Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo 2022 Barcelona: Day 1 Highlights

We are bringing you news and highlights from Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo, taking place this week in Barcelona, Spain. Below is a collection of the key announcements and insights coming out of the conference.

On Day 1 from the conference, we are highlighting the Gartner opening keynote presentation, top 10 strategic technology trends, Gartner’s key predictions for 2023 and beyond, and exploring the state of IT talent and pay strategies. Be sure to check this page throughout the day for updates.

Gartner Opening Keynote: Make the Difference

Presented by Mary Mesaglio, Managing VP, Daniel Sanchez-Reina, VP Analyst and Ed Gabrys, Research VP Analyst at Gartner

CIOs are leading in a world that is deglobalizing, economically disrupted and facing a greater range of threats than ever before. The executive challenge is how to turn these risks into business opportunities. In this session, Gartner analysts Mary Mesaglio, Daniel Sanchez-Reina and Ed Gabrys, shared three key ways in which CIOs and IT executives can use information and technology to lead and make a difference for their enterprises.

Gartner analyst Ed Gabrys on stage at Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo in Barcelona explained how to use IT for sustainable growth.

Gartner analyst Mary Mesaglio said organizations must focus on revolutionary work, responsible investment and resilient cybersecurity to achieve sustainable growth and returns.

Gartner analyst Daniel Sanchez-Reina said CIOs should focus on digital investments that deliver repeatable financial and performance results during Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo in Barcelona.

Key Takeaways

• “CIOs and IT executives should focus on digital investments that deliver repeatable financial and performance results in an efficient and responsible way.This is what Gartner calls IT for sustainable growth.”
• “CIOs can use IT for sustainable growth by focusing on three strategies – revolutionary work, responsible investment and resilient cybersecurity.”
• “Revolutionize work and deliver business results by creating a tech-enabled brand, eliminating work friction and adding AI augmentation by experimenting with the highly-hyped.”
• “Responsibly invest in technologies that will give you a “two for one” return on financial and environmental sustainability.”
• “Resilient cybersecurity will deliver competitive advantage for you in the long term. Treat security as a business risk, benchmark the right security metrics and agree on the right level of protection for your organization.”

Learn more in the Gartner news release “Gartner Says Organizations Should Use IT for Sustainable Growth In Turbulent Times.”

Signature Series: Top Strategic Technology Trends for 2023

Presented by David Groombridge, Distinguished VP Analyst, Gartner

Strategic technology trends have significant disruptive potential and set the stage for innovation over the next five years. In this session, David Groombridge, Distinguished VP Analyst at Gartner, said CIOs and IT executives cannot afford to ignore these trends as they deal with the uncertainty driven by global change.

Gartner Distinguished VP Analyst David Groombridges said the top strategic tech trends for 2023 are centered around the three key themes of optimize, scale and pioneer.

Key Takeaways

• “The Gartner Top Strategic Technology Trends for 2023 span three core themes: optimize operational sustainability, scale productivity and customer value and pioneer productizing individualism”
• Sustainability: To enhance sustainability, organizations need a new sustainable technology framework that increases the energy and material efficiency of IT services, enables enterprise sustainability through technologies like traceability, analytics, renewable energy and others.
• Superapps: A superapp combines the features of an app, a platform and an ecosystem in one application. It not only has its own set of functionalities, but it also provides a platform for third parties to develop and publish their own mini-apps on. By 2027, Gartner predicts that more than 50% of the global population will be daily active users of multiple superapps.
• AI Trust, Risk and Security Management: Organizations that spend time and resources now on managing AI trust, risk, and security will see better outcomes in terms of AI adoption, achieved business goals and both internal and external user acceptance.
• Industry Cloud Platforms: Industry cloud platforms provide a portfolio of capabilities spanning SaaS, PaaS and IaaS, providing industry-specific sets of modular capabilities, to support // specific industry business use cases.
• Wireless Value Realization: As enterprises scale digital, they will require a spectrum of wireless solutions to cater for all environments, from Wifi in the office, through services for mobile devices, to low-power services and even radio connectivity. Gartner predicts that by 2025, 60% of enterprises will be using five or more wireless technologies simultaneously.

These are the Gartner top 10 strategic technology trends that CIOs need to look out for going into 2023.

Learn about five more strategic trends and additional details on each one in the Gartner press release  “Gartner Identifies the Top 10 Strategic Technology Trends for 2023.”

Signature Series: Gartner’s Top Strategic Predictions for 2023 and Beyond — Seizing Uncertainty

Presented by Daryl Plummer, Distinguished VP Analyst, Gartner

The future is always uncertain, but uncertainty brings opportunity — and now is the time to seize opportunities. In this presentation, Daryl Plummer, Distinguished VP Analyst and Gartner Fellow, revealed ten predictions for the future that represent key opportunities and threats facing CIOs and business leaders.

Daryl Plummer, Distinguished VP Analyst at Gartner, presented Gartner’s top strategic predictions for 2023 and beyond at Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo in Barcelona.

Key Takeaways

• Through 2027, fully virtual workspaces will account for 30% of the investment growth by enterprises in metaverse technologies and will “reimagine” the office experience. “If the investments in the metaverse go heavily toward reimagining the work experience, then we can change what it means to collaborate at work.”
• By 2025, organizations that remediate documented gender pay gaps will decrease women’s attrition by 30%, reducing pressure on talent shortages. “Pay is a major driver of attrition, and true equity reduces toxic work culture. Look beyond moral arguments to systems and processes.”
• By 2025, without sustainable artificial intelligence (AI) practices, AI will consume more energy than the human workforce, significantly offsetting carbon zero gains. “AI is a double-edged sustainability source, and it will be critical that CIOs are able to measure gains versus losses.”
• By 2026, citizen-led denial of service (CDoS) attacks, using virtual assistants to shut down operations, will become the fastest growing form of protest. “Virtual personal assistant capabilities make activism easier against organizations.”
• By 2025, shareholder acceptance of “moonshot” speculative investments will double, making them a viable alternative to traditional R&D spend to accelerate growth. “Speculative technology investments are a must-have. IT can champion the ‘moonshot’ culture.”

Gartner has identified ten key predictions that will help CIOs and IT leaders to reimagine their assumptions and turn uncertainty into certainty.

Learn about five additional top predictions in the Gartner press release “Gartner Unveils Top Predictions for IT Organizations and Users in 2023 and Beyond.”

Thanks for following along to Day 1 of the conference. Tune in tomorrow for Day 2 highlights, live from IT Symposium/Xpo in Barcelona!

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