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FOR ENTERPRISE ARCHITECTURE PROFESSIONALS
The Top 10 Technology Trends To Watch: 2016

To 2018
The Age Of The Customer Will Drive Firms To Increase Their Investments In End-To-End
Technology Solutions
by Brian Hopkins and Bobby Cameron
September 8, 2015
Why Read This Report
Key Takeaways
Five years into the age of the customer,

investments in mobile, cloud, big data, predictive
analytics, and social technologies are booming.
But unlike previous technology cycles, tech
investments will continue to grow rather than
diminish throughout the refinement period. This
years top 10 tech trends demonstrate why; a shift
is underway from cyclical, invention-led spending
on point solutions to investments targeting
customer-driven, end-to-end value. Enterprise
architects should read this report to understand
the trends that are enabling continuous customer
value innovation from end to end across
journeys, channels, and the enterprise.
Customer-Obsessed Firms Need End-To-End

Solutions To Create New Customer Value
Standalone investments in customer experience
(CX) are creating market success. But as more
competitors understand the CX opportunity,
leading firms are making broad investments
that span the journeys of the enterprise and its
partners and customers and apply to the entire
customer life cycle -- from end to end.
Investments Are Shifting From Point Solutions
To End-To-End Solutions In Three Phases
In the dawning phase, visionaries experiment
with point solutions to drive innovation. Their
success launches the awareness phase, during
which firms begin to innovate more broadly and
discover the limitations of point solutions. In the
acceptance phase, investments accelerate as
most firms recognize the need for end-to-end
solutions to stay competitive.
Help Your Firm Scale As It Invests
Todays top technology trends open up huge
opportunities, but they also pose challenges in terms
of organization, culture, and maturity --especially
as firms scale. Enterprise architecture (EA)
professionals are uniquely suited to help their firms
address these challenges through their business
technology (BT) agenda.
FORRESTER.COM
The Top 10 Technology Trends To Watch: 2016 To 2018

by Brian Hopkins and Bobby Cameron
with Gene Leganza, Kyle McNabb, Sharyn Leaver, Peter Burris, Leslie Owens, Rachael Klehm, and
Bill Nagel
September 8, 2015
Table Of Contents
Notes & Resources
2 The Age Of The Customer Changes How

Firms Invest In Technology
Forrester interviewed IBM, KPMG, MIT, and

Sogeti in the course of this research.
5 Forresters Top Technology Trends To Watch:

2016 To 2018
Related Research Documents
7 Visionaries Invest In Point Solutions In The

Dawning Phase
The Top 10 Technology Trends EA Should Watch:

2012 To 2014
11 Accelerators Point Solution Investments

Peak In The Awareness Phase
The Top Emerging Technologies To Watch: Now

Through 2020
22 Mainstream Firms Use End-To-End

Solutions In The Acceptance Phase
Top Technology Trends To Watch: 2014 To 2016
Recommendations
29 Help End-To-End Customer Experiences

Scale
What It Means
30 Acceptance Of End-To-End Solutions Will

Redefine The Tech Sector
31 Supplemental Material
Forrester Research, Inc., 60 Acorn Park Drive, Cambridge, MA 02140 USA

+1 617-613-6000 | Fax: +1 617-613-5000 | forrester.com
2015 Forrester Research, Inc. Opinions reflect judgment at the time and are subject to change. Forrester,
Technographics, Forrester Wave, RoleView, TechRadar, and Total Economic Impact are trademarks of Forrester
Research, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective companies. Unauthorized copying or
distributing is a violation of copyright law. Citations@forrester.com or +1 866-367-7378
September 8, 2015

The Age Of The Customer Changes How Firms Invest In Technology

Five years into the age of the customer, companies are changing their business strategy to respond
to the billions of people with wireless broadband, mobile devices, and access to the Internets wealth
of information and social networks. Growth and customer experience (CX) improvement top firms
business priorities, leading to large-scale digital or CX transformation initiatives. This phenomenon
affects all types of organizations: business-to-consumer (B2C), business-to-business (B2B), and
government-to-citizen. As a result, technology leaders are:
Continuing to bet big on BT to win, serve, and retain customers. In 2009, Forrester foresaw a
classic technology cycle: a wave of innovation and growth between 2008 and 2016 followed by
a period of refinement and design from 2016 to 2024.1 BT spending has indeed boomed and will
increase by 10% in both 2015 and 2016.2 In previous cycles, periods of heavy tech investment
were followed by time to digest the advances. But this time is different; complex engagement and
continuous customer innovation mean that your business cant afford to slow down to digest and
rationalize new technology.
Moving beyond point solutions by investing in end-to-end technologies. Spending remains
strong, but the nature of that investment is changing. Early in the age of the customer, firms
met their needs quickly and cheaply with point solutions. But relentless competitive pressure is
exposing the cracks in this strategy. For example, manufacturers pursuing connected products
are often not prepared for the associated tech support costs. Through 2018, firms will increasingly
recognize the need for end-to-end solutions that connect customer experiences throughout the
customer life cycle (see Figure 1).3
FIGURE 1 End-To-End Solutions Differ From Traditional Rationalization Approaches
Traditional enterprise approach
End-to-end approach
Architecture qualities Conformance to standards;

tight integration; designed as
a single entity
Modular/zone standardization;
leveraging of foundational elements
like managed APIs and continuous
business services; modular design
Requirements drivers Lines of business; defined from

the offering (brand-out)
Ecosystemwide customer journeys;

defined from the outside in
Executed by Portfolio rationalization and tech

consolidation; slow-cycle
governance; waterfall delivery
Flexible sourcing; fast-cycle

outcome governance; continuous
delivery through Agile and DevOps
2015 Forrester Research, Inc. Unauthorized copying or distributing is a violation of copyright law.
Citations@forrester.com or +1 866-367-7378
September 8, 2015

Technology Investments Shift Toward End-To-End Solutions In Three Phases

Falling hardware costs, increasing connectivity, and the relentless march of Moores Law and its
spinoffs continue to supply the raw materials to meet the strong technology demands of the age of
the customer. The result: a maelstrom of inventions and trends that Forrester has been tracking since
2009.4 But in this new, end-to-end stage of the age of the customer, technology trends will mature in
three phases, each with its own characteristic tech investment pattern (see Figure 2):
Dawning phase trends spur invention-rich point solution investments. Visionary firms spur
success by developing or exploiting technology inventions, such as the use of web click data to
create new customer insights (CI) pioneered by Google and Amazon. In the dawning phase of a
trend, organizations focus most investments on point needs: For example, one large US retailer
collects lots of digital channel data but doesnt share the insights with its physical stores. Firms
often implement these point solutions with minimal support from technology management (TM) or
coordination with other parts of the business.
Awareness phase trends push the limits of point solutions. Early successes lead more firms
to jump in, ultimately exposing the limitations of point solutions. One financial services firm with
a huge marketing data warehouse recognizes that it has a lot of work to do before it can use the
collected customer data to drive insights in sales, customer support, and product development. TM
will get more involved as the appetite for end-to-end solutions increases: USAAs TM team worked
with its partner TrueCar to deliver Auto Circle, which digitally enables the car-buying journey from
end to end.5
Acceptance phase trends force end-to-end technologies into the mainstream. In the final
phase, mainstream firms embrace investments in end-to-end solutions. For example, retail resellers
of Proctor & Gamble (P&G) products share sales data with the consumer packaged goods giant
to optimize replenishment and reduce stock-outs; P&G then shares this demand data with its
distributors and suppliers, accelerating the end-to-end impact. TM becomes even more deeply
involved in this phase.
September 8, 2015

