With the advent of hybrid working environments, managing assets effectively has become even more challenging, making it crucial to secure management buy-in for ITAM with proper governance and support structures.
In the post-pandemic era, enhancing IT asset management capabilities has emerged as a top trend, ensuring that organizations have the necessary practices in place to support their operations effectively. As companies increasingly migrate workloads to the cloud while maintaining on-premises systems for critical applications, having a well-defined hybrid cloud strategy becomes imperative.
This holistic approach to enterprise technology management is becoming the new norm, allowing organizations to consolidate disparate asset data sources into a unified view. ITAM practitioners are evolving into key players in IT governance, especially in managing cloud services effectively. Lean into IT Service Management (ITSM) practices like Change Enablement and Financial Management, while nurturing strong relationships with suppliers to ensure compliance.
Expect an upswing in software audits in 2023, as software vendors tighten compliance to safeguard revenues. Use this as an opportunity to revamp your software audit approach, ensuring preparedness and a smoother process. New legislation and compliance requirements mandating environmental protection and sustainability practices are emerging. This will impact ITAM, making IT hardware more serviceable and potentially extending warranties with certain caveats.
With remote and hybrid work arrangements persisting, tracking IT assets has become more critical. This trend aligns with the ITIL 4 ITAM guidance, which recognizes the importance of effective asset management in a service-oriented organization. ITIL 4 promotes iterative progress with feedback, encouraging organizations to break down work into manageable phases, akin to Agile and DevOps principles.
ITAM and ITSM are no longer siloed functions; they can support each other to remove duplication and ensure effective management, control, and protection of business services. Leveraging asset information for event management and alerts can further enhance IT support models.
As automation gains prominence, intelligent automation and machine learning will play a pivotal role in ITAM, automating tasks such as asset tracking, license optimization, and data provision for better decision-making. ITAM best practices are extending beyond IT to other business functions, mirroring the trend of Enterprise Service Management’s expansion across organizations.
The evolving ITAM landscape in 2023 emphasizes the need for comprehensive asset management, cloud strategy, compliance, sustainability, and integration with ITSM practices and automation to meet the challenges of the modern business environment.
In the rapidly evolving landscape of IT Asset Management (ITAM) and Software Asset Management (SAM), vendors are confronted with a dilemma: do they devote their resources to chasing the next big trend or reinforce their core audit defense and license optimization features? This question sparked a lively debate during the “Sponsors vs. Delegates” session at Wisdom EMEA 2023 and subsequently led to a revealing LinkedIn poll.
With buzzworthy concepts like FinOps and sustainability capturing the tech world’s attention, it’s understandable that ITAM tools vendors want to align their products with these emerging trends. But is this pursuit of the next big thing overshadowing the importance of their core functionality?
The crux of the matter lies in whether ITAM tools vendors can effectively balance innovation with their foundational capabilities. Are these two endeavors mutually exclusive, or can they coexist harmoniously?
Some users argue that vendors should be transparent about their development pipeline and plans for embracing emerging trends. For many, vendors serve as their primary source of information on these trends. However, this raises the question: are vendors obligated to discuss the “next big thing”?
To delve deeper into this debate, a straw poll was conducted on The ITAM Review’s LinkedIn page. While it’s not definitive, the results provide valuable insights.
50% of respondents believe that ITAM tools vendors indeed focus too much on the next big thing, such as FinOps, at the expense of core SAM functionality, and view it as a problem. 27% acknowledge that vendors prioritize emerging trends but do not consider it a problem.
However, the most compelling statistic is that 77% of respondents feel that vendors are excessively emphasizing the next big thing at the expense of their core SAM functionality, while only 23% believe they strike the right balance.
As the tech world continues to evolve, this debate underscores the importance of aligning product development with user needs while keeping an eye on emerging trends, striking a delicate balance that benefits both vendors and their clients.
