There’s no disputing that COVID-19 has thrown the world’s plans into disarray over the last year. Organizations of all sizes and across many sectors have had to adjust their strategies and plans to deal with the largest global health crisis for a century.

A quite remarkable business shift was forced on companies almost overnight. Within a matter of weeks they delivered operational changes that would have taken months or years to bring to fruition in pre-pandemic times.

Organizations were forced to fast-track technology changes

The speed at which these changes have been implemented is unprecedented and technology has been at the forefront, leading the way so that companies and economies can keep functioning. In a recent survey of IT leaders commissioned by Macro 4, 81 per cent of respondents agreed that the need to react quickly to the pandemic forced organizations to fast-track technology changes to adapt to new ways of working. Companies throughout the world have had to improve digital services, move more aspects of their business online and increase capacity to handle the huge volumes of digital traffic heading their way.

Most have prioritized frontline customer interaction

For many companies, this was frontline work and vital to ensure customers could interact with them online. 64 per cent of those questioned in our survey said they had made changes to improve interaction with customers on their websites, social media or other digital channels. With much face-to-face customer service unavailable or severely restricted, customers have relied on online interactions with companies to run their lives – everything from buying food, clothing and entertainment to dealing with services such as banking, utilities and government departments. This is now the reality of many people’s day-to-day lives and has become their ‘new normal’.

Quick fixes will need more work

Customers are also an increasingly savvy bunch and will switch companies easily if they don’t get the service they expect. Organizations know that many quick IT fixes put in place to manage the issues brought about by the pandemic will need more work to make them fit for the long term. In fact 72 per cent of our survey respondents agree that over the next 12 months organizations will have to invest in upgrading or replacing some of the technology they had to implement quickly in response to COVID-19.

IT leaders and their departments have borne the brunt of the pandemic-induced technology workload and there has been a huge amount of pressure on them to deliver solutions that are robust. But how will IT strategy be impacted in the fallout from the pandemic and what will be the main priorities over the next year for technology in business? Macro 4 surveyed 100 enterprise IT decision makers about how they reacted to the pandemic and how it is informing their business plans for the future.

As these statistics show, IT leaders have had to make some tough decisions. Read the full report to find out more.