FIGURE 2 Technology Trends Move Toward End-To-End Digital Investments In Three Phases
Investment
appetite
End-to-end
investment
Point solution
investment
Dawning
Awareness
Acceptance
Time
Dawning of investment
End-to-end awareness
End-to-end acceptance
High appetite for

ad hoc point solutions
Growing appetite for

end-to-end solutions; point
solutions peak and begin to
decline
High appetite for

end-to-end solutions
Driven by new inventions

and experimentation
Driven by a mix of
experimenting with new
inventions and innovating
on existing inventions
Driven to solve complexity,

mostly by innovating on
existing inventions
Delivered by individual
organizations
Delivered by a mix of
individual and ecosystemwide organizations
Mostly delivered as part of

ecosystemwide operating
models
Little tech management

involvement
Increasing tech
management involvement
Significant tech
management involvement
September 8, 2015

Forresters Top Technology Trends To Watch: 2016 To 2018

Forresters top technology trends span all three phases; at least half of those trends will be in the
awareness phase in 2016 and shift to the acceptance phase by 2018 (see Figure 3). To help enterprise
architects prioritize their plans for this transition, Forrester has plotted this years top trends in terms of:
Phase of development. Use this to evaluate your firms readiness to invest. For example, dawning
phase trends have few best practices, so firms must be willing and able to assume more risk.
Appetite for investment in point solutions or end-to-end solutions. Understand this to gauge
how willing your business is to solve the difficult problems that end-to-end solutions always raise.
Rate of change. Use this as ammunition to plan for trends you need to act on immediately. For
example, acceptance phase trends should be something you have already addressed.
September 8, 2015

FIGURE 3 In 2016, Half Of Forresters Top Technology Trends Will Be In The Awareness Phase
Investment
appetite
Slowly developing
Progressing
4
3
Accelerating
10
8 9
Point solution
investment
Dawning
End-to-end
investment
Awareness
Acceptance
Time
Trends
Essential reading
A smart, connected world delivers

new customer value and relationships
The Internet of Things Will Transform Customer

Engagement
Internet-Of-Things Software Platforms Simplify
Transformation Of Business Operations
Systems of insight power digital

business decisions
Digital Insights Are The New Currency Of Business

Transform Customer Experiences With Systems Of Insight
APIs help firms react to and

drive digital disruption
How APIs Reframe Business Strategy

Brief: Four Ways APIs Are Changing Your Business
Digital CX delivery struggles with

organizational limitations
Transform Customer Processes And Systems To Improve

Experiences
Elevate Omnichannel Customer Experience With
Continuous Business Services
Digital reality drives new security

and risk strategies
Top Security And Risk Priorities For The Business

Technology Agenda
Three Technical Innovations Will Ignite Zero Trust
Hyperconnected hyperadopters
change the way businesses invest
The Future Of Business Is Digital

Understand The Digital Business Landscape
Customer obsession accelerates

business technology maturity
The CIO Mandate: Engaging Customers With Business

Technology
CIOs, CX, And End-To-End Tech Management
Infrastructure capability snowballs

in response to digital demand
Service Design Is Your New Approach To Infrastructure

Organize The Chaos Of Cloud With A Realistic And
Effective Strategy
Firms use software to make their

brand special
Software Must Enrich Your Brand

Customer Obsession Will Remake AD&D Tools And
Supporting Technologies
Customer-obsessed firms empower

their workforce with technology
Vendor Landscape: Collaborative Work Management

For The Enterprise
Equipped To Thrive: Help Employees Turn Mobile
Moments Into Customer Value
10
September 8, 2015

Visionaries Invest In Point Solutions In The Dawning Phase

Visionaries lead trends in the dawning phase. For example, Apple, Amazon, and Netflix recognized
the age of the customer well before anyone else and created systems of engagement to exploit
opportunities and dominate industries. Forresters two dawning-phase trends nominally about
big data and the Internet of Things (IoT) may seem a better fit for the awareness phase given all
the industry hype. But Forrester sees a new generation of visionaries harnessing the power of these
technologies from end to end in ways the rest of the market has missed (see Figure 4).
FIGURE 4 Dawning Phase Trends Present Important Leadership Opportunities
Investment
appetite
Slowly developing
Progressing
Accelerating
Point solution
investment
1
Dawning
A smart, connected world

delivers new customer value
and relationships
Systems of insight power digital
business decisions
End-to-end
investment
Awareness
Acceptance
What is changing now?

Visionaries are exploring
new ways to connect with
customers.
Big data limitations are leading
to point systems of insight.
Time
What will happen by 2018?

Visionaries will create new
point IoT value streams.
Visionaries will use point
systems of insight to
differentiate themselves.
September 8, 2015

Trend 1: A Smart, Connected World Delivers New Customer Value And Relationships
Sensor-enabled smart products are transforming the relationship between companies and buyers;
businesses and consumers expect more interactive, value-added experiences from everything they
buy. But its early in the dawning phase of the IoT, and most firms dont yet understand that smart
connected objects create ongoing customer relationships rather than one-time transactions (see Figure
5).6 Firms can no longer sell and forget. Visionary firms will disrupt industries as they create twoway relationships that offer more value and yield deeper insights into customer needs. Tesla Motors
regularly improves CX via over-the-air software updates to its Model S car. We see that:
Firms are creating smart connected products. Industrial firms like General Electric (GE) and
John Deere are making or retrofitting machinery and assets to use the IoT to improve efficiency and
reduce downtime.7 Consumer goods manufacturers such as Crock-Pot and Nest offer products
that transform the user experience with convenience and service.8
Marketing, CX, and sales seek deeper insights from device data. Early in the dawning phase
of the IoT, most front-office execs remain deeply mired in organizational issues around more basic
digital initiatives. While they vaguely sense the opportunity, they cannot imagine how to turn highvelocity device data into real-time customer insights in an effective way throughout the customer
life cycle.
Visionary firms will innovate to find new value in end-to-end IoT solutions. IoT projects can get
bogged down in operational issues with connected devices. Visionaries will solve these problems
by recognizing the potential in end-to-end solutions and making well-timed investments. For
example, Tesla will have a valuable digital asset when it learns how to use data from connected
cars to upsell at trade-in time.
EA Must Help With The Business Plan To Deal With End-To-End IoT Complexity
The market will remain in the dawning phase of this trend for the next three years, but enterprise
architects can help push their business ahead by:
Engaging with the product and operations organizations. Data and insights from devices
need to flow into enterprise systems and vice versa. EA can create insights services and add
connectivity and insight to customer support software to meet rising customer expectations.
Framing end-to-end benefits in terms of age-of-the-customer priorities. Help business leaders
justify investments in end-to-end IoT solutions by focusing on customer benefits. Use revenue,
growth, and CX improvements as levers to keep projects from stalling due to operational problems
such as unanticipated tech support needs for connected products.
Finding customer data capture and insight opportunities. Take apart your firms IoT plans and
identify points for capturing customer data and inserting insights. Use these to guide technology
decisions that take customer knowledge into account and improve CX.
September 8, 2015

For additional information, please read the following reports:

Brief: The Internet Of Things Will Transform Customer Engagement
Internet-Of-Things Software Platforms Simplify Transformation Of Business Operations
The Smart Home Finally Blossoms
Brief: CIOs Will Architect And Operate The Internet Of Things
FIGURE 5 The Internet Of Things Most Important Impact Will Be Customer Relationship Changes
1 A smart, connected world delivers new customer value and relationships

2016
2017
Early dawning phase:

Visionaries explore new
customer relationships
created by IoT solutions.
Important technologies:
Cloud analytics platforms
IoT platforms
Wireless connectivity
Software-defined networks
Streaming analytics
Lack of best practices,

lack of standards, and
technology immaturity
keep progress slow.
2018
Late dawning phase:
Visionaries have created
new value streams with
point solutions.
Consider adding to your BT agenda:

Cloud solutions for IoT data capture and deep customer analytics
Streaming solutions for real-time experience automation
IoT platform experiments that deliver customer insights to
experience delivery action
Trend 2: Systems Of Insight Power Digital Business Decisions

