As the new financial year begins, businesses face fresh challenges and opportunities that will shape their growth and success.
This period marks a crucial time for organizations to evaluate their strategies, adapt to market dynamics, and capitalize on emerging trends. From navigating economic fluctuations to embracing technological advancements, the new financial year presents a dynamic landscape for businesses to overcome obstacles and unlock new possibilities.
Our contact David Bass, Managing Director of Bass PR, has conducted a comprehensive survey among his esteemed clients to gather their valuable insights on the key challenges and opportunities that organizations are expected to encounter in the upcoming year.
Tim Jackson, Managing Director, Access4
What do you see as the challenges for your customers in the new financial year?
Finding and recruiting talent continues to be a challenge across the tech industry. There is light at the end of the tunnel with more visas being approved, however, finding good resources that want to move remains challenging. Couple this with a tightening economy and a slow-down in spending across SMB’s, many organisations are having to deal with longer sales cycles and more pressure on pricing.
What do you see as the opportunities for your customers in the new financial year?
With talent shortages and pricing pressures, the opportunity for our partners is to be more efficient by utilising automation and doing more with less. The modern workplace is here to stay, and businesses that are investing in unified communications and solutions that enable staff to work across a hybrid of environments will see the most success in driving high staff engagement.
Scott Hesford, Director Solutions Engineering Asia Pacific, BeyondTrust
What do you see as the challenges for your customers in the new financial year?
Hiring, retaining and investing in cybersecurity talent will continue to be a challenge for businesses all the while managing their cyber defences. While cybersecurity budgets may grow a little in the coming year investment decisions need to consider capabilities alongside the resourcing requirements and ongoing overheads. For example, modern Privilege Access Management (PAM) solutions may deliver a faster ROI while also require less staff time to manage.
What do you see as the opportunities for your customers in the new financial year?
Given the number of recent data breaches related to unauthorised remote access IT security leaders should look to review, and if needed replace, their remote access capabilities. Typically, VPNs have been used as an all or nothing access for employees, contractors and third parties, sometimes with disastrous effect. Now is the time to consider alternatives to VPNs that give more granular access and control to help reduce your organisation’s attack surface.
Carl Warwick, Regional Sales Director Asia Pacific and Japan, BillingPlatform
What do you see as the challenges for your customers in the new financial year?
In the light of the current inflation, the new financial year will continue to see businesses facing a rising cost of conducting business with everything from rent and office supplies to power and staff salaries. At the same time, despite the high immigration numbers and influx of students, they’ll struggle to find the employees with the right mix of skills and experience at a price point they’re able to pay. All this in a period of global uncertainty which shows no sign of stabilisation.
What do you see as the opportunities for your customers in the new financial year?
Faced with these challenges, increasing numbers of businesses will examining the potential for further automation across their business. By removing manual processes and streamlining workflows, costs can be saved while efficiency is improved. Automation in billing and revenue management will be particularly attractive when a business is faced with a rising tide of data while at the same time wanting to automate, digitise and adopt new applications to help them stay ahead. However, ensuring that teams have the tools and technologies to do things smarter, faster, better and remotely, if need be, will serve a business well, if it wants to provide great customer experiences and revenue goals aligned with strategic business goals.
Ashwin Ram, Chief Security Analyst, Check Point Software Technologies
What do you see as the challenges for your ANZ customers in the new financial year?
Cyber criminals love to take advantage of the current themes making the news. Given we are approaching tax time, this means a heightened focus on phishing campaigns by cyber criminals. Potential types of attacks to be weary of are weaponised office documents that have malware embedded in it or a link to a fake cite. These types of attacks can lead to credential harvesting, ransomware, or extortion. During tax time is also wise to be weary of Business Email Compromise – this type of attack typically targets executives who have the authority to transfer large sums of funds. Cyber criminals will attempt to trick executives into transferring funds to their accounts account rather than the legitimate account the executives think they are transferring to.
What do you see as the opportunities for your customers in the new financial year?
Customers should look to continually educate their employees on the various cyber risks. It is critical Australian businesses are on top of the current and emerging cyber threats. Organisations must educate their employees about the very sophisticated and convincing phishing emails that are now created by threat actors using AI generative engines. These AI engines have the ability to create very compelling emails without any spelling mistakes or incorrect grammar. Therefore, organisations can no longer only rely on cyber awareness training. There must be a focus on preventative AI driven security controls, especially for email security.
Indeed, as organisations deploy newer technologies and increase their digital footprint, it is imperative they understand the risks associated and deal with it effectively and quickly. We highly recommend organisations carry out regular risk assessments and gap analysis to understand their risk posture. Businesses will also do well to regularly test their incident response maturity using a third-party incident response team.
