Technology without strategy: Don’t let your business be left behind
Don’t become another cautionary tale of a business leader who failed to align technology with their overarching strategy. If you’re still treating IT as a back-office function that supports business change rather than a strategic vehicle that enhances and drives it, you’re not leading – you’re surviving. But for how long?
According to McKinsey, when organisations undertake a digital transformation to improve performance, those efforts fail 70% of the time. This isn’t just a stat – it’s a warning! The failure isn’t in the tech. It’s in the boardroom, which cascades to the wider business. And it’s up to you to prevent technology from operating in a vacuum, divorced from your strategic vision.
Toys “R” Us and the impact of Amazon
The pitfalls of technology misalignment are underscored by Toys “R” Us, which filed for bankruptcy in 2017. The start of its downfall can be traced back to 2000 when it outsourced its online sales operation to Amazon instead of developing its own e-commerce capabilities – a short-sighted move that restricted its ability to embrace the internet. When the partnership dissolved in 2006, the business had to build its e-commerce presence from scratch – already years behind its competitors.
Even if this worst-case scenario doesn’t become your reality, you will experience fundamental challenges that restrict productivity, hinder growth, erode security, and increase costs.
Technology misalignment: the challenges
Talk is cheap. If you champion technology but fail to provide the structure to unlock its business benefits, it will remain ineffectual – and your leadership will be questioned. Empty endorsements restrict technology to a support function, exposing your business to challenges that you’re responsible for:
Technology fragmentation
Your employees depend on you to provide tools and systems that make their job easier, not harder. Disconnected tools and systems create inefficiencies and make integration difficult – eroding performance rather than enhancing it.
Data silos
Information becomes siloed, limiting insights, restricting collaboration, and making decisions inefficient. Imagine making a time-critical decision that impacts the business without access to essential information needed to inform it.
Increased security risks
Poorly managed systems expose businesses to cyber security vulnerabilities. This will result in sleepless nights worrying about a major compromise – as was the case for KNP Logistics Group, with catastrophic results.
Higher operational costs
Supporting multiple systems that don’t benefit the business increases costs. You’ll be chained to inadequate systems that drain your budget rather than adding value – and the blame game will start.
Slow innovation
IT teams focused on firefighting day-to-day issues can’t explore new opportunities that enable the business strategy. You must empower them with the bandwidth to adopt innovative technologies that drive business efficiency and growth, such as AI. For example, Swoop is a fintech platform that simplifies access to funding for SMEs by matching them with suitable lenders and products. It integrated AI tools into this process to analyse financial data, enabling faster and more accurate funding matches – a technology-driven approach that’s elevated funding efficiency for its clients.
How to shift to a holistic IT mindset
Don’t let missed opportunities, wasted investments, and misaligned technology become your legacy. Technology should support clear business goals, such as entering new markets, enhancing customer experiences, and increasing operational efficiency. Create a framework to harness its business benefits by embedding IT strategy into the planning process. If this is met with resistance, it’s probably time to rethink your IT leadership team.
When business and IT leaders work together in planning and execution, the organisation benefits from a joined-up approach to technology that brings business value. This fosters a shared understanding of priorities, ensuring IT initiatives support wider objectives rather than reacting after decisions are made – transforming them into strategic growth efforts.
Advantages to embedding technology in your business strategy
With technology transformed from a support function into a core enabler of your business strategy, you will thrive:
Increased
Productivity
You can integrate business-focused technology across your organisation that streamlines tasks, increasing output.
Enhanced
Collaboration
Considered technology elevates collaboration by streamlining communication, centralising information, and enabling real-time data access.
Improved
Security
You can build a robust cybersecurity culture at every level of your business to safeguard against threats like social engineering attacks.
Scalability
You’re empowered to scale your business using technology that aligns with your strategic goals.
Technology with strategy: a case study of success
PAYE Stonework & Restoration was proactive when it reached a crossroads with its IT managed service provider, which focused on the day-to-day technical aspects of IT. This narrow approach to utilising technology was preventing PAYE from creating a secure and efficient IT infrastructure to support collaboration across teams and remote sites. Deprived of strategic IT guidance, business leaders were forced to manage IT alongside core responsibilities, limiting their ability to overcome this hurdle.
This prompted PAYE to find a technology partner that could help them align IT with the business strategy – leading them to TDM Group. They assigned PAYE a dedicated Business Manager who collaborated with stakeholders to transform IT into a strategic asset that elevates operational efficiency.
Key projects that have driven this shift include a seamless migration to Microsoft Azure cloud, mobile device management through Microsoft Intune, and the successful launch of a SharePoint intranet. This has allowed their teams to collaborate more effectively across multiple sites, helping IT to become a driver of business success.
Unlock growth by bridging the gap between IT and your business
With the right support, you can become an inspiring example of a leader who helped shift your business’s technology mindset from a support function to a strategic force.
At TDM Group, we partner with forward-thinking business leaders who want to hone technology’s competitive edge by embracing our Managed Business IT Services (M-BiTS) – a holistic approach to utilising technology that ensures it’s not just supporting but enhancing and driving business change.
Working as your technology partner, we can help you:
- Align technology decisions with strategic business outcomes.
- Facilitate constructive communication between IT and leadership teams.
- Reassess and realign technology priorities as your business evolves.
- Don’t be a cautionary tale. Be a case study of success.