Firms pursuing big data and analytics for CX improvement are running up against their limits as point
solutions so visionaries are developing systems of insight to solve problems that big data cant
by systematically harnessing data, testing insights, and creating actions (see Figure 6). The best
ones close the loop by using the resulting data to learn what worked and what doesnt. For example,
digital predators like Shutterfly, Netflix, and LinkedIn all have insights-to-execution processes. They
continuously mine real-time application data for new lessons; identify actionable insights; act on these
insights using engagement software; and evaluate expected and actual outcomes to improve future
insights. As you evaluate your data and analytics strategy, understand that:
September 8, 2015

Firms now expect big data and analytics to help them serve customers . . . The firms of 40%
of global data and analytics decision-makers surveyed by Forrester will invest more than $10
million in data and analytics technology in 2015.9 Two-thirds expect to use big data analytics to
help optimize digital experiences.10
. . . but big data and analytics alone do not guarantee effective action. Only 25% of data and
analytics decision-makers say that their business intelligence (BI) efforts are improving customer
interaction and satisfaction.11 Even as firms invest in big data to improve, they see point solutions
falling short because they have no mechanisms to validate and implement insights to create
actions and do not capture learning in a cycle of continuous improvement.
Successful firms will mesh people, processes, and technology into systems of insight. A few
digital disruptors are creating differentiating experiences by embedding insights-driven execution
into business operations. Systems of insight provide the key ingredients: insights teams, processes
to guarantee insights-to-execution, and enabling technology.
EA Must Support Insights Teams And Build An Insights Architecture
As enterprise architects become aware of this trend, they must evolve their strategy to support insights
teams and digital insights architecture by:
Making data accessible anywhere and everywhere. Theres simply too much data to fit in any
one technology solution like Hadoop. Plan to evolve from data hubs to a pluggable insights fabric
that can make data available to insights teams and serve up insight to applications on demand.12
Putting power and data into the hands of insights teams. Each insights team will want its own
set of tools for discovery, testing, and implementation. Support these needs with BI, analytics, data
preparation, collaboration, and governance technologies. Avoid rigid one-size-fits-all solutions and
favor an approach that enables the varying needs of insights teams.
Enabling feedback flows through data streaming and metadata. Accelerate the creative
process of finding, testing, and delivering insights through software with a feedback loop. Plan
architectures that tap and define available data feeds from applications, devices, and external
sources. Leverage cloud to be flexible and pay only for what you need. Enhance the learning
process with insight testing tools from vendors like Cognitive Scale.
Digital Insights Are The New Currency Of Business
Transform Customer Experiences With Systems Of Insight
Is Your Data Management Ready For Systems Of Insight?
Its Time To Upgrade Business Intelligence To Systems Of Insight
10
September 8, 2015

FIGURE 6 Firms Will Turns To Systems Of Insight To Overcome Big Data Limitations
2 Systems of insight power digital business decisions

2016
2017
Late dawning phase:

Firms reach the limits of
siloed big data and analytics.
Visionaries build point
systems of insight.
Predictive analytics
Big data management, data hubs
Data virtualization
APIs for insights services
Business rules engines
Streaming analytics
Visionary firms
demonstrate disruption
and drive more digital
business decisions with
real-time insight.
2018
Mid-awareness phase:
Point solutions peak as a
lack of coordination works
against enterprise strategy.

Building an insights fabric
Creating a set of insights services
Enabling a data science workbench and plugging into a data lake
Piloting the insights team concept to impact CX outcomes
Cross-training agile DevOps and data science teams
Accelerators Point Solution Investments Peak In The Awareness Phase

Accelerators invest to take advantage of the changes highlighted by five awareness phase trends (see
Figure 7). Four of them customer insights, organizational challenges, security and privacy, and BT
maturity are late in the awareness phase. The fifth, around APIs, is still early in the phase but is
accelerating rapidly as firms chase the ability to deliver and reconfigure solutions quickly. Expect the
initially high demand to invest in point solutions in these areas to gradually decline as firms become
disillusioned: The technologies they expected to save the day wont do so, at least not as point
solutions and they will need architects help to go further.
11
September 8, 2015

FIGURE 7 Awareness Phase Trends Represent The Market Momentum In 2016
Investment
appetite
Slowly developing
Progressing
End-to-end
investment
Accelerating
6
7
Point solution
investment
Dawning
3
4
5
6
7
Awareness
APIs help firms react to and

drive digital disruption
Digital CX delivery struggles
with organizational limitations
Digital reality drives new security
and risk strategies
Hyperconnected hyperadopters
change the way businesses invest
Customer obsession accelerates
business technology maturity
Acceptance

Successful accelerators are
raising awareness.
Point solution growth is
revealing organizational pain.
Headline breaches continue to
reinforce current inadequacies.
Customer insight silos make
opportunity planning difficult.
End-to-end digital successes
are demonstrating BTs value.
Time
Mainstream firms will launch
end-to-end API strategies.
Many mainstream firms will
linger in denial.
The depth of change required
will keep progress slow.
End-to-end CI and iterative
planning will be the norm.
BT will become mainstream
as IT stalwarts fail and leave.
Trend 3: APIs Help Firms React To And Drive Digital Disruption

Enterprises looking to meet the needs of powerful customers, fend off digital disruptors, and disrupt
themselves are starting to view APIs as a tool for rapid business reconfiguration. Over the next three
years, firms will increasingly use APIs to create customer-obsessed business strategies and pursue
existing strategies with greater speed and agility (see Figure 8). For example, like most financial
services firms, Denmarks Saxo Bank faces threats from digital disruptors, so it decoupled its trading
engine from its user experience and invoked them separately via APIs. This changed the banks
strategy: It can now quickly innovate with technology on its trading engine without affecting its CX
optimization efforts. More importantly, Saxo could license its trading engine to other firms. As this trend
moves from dawning to full market awareness:
12
September 8, 2015

Firms feel the heat to keep customers, fend off disruptors, and become disruptors. Ninetythree percent of businesses say that they are facing disruptive competition or will soon do so.13
Customers quickly abandon one firm for another if it better integrates into their world. Firms that
can adapt quickly will have an advantage.
APIs are creating a new perspective on business strategy. APIs let firms rapidly reconfigure
business capabilities to create value for existing customers. They also let businesses plug into new
ecosystems and serve new customers. As a result, APIs have become an important strategic weapon.
The best firms will prioritize business APIs to wrap business services. Many different types
of APIs provide value. Visionaries have a clear focus on business APIs as the platform for rapid
strategic change. These APIs will serve as the point of contact between business services and
customer-facing applications and processes.
EA Must Start Framing APIs As Enablers Of Business Services
As more firms invest in point solutions and realize that they cannot serve customers across the life
cycle, enterprise architects must supercharge their API mojo by:
Showing their business savvy. Enterprise architects must be businesspeople first and
technologists second. Business leaders like the CEO of Saxo Bank understand the strategic
value of APIs but most firms will require business-savvy tech leaders to help them make the
connection. Physically colocating business architects with the business organizations they serve
helps make this happen.
Using business capabilities as a launching point for API definition. Partner with your business
domain subject-matter experts to define business capabilities and use those definitions to design
APIs. Brainstorm linkages with existing business strategies and new opportunities to play in
adjacent ecosystems. This will elevate your API strategy to a foundation for business agility.
Creating an API taxonomy and platform. Establish and publicize a strategic taxonomy of API
categories and types. Use it to keep development focused on business APIs while also guiding the
creation of other API types. Develop your API management and broader API platform based on
your user audiences, current infrastructure, and business plans.
How APIs Reframe Business Strategy
Brief: Four Ways APIs Are Changing Your Business
Sizing The Market For API Management Solutions
A Developers Guide To Forresters Strategies For API Success
13
September 8, 2015

FIGURE 8 APIs Are No Longer Just A Technology Enabler They Enable Business Strategy
3 APIs help firms react to and drive digital disruption

2016
2017
Early awareness phase:

Successful APIs for mobile
and the need for agile endto-end customer service
raises the awareness of
APIs as a strategy.
API management suites
Insights service providers
Integration tools
Enterprise service buses
Metadata management tools
Open web standards
Acceleration continues
as more firms use APIs to
connect solutions end to
end for customer scenarios,
process optimization,
and B2B.
2018
Early acceptance phase:
End-to-end solutions attract
investment as mainstream
firms develop end-to-end
strategies.

