Enterprise businesses may not change as fast as technology does, but technology forces companies to keep up. The law of the land is evolve or be replaced, and 2015 was a big year for businesses who invested in that evolution. 2015 was the year Amazon took a victory lap and finally outpaced Walmart in terms of market cap. It was a record year of mergers, and despite the problems surrounding Uber, the company has doubled its US drivers in the past year. And there were those that floundered, perhaps most notably with Volkswagen and its emissions scandal.
In 2016, many industries are on the brink of taking off, from virtual reality to 3D printing. More than ever, businesses are looking to be lean, flexible, and scalable. So where are businesses, new and established, setting their sights on in the new year? Check out the five trends below for where enterprise businesses are putting their money and the direction they’re taking their companies in 2016.
1. Hiring Freelancers
Every hiring manager has at one point or another wondered, “where is the talent?” This is particularly true for the technology industry where demand for talented developers far outstrips the supply. While there doesn’t seem to be an answer in sight, many companies are side-stepping the issue by looking outside their local network and hiring freelancers to complete the job.
Not only does this decrease overhead for companies by not having to pay a full salary and benefits, but it gives companies greater flexibility to hire a more diverse range of talent. To supply this demand, private freelance networks like Toptal have seen rapid growth for their ability to find talented freelancers and connect them with clients. In the past year, one in three Americans did freelance work. It looks like the freelance marketplace is here to stay.
2. Converting to the Cloud
It’s no surprise that cloud services are becoming more popular. Amazon Web Services alone saw 80% growth in the second quarter of 2015. Talk about rapid growth - and that growth is happening for a reason. Cloud services are incredibly useful to customers and businesses alike. Being able to access information and services from anywhere has clear benefits for both parties.
Not only that, but cloud services are what makes the Internet of Things possible - another trend that is certainly on many lists for technology in 2016. Cloud services are currently worth $18.8 billion and are expected to increase to $65.4 billion by 2020. This massive growth is due in part to the increasing shift of cloud native applications and businesses as enterprises seek to maintain flexibility in the face of scaling their business.
3. Confronting Cybersecurity
2015 saw several high profile cybersecurity breaches, the victims ranging from banks to health care insurers and even the Army National Guard. In 2016, businesses will put a greater focus on cybersecurity in an attempt to prevent these breaches as customers voice a desire to retain privacy while businesses try to protect their funds and data.
But how can data be protected? Machine learning shows a lot of promise for increasing cybersecurity, but its function is still limited due to the increasing sophistication of cyberattacks. While cloud storage helps prevent local hacking, the cloud itself is vulnerable to cyber attack. With no clear answers, expect businesses to be investing a lot of time and money trying to find them.
4. Contextualizing Big Data
Big data was the talk of the town last year, but the real question is what do we do with it? Processing that much data isn’t easy, and what’s the use if that data isn’t understood for another year when the data is already outdated? It’s not big data that’s practical: it’s big data that can be understood quickly. In Salesforce’s 2015 State of Analytics report, the company reveals findings that show that high performing enterprises are 8.2 times more likely than underperforming businesses to say that analytics is crucial to their business decisions and strategy. The report also predicts an 83% jump in the number of data sources analyzed by 2020.
In the new year, companies will be trying to figure out how to comprehend this data quickly and implement results in the marketplace. Watch emerging tech like Apache’s Storm - software that is contextualizing large amounts of data and streaming it to businesses and seeing how they engage the market. Analytics will play a huge role in understanding big data, so expect that to be a high-in-demand position in the new year.
5. Building Communities
While businesses do exist to provide a product or service to a buyer, enterprises are realizing that success lies in the hands of their relationships with customers more than the quality of what they offer. Users want a personalized experience and one that provides tangible benefits to them. This is true for employees as well.
To provide that kind of experience, businesses are focusing more on building a culture and community. Building a community can mean releasing information and even products for free, generating online content, developing social media, offering mentorship and learning opportunities for employees. Success is not only found in the right business model and service, but in creating strong relationships with employees and users to create a foundation of people who are passionate about the enterprise and what it does.
Keep an eye on these trends in the new year, and implement them to aid your own success. If you see trends that I’ve missed, please leave them in the comments below!