Kaseya®, a leading provider of IT and security management solutions for small and medium-sized businesses, released its 2021 IT Operations Report. They surveyed nearly 1,000 IT professionals worldwide about their top priorities and challenges.
Key findings include:
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The top three priorities for IT professionals are improving IT security, migrating to the cloud, and automation.
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The top three challenges are cybersecurity and data protection, lack of IT budgets and resources to meet the needs, and outdated systems that hinder growth and innovation.
30% of respondents believe there is not enough IT budget or resources to meet their needs, making it one of the top three issues for IT professionals surveyed. 62% of participants said their IT budgets have been cut, remained the same, or they do not know what their budget will be in 2021.
Improving IT security remains a top priority in the face of rising cyberattacks. Cybersecurity solutions topped the list of what IT professionals plan to invest in, with 53% of respondents planning to budget for email security tools such as phishing prevention and 33% - in ransomware protection.
Cloud technology was also at the top of the list this year, with 54% of respondents saying their spending on IaaS clouds will increase and 36% expecting spending on SaaS applications to increase.
IT professionals also want to improve their productivity through automation, which ranked second on the list of top technologies to invest in. Nearly half of respondents said they would allocate funds for this in 2021.
More resources are needed to meet demands, including cybersecurity and data protection issues.
Cybersecurity and data protection are major concerns for 54% of IT professionals surveyed. When it comes to data protection, there are still some misconceptions remaining. While 82% understand that SaaS applications need to be backed up, 60% of respondents said they believe SaaS vendors are responsible for data protection.
The importance of integration and automation
Time savings through automation and integration of key software solutions are critical to IT productivity. For half of the respondents, automation of IT processes with an endpoint management solution is important. 47% rated the ability to run automation scenarios with an IT documentation tool as critical to their success. In addition, more than half of respondents said access to IT documentation through the help desk was critical to their operations.