Defining services that expose key business capabilities that
customer-facing functions need
Exploring data and insights service revenue streams exposed by
APIs
APIs enabling mobile apps that partners can plug into
Trend 4: Digital CX Delivery Struggles With Organizational Limitations

Investments in mobile, social, analytics, and software-as-a-service point solutions are at their peak,
but awareness of and investment in end-to-end solutions are ramping up (see Figure 9). These
technologies appeal to business execs as a way to understand and flexibly engage customers. But
businesses are waking up to the need for integration across channels and throughout the customer life
cycle, increasing their appetite for end-to-end solutions. But over the next three years, firms will wrestle
with organizational and cross-channel challenges. For example, when marketing and operations dont
coordinate their tech investments, customer support cant keep up with the demand spikes marketing
campaigns create. As digital CX investments shift toward end-to-end approaches, expect to see
organizational conflicts blossom as:
Digital CX point solutions are compelling for individual business needs . . . Point solution
vendors offer as-a-service, mobile, and analytics-powered solutions for every need and vertical.
They can be up and running in weeks music to the ears of frustrated digital business execs. But
all too frequently, different parts of the business make these decisions without coordination. This
works fine until complex end-to-end needs become critical.
. . . but attempts to expand their use run afoul of organizational issues. Firms with lots of
point solutions cant change customer support, product development, and the back office quickly
enough to keep up with new marketing or sales changes. Firms often need to realign organizational
and management incentives in conjunction with tech investments or even before making them.
Culture is often at issue as well.
14
September 8, 2015

Successful firms create agility with continuous business services (CBSes). CBSes are thin layers
of process and technology that deliver three benefits. They define how firms will evolve their business
capabilities; help maintain integrity and coherence among many independently changing customerfacing functions; and reduce political friction associated with end-to-end CX transformation.
EA Must Develop Technology Solutions That Alleviate Organizational Challenges
As firms invest in end-to-end solutions, enterprise architects must help their firm solve organizational
challenges by:
Exploiting EAs skills and knowledge for CX. Well-run EA programs create and clarify plans to
execute enterprise strategy. Select business-savvy architects, steep them in CX know-how, and
task them to deliver value, not standards. This emerging CX architect role is a critical evolution for
customer-obsessed firms.
Bringing the right people together. EA is a collaborative practice; use your skills to unify CX,
CI, and TM. Use customer journey analysis to identify high-value cross-channel and crossdepartmental pain points. Select and invite partners that understand both the line-of-business and
enterprise view of customers digital transformation.
Making cloud-first and mobile-first the watchwords for digital CX. Digital, marketing, and CX
teams are pushing ahead fast and require agile, flexible, and mobile platforms to host the solutions
they need. Architects will find enthusiasm, alignment, and funding when they embrace managed
APIs, flexible sourcing, and CBS delivery models.
Transform Customer Processes And Systems To Improve Experiences
Elevate Omnichannel Customer Experience With Continuous Business Services
Master Business Agility With Cloud Platforms
Mobile Needs A Four-Tier Engagement Platform
15
September 8, 2015

FIGURE 9 Organizational Limitations Will Slow Mainstream Firms Efforts To Transform CX Through Technology
54 Digital CX delivery struggles with organizational limitations

2016
2017
CX point solution investments
have peaked. There are
painful organizational issues
with end-to-end solutions.
Cloud integration tools
Mobile engagement platforms
Social business applications
Analytics-as-a-service
Customer data management
platforms
API management
Organizational pain
becomes intense, but the
scope of the required
changes inhibits
mainstream firms.
2018
Late awareness phase:
Many mainstream firms
remain in denial, but
visionaries and accelerators
prosper.

Data integration across on-premises and cloud solutions
A mobile application for every customer engagement
Contextual master and reference data sets
Defining and implementing continuous business services for crosslife cycle common functions
Trend 5: Digital Reality Drives New Security And Risk Strategies

The pain of todays scattered and underwhelming investment in security and privacy technologies
has become intolerable. Firms cannot be customer-obsessed if they cant protect themselves and
their customers from breaches. But processes and data are no longer confined to the corporate
infrastructure. As firms embrace end-to-end security and risk solutions, they see the need for a new
approach. Perimeter and trust-focused approaches to cybersecurity arent enough; accelerating firms
are adopting proactive approaches like Zero Trust (see Figure 10). For example, WestJet embraced
Zero Trust with virtual networks and a segmentation gateway; it reduced the number of firewall rules
and improved its ability to understand and monitor network traffic. As firms become increasingly aware
of this trend, they are:
Expanding their digital reach and analytical acumen. Mobile, bring-your-own-device (BYOD),
big data analytics, and the IoT create powerful business opportunities. Since 2010, firms have
made lots of point investments in network and data security and compliance technologies,
leveraging data from a variety of sources along the way.
Struggling to control and protect sensitive data at the source. Firms engage with customers
across a variety of digital channels. Business applications are more likely to live in the cloud, while
business operations rely on many third-party partners and employees demand the ability to
access data that they need for work from any location on any device.
16
September 8, 2015

Embracing metrics that focus on data use and culture. Firms cant afford to view security and
privacy in terms of risk reduction, cost reduction, and regulatory compliance anymore. Leaders
view it as a competitive differentiator and aspire to monitor everything, trust nothing, and intercept
problems in real time. They also embrace cultural change by positioning security and privacy as a
corporate social responsibility.
EA Must Develop A Zero Trust Road Map
As firms move to embrace data protection as a corporate social responsibility and treat data security
and privacy as a competitive differentiator, enterprise architects must understand and prepare for the
depth of change required by:
Architecting networks based on Zero Trust concepts. Forresters Zero Trust model of
information security eliminates the idea of a trusted internal network and an untrusted external
network.14 Today, its easier to build a Zero Trust network thanks to three tech innovations: nextgeneration firewalls, virtual network infrastructure, and network orchestration solutions.15
Defining your firms sensitive data. Data-centric controls and the Zero Trust model start with the
data. You cannot expect to protect data if you dont know what data exists, where it resides, who
can use it, and what value it has to the organization. Data discovery and classification is not an
effort for EA alone its an organizationwide initiative.16
Understanding that technology and compliance alone is not enough. A firm that meets security
compliance requirements is not necessarily secure.17 Data security can exist without privacy, but
privacy cannot exist without security.18 Data governance and stewardship are just as important as
technology controls for data protection.
Top Security And Risk Priorities For The Business Technology Agenda
Three Technical Innovations Will Ignite Zero Trust
Top 11 Trends S&R Pros Should Watch: 2015
The Future Of Mobile Security: Securing The Mobile Moment
17
September 8, 2015

FIGURE 10 The Depth Of Change Will Slow Security And Risk Improvement Efforts
525 Digital reality drives new security and risk strategies

2017
2016
Breaches continue to make
headlines, reinforcing the
fact that todays solutions
are not working.
Next-generation firewalls
Virtual network infrastructure
Network orchestration solutions
Big data risk solutions
Policy monitoring and
enforcement
Content and context intelligence
Investments in end-to-end
security and privacy start
to pay off. Mainstream firms
see that leaders benefit
from their investments.
2018
The depth of cultural and
network change needed
keeps the pace slow and
within the awareness phase.

