IT leaders must navigate the competing priorities of innovation and resilience to build future-ready organisations in 2025

For IT leaders, 2025 is going to be defined by overcoming the dual challenges of driving innovation while ensuring operational resilience. The last 12 months have been an inflection point for AI, as viable solutions were successfully applied to strategic use cases. Now, IT leaders are expected to leverage emerging technologies to deliver tangible business value while ensuring IT systems remain secure, reliable, and efficient.

To achieve success across the next twelve months, IT leaders must focus on building agile, sustainable, ethical, and future-ready organisations capable of adapting to and capitalising on the technology trends that will define 2025.

IT leaders must focus on automation and AI innovation

In 2025, core business processes, such as repetitive tasks, will increasingly become automated across a variety of industries, especially as enterprises adapt, thrive and compete in an environment increasingly shaped by AI.

Automation offers numerous business benefits. It can lead to significant efficiency and cost savings by reducing the time spent on repetitive manual tasks, boosting productivity and limiting human errors. For example, chatbots rolled out by companies, particularly for triaging customer relations, increase efficiency and more space and time for human interactions that may require a personal approach. In many cases, these models are being improved with the further integration of AI, moving from an “inform” to a “serve” approach, where chatbots not only supply the requested information, but also perform tasks. Additionally, automated processes are easier to scale, which supports business growth and agility. For example, e-commerce providers can use automation to improve inventory visibility and accuracy to better handle fluctuations in order volumes.

Throughout 2025, businesses' investments in automation will largely focus on AI, where the technology will be deployed across operations to streamline complex processes, such as supply chain management and fraud detection.

However, several challenges must be considered when integrating AI, the biggest of these is unstructured data. Teams must recognise the critical role of data as the foundation of any AI model. Its success hinges on the quality, quantity, and relevance of the data used. Don’t wrongly assume that quantity of data is the key to a successful model, more data doesn’t necessarily mean smarter AI. IT teams must carefully review and select the data based on quality rather than quantity. This is complex and time-consuming, but will be the difference between an AI model that adds extraordinary value and solves problems, and one that doesn’t.

Alongside this challenge are ethical concerns, regulatory changes and difficulties moving from proof of concept to production. In the changing global regulatory landscape, IT leaders must receive expert advice and guidance specifically around compliance and ethics to avoid costly fines and penalties. Teams should set up protocols to continuously audit AI systems in real time, ensuring they align with organisational values and societal norms.

IT leaders must build resilient, data driven organisations

It's crucial that in 2025, businesses harness all the opportunities that data provides. Data-driven organisations can leverage predictive capabilities and cultivate a culture which encourages employees to rely on evidence-based decision making, reducing biases and improving outcomes.

Vitally, for organisations to become data driven, there needs to be policies in place to ensure compliance with global regulations, like GDPR, and mitigate against potential security threats, such as cyber-attacks and human error. Strong security protocols also help maintain business continuity and customer confidence by preventing downtime and disruptions.

A zero trust approach should be adhered to. This term is self-explanatory, it essentially requires verification at every stage of access. This helps to streamline both security and compliance efforts – two birds with one stone.

To be resilient, organisations require both dedicated, security professionals specifically working to protect against cyberattacks 24/7, as well as a highly trained workforce where all staff are familiar with cybersecurity policies and educated on

everything from password etiquette to phishing awareness. Security should also be a core pillar of all staff's development processes, with continuous training and upskilling as new threats emerge.

IT teams must also ensure robust endpoint security to safeguard the data stored on user devices, such as laptops, from exploitation by malicious actors. Modern endpoint security solutions not only protect these devices and their entry points from threats but also extend protection across networks and cloud environments. These solutions have evolved to deliver comprehensive defence against increasingly sophisticated malware and cyberattacks, ensuring organisations remain resilient in the face of ever-changing threats.

Managing access control is also critical, as from outside and within an organisation, the greatest danger often comes from unauthorised access. Cutting edge solutions can enhance endpoint security by controlling and monitoring how users and devices access organisational resources. For example, Identity and Access Management products offer comprehensive control over user identities and access rights, enabling organisations to define and enforce fine-grained access policies, manage permissions, and dynamically adjust settings.

Don’t wait for a cybersecurity breach to arise, galvanise your company now to protect against potential threats, ensure regulatory compliance and build customer trust.

IT leaders must supports broader, corporate sustainability goals

With climate initiatives and net-zero goals becoming the norm, sustainable IT practices are front of mind for businesses going into 2025.

It’s essential to monitor the carbon footprint of your IT operations and most organisations are already doing this effectively. In 2025, sustainable IT will extend beyond energy considerations, and teams will focus on also refurbishing, reusing and recycling hardware. Sustainable product life cycles help minimise e-waste and supports broader, corporate sustainability goals. Recent Atos research found that a data-driven, condition-based device refresh approach, supported by remanufacturing, can achieve an 8-10 year lifespan versus a standard 3-5 year device lifespan on a fixed refresh cycle without compromising user experience. Since 79% of a laptop’s carbon footprint is produced during manufacturing, life cycle extension can have a huge impact on sustainability. For instance, by doing

nothing but adjusting the standard refresh cycle from three to four years, enterprises can gain a 25% reduction in related emissions without downgrading device performance or user experience.

What we can measure, we can change. With a comprehensive, real-time data strategy, IT teams can make meaningful progress towards environmental objectives. Companies can further reduce their carbon footprint by adopting proven principles. These include utilising renewable energy, prioritising recycling, investing in energy-saving devices, encouraging employees to turn off equipment that's not in use, transitioning to energy-efficient systems, and embracing paperless operations. These changes can have a significant impact and demonstrate that implementing sustainable management, processes, and practices in the workplace doesn’t have to be time-consuming or expensive.

Building future-ready organisations through innovation and resilience

As we move through 2025, IT leaders must navigate the complex interplay between innovation and resilience. By focusing on automation, AI, data-driven decision-making, cybersecurity, and sustainability, they can build agile, ethical, and future-ready organisations. The key to success lies in embracing change, leveraging emerging technologies, and embedding sustainability and security into the core of business strategies.