VIEWPOINT
OVERCOMING THE PANDEMIC SIMON BENNETT, CTO, EMEA, RACKSPACE TECHNOLOGY, LISTS KEY STEPS EVERY BUSINESS MUST TAKE TO TACKLE THE CORONAVIRUS CRISIS.
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e’re experiencing a tectonic shift in working practices witnessed by any living generation, with all industries simultaneously having to learn and adapt to serving their customers with a remote workforce. Technology has been instrumental in most organisations’ business continuity throughout this period, yet it hasn’t been easy sailing. This unprecedented situation uncovered and accentuated a number of challenges that IT teams will need to overcome to continue supporting their businesses over the coming months. Whilst lockdown 2.0 took place across EMEA, business leaders needed to adjust to a more permanent period of uncertainty than anyone could have expected and quickly overcome these issues - most of which are not quick fixes. The biggest, according to research commissioned by Rackspace Technology, were a need for business continuity programmes; a lack of adaptability to change; a lack of preparedness for different working arrangements; and not having enough employees with the right skills. The pressure is now on for organisations to overcome these obstacles with longer-term strategies. So how can this be done? Improving adaptability to better prepare for the unknown The biggest challenge that EMEA businesses uncovered during the
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CXO INSIGHT ME
DECEMBER 2020
pandemic was a need for business continuity programmes (44%), whilst they reported the second as being a lack of adaptability to change (34%). This reflects the findings from Leesman, which previously cited the UK as amongst the least prepared countries to deal with a mass home-working strategy. Most organisations are having to shift their operations beyond recognition as a result of the pandemic and its mid-term
impact on their operations. For many, this means completely reformulating their business continuity plans to prepare for the next wave of the unknown as well as establishing adaptable processes that can support the business in navigating the evolving situation. The cloud underpins many businesses’ ability to continue operating services virtually and to support their entire workforce remotely. Those that had