Formal processes for identifying and addressing customer
complaints
Policy monitoring for enterprise marketing
Customer service and communication monitoring
End-to-end payment security across channels
Customer fraud monitoring and recovery
Trend 6: Hyperconnected Hyperadopters Change The Way Businesses Invest

Technology continues to create a rich information fabric that hyperconnects our society; customers
know what things cost and where theyre cheapest and want them at the touch of a button. These
hyperconnected customers adopt new technology at a blinding pace; to keep up, businesses are
changing the way they plan and invest. First, firms seek an up-to-the-minute view of customers their
desires, history, and perception of experiences.19 Second, companies are changing how they use CI
to invest iteratively (see Figure 11). For example, financial services firms see the opportunity to use
customer data collected in a marketing warehouse to improve online experiences, help call center
agents, and support better portfolio management. In the past, firms would have undertaken long,
complex data management projects to satisfy their needs, but impatient businesses wont wait. They
need a new way to invest in change which recognizes that:
Business-unit leaders strive to engage customers in dynamic ecosystems. Consumers
can now pick and choose from a wide variety of digital services to fit their lifestyle. This requires
dynamic ecosystems built around customer value, not products something that confuses
digitally immature firms. Early in this trend, firms invest in point solutions just to get started.
Customer insights are illuminating end-to-end benefits. Hyperconnectivity and hyperadoption
of technology not only change behavior, they provide an unprecedented chance to use CI as a
strategic weapon. Leaders see this potential, but change is slow, as many organizations still treat
customer analytics as a silo.20
18
September 8, 2015

Leaders will disrupt their planning and investment. As this trend progresses, firms will abandon
rigid annual planning and organizational silos to respond to changing customer needs. They will
quickly iterate on opportunities that deliver end-to-end customer value and use up-to-the-minute
CI to better understand which initiatives deliver value so they can more easily abandon the less
valuable ones.
EA Must Make Customer Insight And Agile Planning The Centerpiece Of Strategy
As businesses demand more end-to-end capabilities to participate in evolving ecosystems with deep,
rich CI, enterprise architects must flip their point of view from inside-out to outside-in by:
Mapping business capabilities to current- and future-state customer journeys. Business
capability maps are a common tool for architecture planning, but they can create inside-out
strategies. Journey maps create an outside-in view, but tend to focus on the current state. Help
your firm define future-state journey maps and use business capabilities to define enterprise gaps.
Helping extend CI across the customer life cycle. Traditional approaches to customer analytics
focus on specific inside-out objectives like marketing campaign ROI. But a new breed of CI
professionals is driving rich insights throughout the customer life cycle, shifting focus to customer
value and profitability.
Elevating portfolio management to iterative strategic business planning. Technology managers
have been managing tech investment and innovation portfolios for years. Now is the time to apply
these skills and technologies to help your business manage its end-to-end digital investments.
The Future Of Business Is Digital
Understand The Digital Business Landscape
Revamp Strategic Planning From The Outside In
Turn Data Into Intelligence With Customer Analytics
19
September 8, 2015

FIGURE 11 Business Will Embrace Iterative Strategic Planning Driven By Customer Insights
6 Hyperconnected hyperadopters change the way businesses invest

2016
2017

The pain of point customer
insights silos becomes
unbearable. Accelerators
use iterative planning to
outpace competitors.
Customer analytics packages
Customer journey analytics and
portfolio management CRM
Digital experience management
and delivery
Business strategy and portfolio
management tools
Many firms use customer

insights to drive strategy.
Iterative planning remains
the exception rather than
the norm.
2018
Mid-acceptance phase:
End-to-end customer
insights are the norm. Iterative
strategic planning eclipses
annual approaches.

Customer journey discovery
Advanced customer analytics methods
Expanding CRM throughout the customer life cycle
Instrumenting and tapping more customer engagement data
sources
Business innovation portfolios and governance
Trend 7: Customer Obsession Accelerates Business Technology Maturity

TM faces a new competitive reality: Meeting traditional IT efficiency goals and helping the firm become
customer-obsessed what Forrester calls tech managements dual agenda. Driving the BT agenda by
replacing point solutions with an end-to-end approach requires integrating processes and technologies
throughout the customer life cycle. And execs will insist that the resulting solutions be both flexible
and cost-effective (see Figure 12). For example, GE and Wal-Mart have dramatically upskilled their
tech teams, behaving like cloud-based software companies as they build and manage their experience
architectures. This approach to architecture and services enables speed, flexibility, and pay-per-use
cost structures. Mainstream firms will catch up by 2018 when they finally admit that:
Speed trumps completeness for the customer-obsessed. Cloud vendors, agencies, and the
sprouting digital arms of systems integrators tout speed and flexibility. This has been music to
the ears of businesses as they try to keep up with increasingly powerful customers. As tech
management accelerates, concepts like minimum viable product supersede the comprehensive
definition of requirements.
Design must focus on CX. Technologists designs used to target getting greater utilization or
performance out of expensive hardware but no longer. Today, powerful customers demand
simple digital touchpoints seamlessly integrated across the digital ecosystem. This forces TM to
orient its design approach toward the customer journey and life cycle.
20
September 8, 2015

The BT agenda provides the systems and processes for customer obsession. To win in the
age of the customer, firms must adopt new capabilities such as customer-in design, continuous
delivery, fast-cycle governance, outcome management, and business service management. These
BT agenda items will help firms respond rapidly to changing customer and market realities.
EA Must Start From The Customer And Work Back To The Architecture
As firms ability to execute the BT agenda improves, enterprise architects must learn to deliver
customer value quickly by:
Using engagement patterns to fuel innovation pipelines. Look for patterns of customer
engagement across journey maps and mobile platforms. Use your firms insight into customer
habits and translate these into ideas for testing in innovation programs.
Designing and prototyping a combination of CBSes and APIs. Prove that APIs and CBSes
can work together as a power tool to deliver customer obsession. Identify a common capability
that serves several customer engagement scenarios. Prototype the delivery of functions as a
CBS sitting atop business APIs. Show how to easily reconfigure systems of engagement without
touching core systems of record.
Using customer life cycles and journey maps to build your technology watchlist. Use your
firms customer life cycle and journey maps to identify new technologies for your BT agenda
instead of traditional IT taxonomies. Discuss opportunities to solve customer pain points or
connect experiences across journeys.
The CIO Mandate: Engaging Customers With Business Technology
CIOs, CX, And End-To-End Tech Management
Time For Integrated Strategic Planning
Re-Architect Your Business Capabilities To Win In The Age Of The Customer
21
September 8, 2015

FIGURE 12 Demand For End-To-End Solutions Will Force Technology Managers To Embrace Business Technology
7 Customer obsession accelerates business technology maturity

2016
2017

BT is delivering end to end
on digital change demands.
BT best practices are
emerging.
Enterprise marketing
Sales and fulfillment packages
Customer service software
Product innovation software
Mobile engagement platforms
Digital experience delivery and
management tools
More of the same.

Conservative firms cling to
enterprise software and
shared services.
2018
The failure of organizations
that stick to an IT model
drives mainstream
acceptance of BT.

An evaluation of systems integration partners based on their
alignment with BT principles
An integration and data services layer
Contextual customer insights services
Agile portfolio and program management tools and processes
Mainstream Firms Use End-To-End Solutions In The Acceptance Phase

Three trends have entered the acceptance phase, where even the most conservative firms see the
need to invest in end-to-end solutions. Two trends infrastructure and software development face
tough execution challenges that will slow progress; they will still be evolving in 2018. In contrast, the
workforce management and collaboration trend will be drawing to a conclusion (see Figure 13).
22
September 8, 2015

FIGURE 13 Everyone Needs To Invest In End-To-End Solutions Now For Acceptance Phase Trends
Investment
appetite
Slowly developing
Progressing
End-to-end
investment
Accelerating
10
Point solution
investment
Dawning
Awareness
Infrastructure capability snowballs

in response to digital demand
Firms use software to make their

brand special
10 Customer-obsessed firms empower

their workforce with technology
Time
Acceptance
Mainstream firms are planning

end-to-end infrastructure
change.
Firms are struggling more than
ever under legacy software
practices.
Mainstream firms recognize
that empowered employees
create better CX.
Cracks in the infrastructure

foundation will become
deep fissures.
Mainstream firms will
embrace new technology
and crowdsourcing.
Point investments will drop
drastically as the trend
concludes.
Trend 8: Infrastructure Capability Snowballs In Response To Digital Demand

