaboration, including driving more departments to support multidisciplinary
teams and
agile ways of working.

5. Deliver and manage more ML in production

“Ensure you have enough budget to fully deploy and scale those models in
production – including the budget for cloud consumption, MLOps capabilities,
support and maintenance, and change management with the business (change in
processes required for adoption).” – Nir Kaldero, chief data, analytics, &
AI officer at Neoris  

* Why MLOps and Modelops are force multipliers: Many organizations invest
in ML but struggle to push models to production and realize the benefits.
Organizations can support smarter and faster deployments by adopting
MLOps (for data scientists) and ModelOps (for model governance)
and establishing a full ML model lifecycle.

6. Increase data security, dataops, and data governance programs

“In 2023, network and data security will continue to be top budget priorities
for every CIO, especially as the explosion of VPN usage opens new threat
vectors. IP address intelligence data provides the context security teams need
to mitigate risks, such as identifying whether inbound or outbound traffic is
tied to a VPN, proxy, or a darknet, whether it’s residential or commercial
traffic, as well as the VPN provider’s name and URL. CIOs will invest in and
prioritize access to IP address insights so that they can gain context around
a break in and set proactive rules as to who can access a network, who should
be flagged for additional authentication, and who should be blocked
automatically.” – Jonathan Tomek, VP of research and development,
Digital Element

* Why data management tech and practices are force multipliers: While
many CIOs, CDOs, and chief data scientists focus on delivering data
visualizations, machine learning models,
citizen data science, and other analytics, there’s been a
lag in corresponding investments
in data security,
dataops, and
proactive data governance.

7. Invest in your people and talent development

“It’s less about the technologies but more on the talent and people side. It
would help if you were ready to acquire or develop talents such as gaming
engineers, VR/AR designers, and data engineers. These key profiles will help
you create, power, and grow your metaverse presence for your company.” – Nir
Kaldero, chief data, analytics, & AI officer at
Neoris

* Why investing in talent development is a force multiplier: You don’t
realize the benefits of digital transformation investments without a
successful transformation to new business models, improved customer
experiences, and leveraging data/analytics to strategic advantages. As I share
in Chapter 10 of my book,
Digital Trailblazer, getting early adopters onboard is relatively easy compared to middle-late
adopters and detractors. Establishing a
learning culture
and developing
centers of excellence
are the keys to transforming the culture.