Communication technology provider Cisco, US, recently announced the final installment of the Cisco Connected World Report, an international study conducted by InsightExpress, a US-based third-party market research firm. The report examines the behavioral trends of workers in accessing information anywhere, with any device, and the ability of information technology professionals to address their needs. The latest results focus on data centre, virtualisation and cloud computing trends, and evolving IT roles in the context of increasingly mobile and distributed workforces.
The study found that global IT professionals are creating new job opportunities by increasing collaboration among teams in the data centre, and adopting new technologies such as virtualisation and cloud computing. But they are also struggling to maintain security and data governance as employees demand more offsite access to networks and information. Across the 13 countries in the global study, 52 percent of the IT professionals stated they use or plan to use cloud computing, while much higher cloud adoption rates are predicted in Brazil (70 percent), China (69 percent) and India (76 percent). Across the world, respondents rated the following as their top data center priorities for the next three years: improve agility and speed in deploying business applications (33 percent); better manage resource capacity to align demand and capacity (31 percent); increase data centre resilience (19 percent); and reduce power and cooling costs (17 percent).
The latest findings add to the initial survey results released in October, which revealed that workers want flexible access to corporate information from any mobile device, anywhere, anytime. They are also in tandem with the results released in November, which revealed disconnects in worker expectations around information access, IT policies and employee awareness of policies. The latest survey results examine how IT managers are evolving their data centres and taking advantage of new technologies, while working to accommodate trends in the workplace like social media, device proliferation, video and an increasingly mobile workforce.
Cisco commissioned the study to sharpen its understanding of present-day challenges that companies face as they strive to address employee and business needs amid increasing mobility capabilities, security risks and technologies that can deliver applications and information more ubiquitously, from virtualised data centres and cloud computing to traditional wired and wireless networks.
The global study includes two surveys: one on employees, the other on IT professionals. Each survey included 100 respondents in each of the 13 countries, resulting in a survey pool of 2,600 people.
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