Customer obsession has given infrastructure evolution and performance a powerful gravitational pull
but the evolved infrastructure has become complicated, so companies are undertaking efforts to retool
and repartner for end-to-end customer obsession (see Figure 14). As firms invest in end-to-end solutions,
they will move more infrastructure and operations management into the cloud and to service partners. As
infrastructure requirements snowball, external services are the optimal mechanism to effectively manage
the demand. For example, European telco Orange outsourced network management to high-frequency
trading company Liquid Capital. As more firms make moves like Oranges, they will fully accept that:
Cloud and software-defined infrastructure (SDI) capabilities are exploding. Enterprise network
traffic, servers, and storage capacity are spiking in response to digital demand, and new IoT use
cases will strain things even more. The infrastructure-as-code movement will usher in extreme
automation. SDI will create a more flexible systems-based approach to service design.21
23
September 8, 2015

They will struggle to both manage the current state and evolve toward the future. Technology
innovation in hardware- and software-defined infrastructure promises flexibility and speed. But
rapidly evolving technology coupled with a change-resistant culture slows progress. By 2018, most
firms will overcome this resistance and a more agile infrastructure will spread quickly.
Winning firms will enable customer obsession via cloud, SDI, and integration partners.
Demands for high performance and flexibility are forcing firms to find alternatives. Leaders will
embrace cloud, SDI, and partners to help navigate the new risks.22
EA Must Embrace A Customer-Oriented Systems Approach To Infrastructure Planning
As even the most conservative firms accept this trend, enterprise architects must take a customeroriented systems approach to business service planning:
Map strategic business capabilities to technology-based services. Use capability maps
to identify infrastructure technologies that bring the most strategic value. Define infrastructure
services that help make the business parts interchangeable such as swapping out a server for
public-cloud infrastructure-as-a-service or vice versa.
Optimize complete services, not just the parts. You can only optimize CX if you optimize the
full end-to-end service. Use systems thinking to discard the haphazard development of individual
technologies. You must merge applications, on-premises infrastructure, and cloud services into an
integrated model.
Beef up governance processes that will help manage partner innovations. Service providers will
bring many new technology and process suggestions so ensure that your architecture governance
processes are ready to absorb the influx of ideas. Pursue sensible guardrails, not tight control.
Service Design Is Your New Approach To Infrastructure
The Enterprise Network Enables Business Innovation
Organize The Chaos Of Cloud With A Realistic And Effective Strategy
Evolve Your Infrastructure Architecture For Systems Of Engagement
24
September 8, 2015

FIGURE 14 Overly Conservative Firms Will Sink Under The Weight Of Their Infrastructure
8 Infrastructure capability snowballs in response to digital demand

2016
2017

Mainstream firms recognize
that they cant get there from
here and begin planning for
end-to-end solutions.
Converged IaaS/PaaS
Virtual private clouds
Cloud integration gateways
Hyperconverged infrastructure
Software-defined infrastructure
Service automation tools
A new class of infrastructure to
support IoT
The shift of workloads to

the cloud continues, led by
systems of engagement.
Service partners do more.
2018
Mid-acceptance phase:
Cracks become large fissures
for firms that continue to do
it themselves on-premises.
On-premises dwindles but
cannot disappear entirely.

Revamping the technology supply chain to be more external
Creating a hierarchical and modular service catalog
Mapping infrastructure needs through applications to customerfocused business services and capabilities
Accelerating DevOps skill sharing and improving I&Os software
knowledge and skills
Analytics to assess service behavior with more accuracy
Radical adaption of skills to account for systems engineering,
systems software development, automation, and job changes
Trend 9: Firms Use Software To Make Their Brand Special

Software continues to eat the world; even lagging firms see it. In the acceptance phase of this trend,
visionaries have turned the pace of software change to their advantage (see Figure 15). Firms that
really get software will have a strategic advantage; for the moment, enterprises are slowly catching
up to digital natives. For example, a European insurance firm used a low-code platform to accelerate
the time-to-market for customer-facing applications, helping to fulfill its business innovation strategy.
Medical equipment manufacturers like Philips Healthcare are wrapping their machines in software
and connecting them to the Internet and to each other. GEs clients can send insights derived from
continuous monitoring directly to patients electronic health records and share these insights across
medical devices and information systems. As this trend persists:
Customers expectation to interact with you through software will increase. Its no longer
enough to have a mobile app and website; everything must be smart, and that requires software.
This makes software and software skills increasingly critical business assets for delivering the
elements of a 21st-century brand.
Firms will understand the why and get closer to the how. Most firms understand that the pace
of change affects both front-office and back-office solutions and are embracing Agile as a way
to deliver new software and new products faster. They are also buying software firms as a way to
improve their capabilities.
25
September 8, 2015

Winners will use software to make their brands special. Software has the potential to make
your brand trusted, remarkable, unmistakable, and most importantly essential. But only if you have
the advanced software capabilities of the best firms. Digital leaders can release software 30 times a
day a huge advantage for rapidly responding to customer needs.
EA Must Plan The Foundation For Continuous Delivery And Software Excellence
As mainstream companies continue to struggle, enterprise architects must help their firms break
out. Consider:
Defining the architecture of new business paradigms. Using software to enrich your brand is
not business as usual. For example, you will need new data-centric business models and more
granularly defined processes. Use your design skills to create artifacts that describe a compelling
future state.
Using Agile-plus-Architecture for effective implementation. Development teams need both
agility and strategic alignment, but this only works if firms embed architecture practices into their
Agile processes what Forrester calls Agile-plus-Architecture. Aligning rapidly changing customer
strategies and budgets will take strong, flexible portfolio management.
Driving foundational investments in new development tools and talent. Firms that succeed
make process changes, but they also add new tooling. Low-code platforms, API management, and
Agile development tools will help your firm succeed. You will also need software talent in product
and service design.
Software Must Enrich Your Brand
Customer Obsession Will Remake AD&D Tools And Supporting Technologies
Agile-Plus-Architecture: Embrace The Oxymoron
TechRadar: Continuous Software Delivery, Q2 2015
New Development Platforms Emerge For Customer-Facing Applications
26
September 8, 2015

FIGURE 15 Mainstream Firms Will Make Slow Progress As New Technologies Come On Line
5 9 Firms use software to make their brand special

2016
2017

Firms struggle under the
burden of legacy software
practices, but change is very
painful.
Continuous integration
Application release automation
Life-cycle integration
Low-code platforms
API management tools
Firms reinvent their

technology stack and
experiment with
continuous delivery.
2018
Mid/late acceptance phase:
New API management, lowcode platforms, and
crowdsourcing help firms
make slow progress.

A platform featuring curated APIs for customer-facing application
functionality
A low-code platform for customer-oriented innovation
More SaaS and PaaS to reduce the burden associated with testing
customer-facing software
Trend 10: Customer-Obsessed Firms Empower Their Workforce With Technology

Customer-obsessed firms need a workforce that can quickly adapt to rising customer expectations and
complex digital ecosystems. As the thirst for CX improvement grows, firms will seek agile workforce
enablement and collaborative work management technologies to help employees deliver end-to-end
customer value (see Figure 16).23 Consider that 60% of information workers spend at least 1 hour each
day directly engaging customers; 40% engage directly with partners and suppliers.24 But in order to
revolutionize CX by empowering employees, firms are moving beyond BYOD. For example, clinical
liaisons at a healthcare firm use video content to educate patients and share information immediately
with their families via email. As acceptance of this trend penetrates deeper into the mainstream:
BYOD will catalyze the employee mobile mind shift. What happens when your people use
mobile apps yours or their own to change the way they do their jobs? They have different
expectations, both of themselves and of you. They change the culture of your company because
they begin to expect technology to work the way they do.25
Firms will struggle to integrate social, knowledge, BYOD, and core systems. Employees
might still have to wade through a mire of disconnected, self-provisioned, and company-furnished
technology. For example, a sales representative might use a CRM system, company-furnished
mobile email, and their own cloud document service.
Firms will embrace collaborative work management and agile workforce enablement.
Collaborative work management technology empowers employees to serve customers quickly
by connecting them with the people and information they need. Agile workforce enablement uses
Agile processes to furnish and support employee technology.
27
September 8, 2015