Shane Harding, CEO, Devicie
What do you see as the challenges for your customers in the new financial year?
Productivity in Australia is slipping. Australian businesses will be looking to increase productivity in their IT team and broader workforce in the new financial year. An economic downturn and ongoing IT skills shortage will mean every person, and every machine, will need to be as productive as possible.
Automation will enable IT teams to redistribute resources from manual tasks – for example provisioning laptops, OS patching and application updates – to problem-solving tasks which require human ingenuity and intervention. The ability and willingness to embrace automation is going to be a defining characteristic of the high-performing success stories of tomorrow.
What do you see as the opportunities for your customers in the new financial year?
Identifying tasks which can be completed or supported by automation or AI will be the new vector determining competitive advantage. Resources released from manual tasks will be freed up to focus on high-impact tasks and innovation. We have already seen this in action with Devicie customers who’ve automated laptop provisioning, operating system patching and application updates. In-demand IT resources are released to burn down other tasks, and because machines are up-to-date, there are fewer helpdesk tickets and organisation-wide downtime is reduced.
Martin McGregor, Co-Founder and Executive Chair, Devicie
What do you see as the challenges for your customers in the new financial year?
The proliferation of devices – computers, tablets, phones and emerging technology – has enabled organisations and their team members to work more efficiently. It has also created additional challenges. Over 70% of security incidents originate at end user devices, and managing the needs of a distributed workforce puts significant pressure on infrastructure and security teams.
In the new year, as geopolitical tensions continue, state actors and other hackers will test new tactics to destabilise essential services or make money. Security professionals, who are already in demand and under pressure, will continue to do their best in trying circumstances. They’ll be looking to streamline tasks and gain visibility across their infrastructure and devices to proactively protect their environment and quickly identify and respond to breaches. To ensure that their organisation is safe, security professionals are going to demand better visibility and an uplift in infrastructure to achieve defence in depth.
In addition to affecting everyday Australians whose data is exposed, security incidents impact national productivity significantly. When a breach occurs, organisations often realise that their business continuity plans (and their customers’ business continuity plans) don’t encompass the range of disruptions caused by security incidents.
Christian Lucarelli, Vice President APAC, Nintex
What do you see as the challenges for your customers in the new financial year?
Cost pressure related to what’s happening locally as well as in global markets will be the order of the day, with increased scrutiny on spend. The expectation of a return on investment will be at an all-time high, motivating organisations to pay special attention to how efficiently their teams are operating. This outlook will highlight the need to leverage technology investments that identify process automation opportunities. In addition, teams will be challenged to evolve their thinking on the term ‘digital transformation’ as it develops from merely being a catch-all for activities related to the implementation of technology. Instead, organisations that gain a deep understanding of process efficiencies and get clearer on which use cases to automate before launching into their digital transformation journey are more likely to create teams that successfully interact within the ecosystem of digitisation and automation.
What do you see as the opportunities for your customers in the new financial year?
Despite current economic challenges, organisations can strategically set themselves up for a successful financial year ahead. As a first course of action, businesses should make a concerted effort to understand their processes. This will help them uncover, visualise and improve how work gets done. By honing in on process discovery, teams can get a clear understanding of who is doing what, and how. This level of understanding makes it easier to identify which rote, mundane processes are ripe for automation, freeing teams up to focus on higher-value work and drive better business outcomes. Lastly, IT teams have traditionally been key to driving digital transformation and automation initiatives. In the new financial year, line-of-business teams – who are typically most intimately aware of current business processes and challenges – will have the opportunity to work more closely with IT on the implementation of technology solutions. By partnering more intentionally, this powerful duo can work together to understand, anticipate and solve business and customer challenges.
Stephen Schwalger, Business Development, Director, n3 Hub
What do you see as the challenges for your customers in the new financial year?
With continuing interest rates and cost of living increases businesses face significant challenges. In the banking sector, this will include customer churn and in some cases defaults while in retail sector we see rising costs reducing sales receipts and customers looking for bargains or putting off their purchasing decisions.
What do you see as the opportunities for your customers in the new financial year?
In these tough times customer engagement and communications are critical in building and retaining trust and loyalty. Identifying and understanding who your best customers are and how to find more of them is going to be critical. Businesses that are investing or boosting their use of advanced customer centric marketing platforms with solutions including Customer Data Platforms will be far better positioned and will be able to bounce back faster as the economy rebounds. Understanding what your different types of customers are facing and how that is impacting on their behaviour individually can enable the business to be proactive and make changes that benefit both their customers and their bottom line.
At the same time, marketing will be asked to do more with less, targeting effective communications via the right channel as one of the few options available to marketers. For those with an ability to understand their customers and with the right platforms in place will have a major strategic advantage that allows them to continue to grow even as markets contract.
