UK businesses are ahead of Germany, France and Spain in achieving enterprise-wide automation

Red Hat has published new research showing that more than a quarter of large UK businesses surveyed (27%) have achieved enterprise-wide IT automation, where the most valuable IT processes across teams are automated. The majority of respondents have an automation strategy and are working towards enterprise-wide IT automation, either already on the path (29%) or have an automation strategy but haven’t commenced automation yet (25%), while only 4% haven’t automated any processes and don’t plan to.

The report - Thriving through change with enterprise-wide IT automation - surveyed 1,200 IT leaders in large enterprises across the UK, France, Germany and Spain about the role of automation in their businesses today and tomorrow, and the challenges that could hinder success.

Key UK-specific findings:

27% of UK IT leaders surveyed said a lack of talent as the biggest challenge for their businesses today

27% of large businesses surveyed in the UK say they have already achieved enterprise-wide IT automation, compared to large organisations in Germany (18%), Spain (16%) and France (12%)

33% of UK IT leaders surveyed whose organisations have not yet achieved enterprise-wide IT automation believe that without enterprise-wide IT automation, businesses won’t be able to adopt new technology, such as generative AI

36% of UK IT leaders surveyed believe the top benefit of enterprise-wide IT automation is freeing up the business for more creative and strategic thinking

IT leaders’ biggest automation challenges

100% of IT leaders surveyed believe enterprise-wide IT automation has benefits. Benefits cited include better customer service/experience (33%), higher revenue/sales (30%) and more productive teams (28%).

However, a quarter of respondents don’t even have an automation strategy in place (25%).

Of the overall respondents who said they haven’t yet achieved enterprise-wide IT automation (82%), many cite barriers such as:

Teams not having the skills to implement automation (29%)

The organisation’s tech not being mature enough to adopt automation (28%)

Concerns about the cybersecurity implications of automation (28%)

The emerging use of generative AI tools (like Ansible Lightspeed with IBM watsonx Code Assistant) can help address these challenges in future. Ansible Lightspeed enables users to generate consistent, high quality code recommendations for automation challenges, while making it easier for novice users to automate tasks.

Overcoming ‘people’ barriers

When asked about how their teams react to adopting new technology or processes, 92% of IT managers surveyed believed their teams are/would be reluctant to change. A variety of factors are behind this, including that people feel they don’t have time to implement automation (45%), that they’re overwhelmed by changes considered over-complicated or too technical (40%), and that they’d rather do their own thing and don’t want to be told what processes or technology to use (39%).

According to respondents, effective change management can be achieved by clearly outlining the benefits of change at the start and throughout a change process (32%), giving teams the relevant education and training to ensure they have the skills to manage change (31%) and involving teams in the entire change journey so they have a voice (29%).

An automated future

When looking ahead, the IT leaders surveyed highlighted a number of challenges that they believe will impact their business in the future - including a decrease in sales and/or customers (22%), budget cuts (22%) and compliance with government regulations (21%).

Respondents whose organisations have not yet achieved enterprise-wide automation, believe enterprise-wide IT automation can help prepare for future challenges, including:

Without enterprise-wide IT automation, businesses won’t be able to adopt new technology (like generative AI) in the future (28%) or be able to hire and retain talent (26%)

Enterprise-wide IT automation will support businesses to more easily collaborate within their teams (22%) and be better equipped to manage climate change (22%)

Businesses will fail without enterprise-wide IT automation (21%)