EA Must Connect The Dots Between Empowered Employees And CX Benefits

As firms move from point solution investments to end-to-end adoption of workforce collaboration
technology, enterprise architects must empower employees by:
Adding organizational change dimensions to digital business plans. Adoption needs to be a
top priority in any social business and collaboration initiative, and getting there requires skills and
resources to drive effective change management. Step beyond technology to address proposed
people changes in EAs road map and future state.
Mapping employee-empowering technologies to CX outcomes. Become part of CX
improvement efforts like journey mapping. Prioritize plans for collaborative work management
technologies at painful customer interaction points. Ask what technologies employees are using
and how they use them to meet customer expectations.
Focusing on investments that enrich employee mobile moments. Address employee mobile
moments and prioritize those that affect customers. Assess capabilities based on the amount of
employee attention required to execute key tasks. For example, use location to kick off a social
stream when technicians show up at a customer site.
Vendor Landscape: Collaborative Work Management For The Enterprise
Equipped To Thrive: Help Employees Turn Mobile Moments Into Customer Value
Business Agility Starts With Your People
Resolving The Collaboration Paradox
28
September 8, 2015

FIGURE 16 Empowered Employees Will Become Synonymous With Engaged Customers
10 Customer-obsessed firms empower their workforce with technology

2016
2017
Acceptance phase: Most

firms realize that employee
technology has a big impact
on end-to-end experiences.
Enterprise social
Cloud knowledge, document
management, and enterprise
content management services
Workforce productivity apps
Search and knowledge discovery
Device and service management
(on-premises and cloud)
Investing in end-to-end
employee enablement
solutions pays off; increasing
connectivity takes it further.
2018
End of trend: Business
leaders demand that their
firms use only end-to-end
solutions to empower
employees.

Workforce analytics efforts to find out who knows who and what
Enabling end user technology process agility
Digital identity management to better enable self-provisioned
technology
Business process management innovation with low-code and
knowledge management tools
Recommendations
Help End-To-End Customer Experiences Scale

The journey toward end-to-end CX becomes more difficult as scale increases and systems are
integrated throughout the customer life cycle. But planning change at scale and through complexity
is a core EA competency. Enterprise architects are uniquely positioned to connect strategies,
architectures, design, delivery plans, and operations but they must shed yesterdays rationalization
and approach and embrace the end-to-end concept in order to:
Focus on new capabilities for the BT agenda. EA must enable the acceptance of end-to-end
solutions via a broad web of capabilities, such as outcome management, strategic execution,
and flexible sourcing, tied to fast-cycle strategy and governance. This means having a vision to
minimize long-running projects and drive investments based on customer-driven value instead of
resource availability.26
Adopt continuous delivery. Agile software development methodologies, supported by DevOps
for production delivery, have become critical for making fast-cycle change a constant. Nurture your
ability to change quickly and constantly, learning from customer experiences and using insights
to drive action.27 Expand your use of low-code and user-executed development to reduce TMs
workload from simpler problems.28
29
September 8, 2015

Deliver platforms that enable end-to-end integration. Standards must emerge even as you build
the foundation for end-to-end integration like managed APIs and new data insight strategies
through revised master data management. Design and delivery methodologies must respond to
specific solution needs like fast-cycle changes in systems of engagement and systems of insight
or more measured changes in systems of record.
What It Means
Acceptance Of End-To-End Solutions Will Redefine The Tech Sector

As firms broaden their digital investments, key changes will occur in the technology sector:
Successful point solution vendors must become end-to-end players. Technologies often come
to market as point solutions, but users appetite for end-to-end solutions and willingness to roll
their own solutions will force vendors to adopt richer, broader platforms much like the explosion
of enterprise resource planning (ERP) suites in the 90s. As they mature, successful vendors will
componentize their systems to avoid replicating yesterdays expensive, bloated enterprise
software packages, which buyers will increasingly shun.
Markets for prebuilt end-to-end services will prosper. KPMG now offers an end-to-end
employee onboarding solution that stretches across multiple systems including HR, finance,
facilities, and TM. Packaged as a CBS, KPMG will manage the ongoing sprint to maintain end-toend integration. And IBM offers 20 prebuilt industry-specific, behavior-based predictive analytics
templates interactive and role-specific that pull data from a variety of systems.
Emerging technologies will create new value propositions. Even as acceptance of end-to-end
solutions grows, individual technologies continue to advance and proliferate at a furious pace. This
is creating new investment curves and value propositions like 3D printing, the IoT, and the network
as a platform for Agile development. These emerging technologies will leverage new inventions,
delivered as point solutions by individual organizations, and drive new cycles of dawning,
awareness, and acceptance.
30
September 8, 2015

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Supplemental Material
Survey Methodology
Forresters Global Business Technographics Data And Analytics Survey, 2015
We conducted Forresters Global Business Technographics Data And Analytics Survey, 2015, in
January through March 2015 of 3,005 business and technology decision-makers located in Australia,
Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, New Zealand, the UK, and the US from companies with
100 or more employees.
Forresters Business Technographics Global Data And Analytics Survey, 2014
Forresters Business Technographics Global Data And Analytics Survey, 2014, was fielded to 1,658
business and technology decision-makers located in Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France,
Germany, India, New Zealand, the UK, and the US from SMB and enterprise companies with 100
or more employees. This survey is part of Forresters Business Technographics and was fielded
from January 2014 to March 2014. Research Now fielded this survey on behalf of Forrester. Survey
respondent incentives include points redeemable for gift certificates. We have provided exact sample
sizes in this report on a question-by-question basis.
31
September 8, 2015

Forresters Business Technographics Global Priorities And Journey Survey, 2015

Forresters Business Technographics Global Priorities And Journey Survey, 2015, was fielded to
14,596 business and technology decision-makers located in Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France,
Germany, India, New Zealand, the UK, and the US from SMB and enterprise companies with two or
more employees. This survey is part of Forresters Business Technographics and was fielded from
December 2014 to March 2015. Research Now fielded this survey on behalf of Forrester. Survey
respondent incentives include points redeemable for gift certificates. We have provided exact sample
sizes in this report on a question-by-question basis.
Forresters Global Business Technographics Telecommunications And Mobility Workforce
Survey, 2015
Forrester conducted an online survey fielded in January 2015 of 7,238 information workers located
in Australia/New Zealand, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, the UK, and the US from
companies with two or more employees.
Each calendar year, Forresters Business Technographics fields business-to-business technology
studies in 10 countries spanning North America, Latin America, Europe, and Asia Pacific. For quality
control, we carefully screen respondents according to job title and function. Forresters Business
Technographics ensures that the final survey population contains only those employed adults who use
a computing device at least 1 hour per day as part of their job. Additionally, we set quotas for age,
gender, and job function as a means of controlling the data distribution. Business Technographics uses
only superior data sources and advanced data-cleaning techniques to ensure the highest data quality.
Forrester/Russell Reynolds 2014 Digital Business Online Survey
The Forrester/Russell Reynolds 2014 Digital Business Online Survey was fielded to 1,591 Russell
Reynolds Associates contacts. However, only a portion of survey results are illustrated in this
document. For quality assurance, we screened respondents to ensure they met certain standards in
terms of job responsibilities and the size of their organizations.
Forrester fielded the survey from November 2013 to January 2014. Respondent incentives included
a summary of the survey results. Exact sample sizes are provided in this report on a question-byquestion basis. This survey used a self-selected group of respondents (executives who have interacted
with Russell Reynolds Associates) and is therefore not random. The survey was fielded only in English.
Among the respondents, 38% work in North America, 53% work in Europe, and 9% work in the rest
of the world. This data is not guaranteed to be representative of the population, and, unless otherwise
noted, statistical data is intended to be used for descriptive and not inferential purposes. While
nonrandom, the survey is still a valuable tool for understanding where business executives are today
and where the market is headed.
32
September 8, 2015