Ashley Diffey, Vice President Asia Pacific and Japan, Ping Identity
What do you see as the challenges for your customers in the new financial year?
Challenging economic headwinds and increasing financial pressures will mean that companies will need to prioritise security and customer experience budgets that can drive revenue.
What do you see as the opportunities for your customers in the new financial year?
In order to optimise their budgets, companies will focus their investments on technology which can connect and consolidate security platforms to deliver better outcomes and reduce costs. Organisations can win in this uncertain environment by providing better services, seamless customer experiences and focusing of driving innovation in how they deliver goods and services and, ultimately, better understanding how customers want to consume. An example of this might be where customers can present preauthorised digital credentials to perform a transaction.
As a result, enterprises will no longer need to take on the role of storing and managing user data, will save money and reduce the risk of reputational damage caused by breaches. Digital credentials uptake in the new financial year will allow businesses to provide better user experiences. Rather than requiring users to complete lengthy registration forms or applications, enterprises that embrace decentralised identity can have customers scan a QR code, for instance, to provide all of their required identity information. Possessing digital credentials will allow users to protect their personal information and share only what they want to provide which will be of much comfort following severe data breaches across Australia during these past 12 months.
Neal Ross, Chief Technology Officer, Ricoh Australia
What do you see as the challenges for your customers in the new financial year?
Heading into the new financial year we expect one of the key challenges our customers will face is the imperative to continue embracing a hybrid workplace to attract and retain top-tier talent. With the evolving dynamics of work, professionals are increasingly seeking flexible work arrangements that offer a blend of remote and office-based work. To remain competitive in attracting the highest quality of staff, organisations must adapt to the hybrid workplace trend, while providing a seamless experience from home to office that enables maximum collaboration, engagement and productivity of their employees.
Tina Economou, General Manager (Sales and Marketing), Ricoh Australia
What do you see as the opportunities for your customers in the new financial year?
Looking ahead to the new financial year, we believe there will be abundant opportunities to embrace. As the business landscape continues to evolve, we see immense potential for growth, innovation, and transformation. Rapid advancements in technology such as AI, cloud computing and automaton will provide organisations with the chance to enhance operational efficiency, optimise workflows, and deliver exceptional experiences to their customers. In addition, the increasing focus on sustainability and ESG enables businesses to make a positive impact on the environment while building trust and loyalty with their own stakeholders. By evaluating supply chains, implementing eco-friendly practices, and adopting renewable energy sources, businesses can align their operations with ESG standards and contribute to a more sustainable future.
Marcus Chow, Head of Sales, Tecala
What do you see as the challenges for your customers in the new financial year?
Moving into FY 2024, we’ll continue to see IT departments within Australian businesses grappling with the requirement to optimise their IT spend and looking for efficiencies within their business. Today, many organisations still struggle with digital transformation but are fast coming to the inevitable realisation that this is an ongoing evolution which will continue to require budget investment in both people and dollars in the years ahead.
At the same time, businesses will also continue to push up against the ongoing threat of potential cyber breaches which show no sign of slowing down and if not handled proactively will result in reputational damage and exposure to massive fines. Indeed, managing risk and trust will be both a major challenge and an opportunity for businesses at a time when economic headwinds are making forward planning difficult.
What do you see as the opportunities for your customers in the new financial year?
Investment in intelligent automation of both everyday as well as long term strategic business processes coupled with new insights from data integration programs will also enable businesses to reap the advantage of gaining efficiencies in better serving both customers with secure and reliable experiences. Working with expert managed services partners may well also be an ideal solution for companies beset with staffing challenges and requiring the expertise of a reliable IT partner to support transformation. There is also a marked increase in mid-market companies bringing expert managed services partners in to mitigate their hiring challenges, reduce cost and risk, and leverage broader IT skillsets in their business.
Anthony Daniel, Regional Director – Australia, New Zealand Pacific Islands, WatchGuard Technologies
What do you see as the challenges for your customers in the new financial year?
Moving into the new financial year we’re likely to see increasingly sophisticated cyber threats because as technology evolves so do cyber threats. Hackers and nation state attackers never take a rest. At the same time, we see no end to the significant shortage of skilled cybersecurity professionals in Australia and we’ll likely keep on playing catch up in terms of increasing demands for greater regulatory compliance to protect consumer data privacy.
What do you see as the opportunities for your customers in the new financial year?
Cybersecurity training and awareness will ride high on business agendas in FY24 and many enterprises may well look to see the support of specialist security consulting and advisory services to support their increasing requirements for cyber insurance and employee training as well as for expert guidance and advice on cybersecurity best practices, risk assessments, and incident response planning.
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