There have been many challenges experienced in South Africa over the past couple of years, especially in the areas of business and economic activity. Never before have we seen such an enormous impact on how we do business. Of all the sectors and industries that have withstood these changes, the information and communications technology sector have probably experienced the most significant seismic shifts. Being clear about the challenges ahead and how to face them head-on, will be the difference between being capsized by change or thriving through the times.

Here are the main tech concerns for SA businesses.

Data Security Challenges

The most noteworthy impact of a data security breach is losing business from current, as well as potential, customers.

Poor passwords or credential management – as well as misconfigured cloud data storage that allows public access – are the main two causes of data security breaches. As organisations collect and store more information from digital networks, big data security difficulties and cloud data security challenges grow.

In order to avoid big data security threats and concerns, everyone in your business needs to know about big data security and privacy problems, for example:

• Security practices are deemed to conflict with agile development methods.
• Inadequate knowledge of how data flows into and through an organisation.
• Organisations do not know why data has been gathered or created or how to maintain the data to be compliant.

Why Is IT Reliability So Important?

Most employees will not know about the day-to-day running of their organisation’s IT infrastructure. The infrastructure behind a business can be incredibly complex with several moving parts, providing much more than an email system, Wi-Fi and access to a printer.

From allowing employees to process customer orders, to integrating databases and keeping the business’s website running, businesses are increasingly at the mercy of potentially unreliable infrastructure to power their everyday systems.  Unreliable infrastructure can cause much more than just a headache, it can cost a business thousands. In fact, Gartner predicts that on average, downtime costs businesses $5 600 a minute.

Ensuring Reliable IT Systems And Connectivity

Whether corporate entities or services like Big Dollar online casino, businesses have never been more dependent upon reliable network service. Increasingly complex business applications, communication and collaboration, mobile access, and streaming video are among the services that have significantly increased network traffic and intensified connectivity demands.

At a time when network reliability has become an operational imperative, slowdowns resulting from poorly performing IT systems also carry significant business costs. It is estimated that companies lose $26.5 billion in revenue each year due to IT downtime.

Facing The Skills And Talent Gap

Skills gap analysis is a very important tool for organisations to assess the effectiveness of their workforce. Pinpointing any skills gaps present and understanding how they limit company performance is becoming vital thanks to new technologies changing many business sectors.

With AI, automation as well as other advances, many roles are becoming outdated and organisations have to source new skills in order to match growing technological requirements. However, research shows 87% of organisations expect to experience skills gaps in the coming years, with 43% saying that they already have one.