In March 2020, as COVID-19 unfolded, local technology and business leaders faced the huge responsibility of shifting the workforce to a secure work from home set-up, overnight. Relentless changes and uncertainty in the external environment demand collective knowledge sharing within the C-suite. On the 22nd April 2020, ADAPT conducted an invitation-only media online workshop to discuss the key survey findings of ADAPT’s April 2020 “COVID-19 Survey: AU & NZ Organisational Response, Resilience & Recovery”.

In April ADAPT conducted an in-depth survey of 217 C-level executives representing 197 organisations to gauge COVID-19 response and recovery of Australian and New Zealand businesses, including 47 of ASX-200 listed organisations.”

 

Were organisations prepared? Did Australian/NZ organisational leaders deliver under pressure?

  1. The majority of organisations rose, with little issue, to the challenges presented by the COVID-19 crisis, with 61% stating their existing Business Continuity Plans worked.
  2. Exact percentages show how organisations successfully controlled transitioning their workforce to work from home (WFH), maintain BAU and transitioning to secure digital workplace policies and practices.
  3. Companies which had less control or hadn’t invested in the right ways, found external focussed priorities such as supply chain, customer service, new digital product development and delivery stumbled.
  4. However, during the crisis, CEOs and other corporate leaders provided more availability and access than ever before, improved engagement, and limited barriers with decision rights.

 

Did IT lead from the front? CIOs and IT leaders justified their seat at the table:

  1. 80% of respondents to the question agree that their CIOs and tech leadership played a strategic partner role in the COVID-19 war room to get their organisations through the necessary changes. CIOs proved their worth.
  2. The most significant change within the tech stack has been the move to cloud – including private, public and hybrid workloads. 50% of respondents to the question told us their organisations have increased their Cloud workloads by more than 50% to enable their remote workforce.
  3. However, with cost increases this could be temporary, and a percentage of respondents also revealed they plan to repatriate from public Cloud to on-premise in the coming months.

 

What are organisations’ predictions and plans for these next three months?

  1. Exact statistics were revealed on IT budgets showing a significant proportion of cuts, especially on emerging technologies.
  2. The focus remained on reducing costs, digitising workflows, and resilient security.
  3. Vendor revenues will take a hit, over 20% of Australian organisations have disengaged from their existing relationships.

 

More about the ADAPT COVID-19 Survey:

  • The survey was conducted by ADAPT from 2/4/20 to 14/4/20
  • 217 respondent sample size
  • 98% from Australia and 2% NZ
  • 197 different organisations from 11 sectors
  • 47 replies were from ASX-200 and 11 replies were from ASX-25 organisations
  • All organisations were > AUD $500 million in revenues
  • Respondents were: CIO (33%), CTO (31%), CDO (10%), CFO/COO (10%), Other (10%), CISO (6%)
  • The survey was comprised of 11 quantitative questions, plus 2 open questions

 

ADAPT Research and Advisory is writing a whole series of research reports on building reliance, business continuity planning, and coming out strong in the new environment. Become an ADAPT Research and Advisory client to access the full report COVID-19 – The Renaissance of Tech Leaders.

Contributors
Matt Boon Senior Research Director at ADAPT
Matt Boon is responsible for directing and developing ADAPT’s research content and positions. He interacts with executives daily, bringing together groups of... More

Matt Boon is responsible for directing and developing ADAPT’s research content and positions. He interacts with executives daily, bringing together groups of C-suite leaders to discuss and prepare for the challenges and opportunities they face.​

For over 30 years, including 18 in senior leadership roles at Gartner, Matt has been a sought after and highly respected authority on the local and global IT landscape.​

ADAPT hosts numerous industry-leading business and technology events, which Matt chairs, that deliver unique ADAPT research positions, and advises executives across the end-user and technology provider landscape to make informed IT decisions.​

When he is not working, Matt enjoys walking the many trails of the NSW Southern Highlands, travelling and listening to music. He is also partial to a good steak and nice glass of red wine.​

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Aparna Sundararajan Senior Research Strategist
Aparna Sundararajan leads the emerging and disruptive technology research agenda within ADAPT’s strategic advisory team. As Senior Research Strategist, her role is... More

Aparna Sundararajan leads the emerging and disruptive technology research agenda within ADAPT’s strategic advisory team. As Senior Research Strategist, her role is to create independent advice for the Australian C-Suite around emerging technologies, trends and investment priorities and developing industry leading content for the ADAPT portfolio of Edge events.

As a technology analyst and marketer, Aparna aligns the burning issues of senior executives with digital business dynamics and emerging technology capabilities to create strategic advice for ADAPT’s Members and Strategic Partners.

Aparna has had 12 years working in the IT services sector, much of it with Gartner, where she developed independent advice for senior IT managers on the emerging roles and responsibilities they face in digital technologies, digital customer behaviour, and business model transformation.

 

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Jim Berry CEO & Founder at ADAPT
Jim founded ADAPT with a vision to help Australia thrive commercially, now and for the future. To enable that, Jim leads ADAPT’s mission... More

Jim founded ADAPT with a vision to help Australia thrive commercially, now and for the future. To enable that, Jim leads ADAPT’s mission to connect, inform and equip our local business and tech leaders. ​

Leading the development of ADAPT’s agendas and content strategy whilst also advising executive leadership teams from global technology providers, Jim is uniquely experienced to be the voice of the end user, customer and vendor.​

Bringing his deep knowledge of the local market, Jim regularly presents on modernisation and “know your customer.” He guides business leaders who are responsible for developing and deploying technology strategies across their organisations and helps some of the world’s largest vendors with their go-to-market and content plans.​

Through entrepreneurial product development and a servant leader mentality with his team and clients, ADAPT grows annually with clearly differentiated value for all stakeholders.​

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Management Leadership