6 Collaboration Trends Shaping the Future of IT

Collaboration-centric strategies are now at the heart of modern IT departments, breaking down formerly rigidly defined siloes and creating responsive, communicative teams through methodologies like agile development.

Instead of reacting slowly to change, IT now plans for it far in advance, remaining flexible enough to respond in real time rather than being purely reactive. Instead of waiting for lengthy analysis and approvals, IT now relies on teamwork and trust to race ahead on execution and delivery.

For these reasons, collaboration trends on the horizon are strong indicators of IT’s future.

Here are six predictions for the future of IT, based on a talk PGi’s John Perkins gave at this year’s Gartner Catalyst Conference in San Diego:

1. Collaboration will be central to IT culture. Now that every company is a technology company, the next step is for every company to become a collaboration company. For IT in particular, this not only means letting teamwork flourish but also strengthening partnerships across departments. IT will become increasingly agile, further embedding themselves throughout the entire organization.
2. IT will migrate from assigned desks to shared spaces. As more flexibility-loving Millennials enter the workplace, permanent workspaces will no longer hold as much value. For newer generations, desks of their own will give way to collective, collaborative spaces that employees can gather around for teamwork.
3. Remote teams will multiply. The most successful IT organizations will go where top talent is and not just rely on co-located workers. Great IT teams will be built on the principle that work is no longer defined as a place, embracing remote teams and flexibility.
4. IT will work together on purpose-built collaboration applications. Eventually, customized collaboration solutions will exist for every function, and IT will even have their own collaboration platform to build upon. This again speaks to IT partnering with LOB leaders to understand each department’s unique needs and building out solutions to meet them.
5. Always-on tools will aid both co-located and distributed agile IT teams. The ability to efficiently communicate and collaborate both synchronously and asynchronously will come to define success in modern organizations, and IT departments will lead this charge. The barriers to entry for collaboration will lower if not completely vanish, allowing IT teams will have the ability to communicate instantly and seamlessly with coworkers across departments, no matter where they are.
6. Context will come to IT. Collaboration solutions of the future will bring context to IT, including relationships and history with collaborators and projects. Instead of searching for the latest project updates or where a conversation last ended, IT will have that information, without having to ask for it, empowering IT to act even faster.

You can watch John’s entire presentation from the Gartner Catalyst Conference now, “360 Degrees of Collaboration: Distributed Agile Delivers,” to learn more about how he transformed his own distributed agile team into the fast-moving, highly effective IT organization it is today.

For more trends and technologies shaping collaboration for IT, download our free eBook “The Future of Business Collaboration: 2015 Edition” today.