These are the top challenges facing IT and Finance leaders.
Are you facing the same obstacles?
Earlier this year, the Mulesoft team at Salesforce released their annual Connectivity Benchmark Report, a survey of over 1,000 CIOs and IT leaders. This new research found that even amid economic uncertainty, IT spending is on the rise, and forward-thinking IT leaders are not shying away from smart investments in digital technology to improve business outcomes and lower overall costs.
Organizations are using more apps than ever – an average of 1,000 separate applications – a 10% increase over last year. In addition, nearly 75% of customer interactions are now digital, and customers expect each of those interactions to be personalized. This has left a significant gap in the digital customer experience. Multiple data sources across channels and touchpoints create siloed, redundant data that is difficult to translate into a real-time view of the customer, and even harder to act on.
IT leaders recognize that the opportunity cost of disconnected data is high. 36% of IT leaders said that data silos are their biggest challenge. Missed opportunities to better understand and serve customers, and lost efficiencies in their finance, marketing, and sales processes quickly add up to lost revenue.
According to respondents, custom development is costly in every sense of the word. The average organization saw a 30% increase in spend on custom integrations in 2022. What’s more, nearly all reported that integration issues were slowing down their long- and short-term digital transformation initiatives. And the stakes couldn’t be higher. The average cost of failing to complete digital transformation initiatives can be as high as $9.5 million.
CIOs are not the only ones who recognize the benefits of automation like higher productivity and cost savings. 56% of finance executives also want to bring automation to their teams. Forward-thinking executives recognize that automation tools are essential to their future business model – and to successful digital transformation. While they are happy to leave implementation and governance to IT, these Finance leaders want to customize their own automated processes – and need intuitive, no-code options to get there.
The insights captured in the 2023 Connectivity Benchmark Report were not surprising. However, these unified, clear-cut responses from IT execs reflect in no uncertain terms the urgency of prioritizing automation and digital transformation. Is your organization falling behind? To learn how other organizations have successfully leveraged Chargent to drive their digital transformation journey, view selected case studies or reach out to our sales team today.
Additional Helpful Resources
Whether you’re ready to implement new AR software today, or are not quite yet ready to make the investment, below are resources that can help you decide the next steps to take. When the time comes, you’ll enjoy increased revenue and improved operational efficiencies.
