Post-Pandemic Planning: How CIOs Can Help Restructure the Enterprise

If COVID-19 has taught organizations nothing else, it has driven home the need for enterprise agility—the ability to evolve quickly and dynamically to shifting markets, internal disruptions, and global crises. Yet the pandemic has also exposed organizational weaknesses in this regard. According to data from Deloitte’s recent CIO Program Transition Lab sessions, 25% of CIOs indicated that innovation capabilities within their organizations are non-existent; only 11% said their innovation capabilities were industry-leading or excellent.

Does your enterprise have the tools in place to handle the next big market shift? See our checklist of corporate restructuring strategies to make sure your organization is ready for the post-pandemic world.

First things first: Are you taking advantage of digital tools that help respond to fluctuating company and industry demands? Consider the pandemic an example: Were you ready to shift quickly from in-person meetings to video conferencing? Could you foster collaboration among employees working remotely? If the answer is “no” or even “sometimes, yes,” then it might be time to engage in some IT department restructuring, including the adoption of new tools to accommodate an increasingly digital workforce.

Those tools might include cloud-based applications that allow for easy document collaboration, secure sharing services, eSigning capabilities, and reduction (or complete elimination) of paper-based processes. However, new digital applications are only as good as their rate of employee adoption, so make sure your IT department’s restructuring includes a change management plan that accelerates user adoption (i.e. select digital tools that are easy to implement and use).

If you’re not leveraging artificial intelligence and machine learning as part of your corporate restructuring strategy, you’re missing a huge opportunity to make strategic decisions quickly and efficiently. Big data and data analytics have enabled companies to quickly track and analyze huge amounts of information almost instantaneously. It allows for up-to-the-minute financial forecasting, easy modeling of consumer behavior and likely buying decisions, fast processing of data for speedy corporate problem-solving, and increasingly intelligent customer relationship management systems.

According to research from McKinsey Global Institute, the use of AI could add $13 trillion in additional global economic output by 2030, increasing global GDP by 1.2% per year! Isn’t it time your enterprise hopped on this bandwagon?

Understand that the role of IT departments is changing at warp speed. Long gone are the days when IT teams implemented new software, doggedly trained employees, and then waited for their phones to ring with support issues. The modern CIO is leading teams of innovative changemakers who are a critical part of organizational success. IT leaders have a crucial seat at the table when it comes to implementing corporate restructuring strategies that promote more efficient workflows, digital transformations that drive major cost savings, and brainstorming technology solutions to challenges in every aspect of the organization and the market at large. This isn’t just a change in mindset for IT departments; it’s a whole culture change where technologists are driving change instead of just responding to it.

This isn’t the usual call to invest in the best and the brightest. It’s about super strategic thinking when it comes to hiring and placing your employee assets. Today’s CIOs are overhauling the way they hire talent to support a critical need for innovation. Siloed workforces are a thing of the past. Among the many innovations in IT department restructurings are the hiring of non-IT employees to provide guidance and advice on what they actually need from IT departments.

For example, does your IT department support a healthcare team? Then bring an experienced nurse into your department who can advise on the pain points of everything from population health management systems to telemedicine.

CIOs are more critical leaders in corporate restructuring strategies than ever before. In fact, according to a 2019 State of the CIO survey, more than 80% of IT executives are taking on new and expanded roles in everything from business development to customer service. Make sure you and your IT team are part of the solution when it comes to restructuring your organization for success in a post-pandemic work world, and invest in digital partnerships that can help you transform operations quickly and seamlessly.