How Things Have Changed:
It goes without saying that COVID-19 had a big effect on the world, especially when it came to professional services. Before COVID-19 many jobs and industries formerly operated in a physical office of some kind. Once the pandemic hit, companies had to adjust in order to stay operational until the pandemic was over. This resulted in many changes to the system such as companies offering remote working to their employees.
One major change that happened as a result of the pandemic was a greater reliance on digitalization and cloud-based services. According to SpringML the pace of digitalization globally has increased 7X because of the pandemic. A post pandemic study done by the Logic Monitor asked global IT decision makers, “What will the long-term impacts of COVID-19 be on IT organizations worldwide?”. 87% of them agreed that organizations would accelerate their migration to the cloud as a result of COVID-19.
Cloud & Data Evolving More and More:
As of 2022 we’ve already seen many examples of professional services placing a bigger emphasis on cloud and data services. A report from CloudHealth mentioned how spending on computer services decreased because of COVID-19. However, as spending on computer services decreased, total cloud spending increased. Enterprises also investigated moving applications from physical hardware to virtual machines in order to have faster application development and deployment and increased portability.
According to SpringML because of this bigger emphasis on cloud and data, many fundamental shifts took place across many professional services. Because of the reliance on remote work, many companies plan on keeping remote work post pandemic. This means having their data accessible to potentially thousands of employees across a particular area is very important to ensure operations remain smooth.
More and more professional services are starting to adopt multi-cloud services. According to a survey done by the International Data Group, 55% of organizations that utilize cloud services utilize multiple public clouds. They also mentioned how by the end of 2022, they expect 90% of enterprises to use a mix of public, private, and on-premises environments.
Why Things Won’t Go Back to How They Were Pre-Pandemic:
Professional services will forever be changed because of COVID-19. Before the pandemic started, many professional services utilized cloud and data services. However, the pandemic has shown us just how important and reliable these services are. The 7X increase in the pace of digitalization is proof of this. As the days go on, professional services are spending less on computer services and more on cloud spending. An example was that due to everyone working remotely, there was a need for data to be stored and accessible for many different employees. Without cloud and data services, remote working would have been a lot more difficult for professional services to adjust to. In fact, cloud and data services are so reliable that professional services are starting to adopt multi-cloud services. This is evident as 55% of organizations that use cloud services use more than one cloud. By the end of 2022 we could even expect a mix of public, private, and on-premises environments to become the norm. It’s been a long few years, but professional services have proven they can adapt and overcome the challenges that came from COVID-19. We can’t wait to see what other changes will occur in the upcoming future!