Business decision makers (BDMs) and IT decision makers (ITDMs) understand current IT trends much closer than they are generally perceived to be, Dell State of IT Trends 2016 global study revealed.
Dell noted that business and IT leaders had different levels of understanding of IT trends and technologies in the past. However, the situation has changed now.
“There is a lingering misperception that business leaders are disconnected during strategic IT discussions, but times have changed,” said Matt Baker, executive director, Enterprise Strategy, Dell.
”This study reveals that there is an increasingly common understanding between business and IT decision makers on the key IT trends and the growth opportunities that IT can deliver.”
Increasing business productivity is cited as the main IT consideration for both ITDMs and BDMs, followed by growing the business.
The study found 62 percent of ITDMs and 51 percent of BDMs agree that cloud computing is the most important technology trend for their companies.
With regard to data center, 88 percent of ITDMs and 80 percent of BDMs say their organization is considering adopting a software-defined data center (SDDC).
Both groups agree the benefits of SDDC are flexibility, simplicity, efficiency and cost-savings. A hybrid cloud platform is seen as the best place for SDDCs to reside in the future.
In terms of technology spending for 2016, cloud is the main priority among both ITDMs (67 percent) and BDMs (59 percent). This is followed closely by data storage upgrades or purchase, 54 percent and 48 percent, respectively.