The pandemic showed how fast the world can change in a short amount of time. Thre are many examples. For instance, in the past two years, according to Info-Tech's “Tech Trends Survey 2022,” 62% of IT professionals are more concerned about being a victim of ransomware than they were a year ago. In the same time frame, 82% of Microsoft’s non-essential employees shifted to working from home in 2020 and 89% of organizations invested in web conferencing technology to facilitate collaboration.
Future unexpected global changes may impact an organization's strategy at any given time. When the unexpected happens, being able to adapt quickly to new priorities ensures continued long-term business success.
Info-Tech Research Group published a new research blueprint, “Identify and Manage Strategic Risk Impacts on Your Organization,” designed to assist organizations in building adaptive resiliency into their strategic plans.
Organizations build portions of their strategies around chosen vendors and should protect those plans against the risks of unforeseen acquisitions in the market. Strategic plans need to be adaptable to avoid vendors’ negative actions causing an expedited shift in priorities. Organizations need to become better at risk assessment and actively manage the identified risks to their strategic plans.
"Like most people, organizations are poor at assessing the likelihood of risk,” said Frank Sewell, research director of vendor management at Info-Tech Research Group. “As a result, almost none realistically plan to monitor, manage and adapt their strategies to those risks."
The new research blueprint outlined Info-Tech's approach to preparing strategic risk management for success:
- Review organization's strategy: Understand the organizational strategy to prepare for the "What If" game exercise.
- Identify and understand potential strategic risks: Play the "What If" game with the right people at the table.
- Create a risk profile packet for leadership: Pull all the information together in a presentation document.
- Validate the risks: Work with leadership to ensure that the proposed risks are in line with their thoughts.
- Plan to manage the risks: Lower the overall risk potential by implementing mitigations.
- Communicate the plan: It is essential to not only have a plan but to also socialize it in the organization for awareness.
- Enact the plan: Once the plan is finalized and socialized, implement and monitor it for success.
Strategic risk impacts are often unanticipated, causing unforeseen downstream effects. Anticipating the potential changes in the global IT market and continuously monitoring vendors' risk levels can help organizations modify their strategic alignment with the new norms.
Edited by
Erik Linask
