The evolution of data in the enterprise

By Chris Gondek, Principal Architect, Commvault

Chris Gondek, Principal Architect, Commvault

In today’s digital economy, organizations are managing huge volumes and increasingly diverse types of data. The growth of technologies like the Internet of Things has increased the volume of user data available for businesses to leverage.

This has also led to an increased impetus on business leaders to manage, protect and use data to make informed decisions, and ensure they make use of it to gain a competitive edge. Not sure if you agree? Consider how the world is being shaken by continuous ransomware attacks such as WannaCry, or even new data legislation like GDPR, which demonstrate the world’s new focus on data. There are several factors driving this change, including:

1. Enterprises are more aware that data is critical to their success

From building smart cities, to developing targeted and personalized marketing campaigns, data has been critical to creating an immensely positive impact in businesses. Organizations have come to understand what a gold-mine data is, and are now treating it as such. For example, data is now the focal point of most organizations’ business strategy. In addition, there has been an increased focus in managing, moving, protecting, and most importantly, using data.

We should continue to look for creative solutions to ensure we are not just leading for the general public, but the industries that serve the general public.

2. Cyber attacks have provided a wakeup call for business leaders to think about their data

The complex threat landscape, and continuous news cycle of compromised organizations has brought to light just how important it is to focus on data, in order to protect it. Business leaders realized that they must think about cyber attacks as an inevitability. Especially given outages are not limited to cyber attacks or natural disasters, they now include human errors too. As a result, organizations are focused on understanding their data: where their data is, what it is, and who has access to it.

3. Cloud is driving awareness

The cloud is the new black and organizations are taking full advantage of this environment. Cost-effectiveness, efficiency and revenue growth are just a few benefits that companies can reap from the cloud, so it’s no wonder that business leaders are moving towards this infrastructure. The benefit of this move is that data awareness must be high on the radar in order to successfully migrate organizations across cloud and on-premise environments.

4. Legislation is making businesses more accountable

External factors such as the tightening of legislation and regulations are making it harder for companies to ignore their data. Currently, there are hundreds of pieces of legislation impacting business processes around a company’s data and burying their heads in the sand is no longer an option for business leaders.

Business leaders have experienced a monumental shift, whereby data is front and centre in both planning and operations. The promises of increased productivity, better customer engagement and increased profitability are too good to miss out on. But in today’s complex IT environment, having a unified overview of where data lives empowers business leaders to be compliant, agile and competitive – three key factors that drive success today.