Companies Interviewed For This Report

IBM
MIT
KPMG
Sogeti
Forrester Analysts Interviewed For This Report

Alex Cullen
John R. Rymer
Andras Cser
Jost Hoppermann
Andre Kindness
Julie A. Ask
Boris Evelson
Kate Leggett
Christopher Mines
Kurt Bittner
Clay Richardson
Kyle McNabb
Craig Le Clair
Margo Visitacion
Dan Bieler
Martin Gill
David K. Johnson
Martha Bennett
Deanna Laufer
Michael Facemire
Diego Lo Giudice
Michele Goetz
Duncan Jones
Michele Pelino
Fatemeh Khatibloo
Mike Gualtieri
Frank E. Gillett
Nate Elliott
Glenn ODonnell
Nick Hayes
Gordon Barnett
Nigel Fenwick
Heidi Shey
Noel Yuhanna
Ian Jacobs
Peter Burris
Jeffrey Hammond
Richard Fichera
Jennifer Belissent, Ph.D.
Randy Heffner
Joana van den Brink-Quintanilha
Srividya Sridharan
John C. McCarthy
Stephen Powers
John Kindervag
Sucharita Mulpuru
33
September 8, 2015

Ted Schadler
Tyler McDaniel
Tony Costa
Tyler Shields
Endnotes
Forrester has described the fourth wave of IT as IT everywhere and projected innovation and growth between 2008
and 2016, followed by a refinement and design period between 2016 and 2024. See the The Top 15 Technology
Trends EA Should Watch Forrester report.
Forrester estimates a 10.3% spending increase in 2015 on BT: technology that helps firms win, serve, and retain
customers. This is more than double the overall US tech spending increase of 5%. Forrester projects that BT spending
will grow by 9.5% in 2016. See the US Tech Market Outlook For 2015 And 2016: The BT Agenda Powers Steady
Expansion Forrester report.
Forrester further defines end-to-end solutions as those that are omnichannel, insight-driven, and consistent across
customer journeys. The easiest way to understand the difference between traditional and end-to-end solutions: The
latter starts with the customer and works back into the required integration and insights. See the CIOs, CX, And EndTo-End Tech Management Forrester report.
For more on the previous top technologies and technology trends, see the The Top 15 Technology Trends EA Should
Watch Forrester report, see the The Top 15 Technology Trends EA Should Watch: 2011 To 2013 Forrester report,
see the The Top 10 Technology Trends EA Should Watch: 2012 To 2014 Forrester report, see the The Top 10
Business Technology Trends EA Should Watch: 2012 To 2014 Forrester report, and see the Top Technology Trends
To Watch: 2014 To 2016 Forrester report.
As firms intensify their focus on CX, CIOs are increasingly drawn into the heart of a key CX challenge: how to add
digital to the CX mix. CX investments in systems of engagement have been expanding beyond mobile apps and
websites to include systems of record and systems of insight. This expansion to end-to-end CX is shaping decisions
across the enterprise and its partners. It demands the design, delivery, and operations skills that the tech management
team brings to the table, and its the CIOs job to see that these demands are met. See the CIOs, CX, And End-ToEnd Tech Management Forrester report.
Designers are building sensors and software control into products large and small, enabling radical new ways for
their companies to win, serve, and retain customers. IoT technologies enable firms to strengthen eight dimensions
of engagement and retention across the customer life cycle. Putting IoT systems into action in service of customers
will require CIOs to work in new ways across the company, partnering with teams in product engineering, operations,
marketing, and support. See the Brief: The Internet Of Things Will Transform Customer Engagement Forrester report.
A technology revolution is brewing that uses sensors, networks, and analytics software to connect physical objects
and infrastructure to computing systems, providing an unprecedented view into the status, location, and activities of
products, assets, and people. By understanding the landscape of the connected world, business technology leaders
can prepare their firms for the implications positive and negative of optimizing assets, differentiating products and
services, and transforming customer relationships. See the Mapping The Connected World Forrester report.
After decades of poorly executed home automation systems and gadgets, startups are taking advantage of mobile
tech advances to deliver slick smart home devices that support a wide range of activities in the home. These products
will shake up large established markets and customer relationships in home insurance, food and grocery, healthcare,
energy, and water utilities. This report outlines how the smart home will emerge, what the 13 core activities of the
smart home are, and how the battle between web giants, startups, and incumbents will play out for control of the
customer relationship. We outline five actions that CIOs need to take to prepare for the long-awaited arrival of the
smart home. See the The Smart Home Finally Blossoms Forrester report.
34
September 8, 2015

Source: Forresters Global Business Technographics Data And Analytics Survey, 2015.
10
11
Enterprises face growing challenges in bridging disparate sources of data to fuel analytics, predictive analytics, realtime insights, and applications. The data explosion is also exacerbating integration, security, performance, quality,
and availability issues. Business users need reliable information fast (in real time) to make business decisions, while
IT needs to lower costs, minimize complexity, and improve operational efficiency. Eight years ago, Forrester invented
the category of data virtualization with our vision of the information fabric; these solutions continue to evolve to
address the pressing problem of delivering comprehensive capabilities to enable dynamic, real-time data services. In
updating our information fabric reference architecture to version 3.0, we reflect these new business requirements to
accommodate new technology enhancements supporting big data, cloud, mobility, distributed in-memory caching,
and dynamic services. Use information fabric 3.0 to inform and guide your data virtualization strategy. See the
Information Fabric 3.0 Forrester report.
12
Source: Forrester/Russell Reynolds 2014 Digital Business Online Survey.
13
Three concepts underpin Zero Trust: 1) Verify and secure all resources regardless of location; 2) limit and strictly
enforce access control across all user populations, devices/channels, and hosting models; and 3) log and inspect all
traffic, both internal and external.
14
In just a few short years, Zero Trust has grown from conceptual theory to implemented reality as vendors have
developed technologies that make adopting a Zero Trust architecture more and more feasible and available to almost
all organizations. Vendors have even banded together to create partnerships which essentially offer off-the-shelf Zero
Trust solutions. See the Three Technical Innovations Will Ignite Zero Trust Forrester report.
15
Defining data via data discovery and classification is an often overlooked, yet critical, component of data security and
control. This report outlines processes, best practices, and approaches to defining your data. See the Rethinking
Data Discovery And Data Classification Forrester report.
16
This is evident in the data breaches that we see today. For example, Sony Pictures was SOX-, PCI-, and ISO
27000-compliant and had a long-standing risk management program. When you implement SOX, PCI, or even ISO
27000, you can do so in a very limited scope, creating what is essentially a checklist approach to securing your data. See
the Quick Take: Sony Breach A Sad Tale Of Epic Failure That Could Have Been Avoided Forrester report.
17
Security is just one of the components of privacy. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
(OECD), a group focused on economic data and social policy, has divided privacy into eight internationally accepted
principles. See the Identify And Influence Data Security And Privacy Stakeholders Forrester report.
18
Luciano Floridi argues that explosive developments in information and communication technologies are changing the
answers to fundamental questions about who are we and how we relate to each other. This change spills over into how
business will succeed in the future. Forrester saw this shift and named it the age of the customer in 2010. Source:
Luciano Floridi, The 4th Revolution: How the Infosphere is Reshaping Human Reality, Oxford University Press, 2014.
19
Forty-five percent of global data and analytics decision-makers say their firms run customer intelligence separate from
their other BI capabilities; a further 11% dont know. Source: Forresters Business Technographics Global Data And
Analytics Survey, 2014.
20
Forrester has addressed the high-level revolution in infrastructure development. Systems engineering will prevail to
optimize the entire service rather than individual components. See the Service Design Is Your New Approach To
Infrastructure Forrester report.
21
Forrester has outlined how cloud is fueling a new economy of services, allowing cloud consumers to also become
cloud service providers. See the Cloud Evolves From Point Solution To Strategic Enabler Of The New Connected
Economy Forrester report.
22
35
September 8, 2015

Business execs we surveyed said that improving CX was their top priority in 2015. Source: Forresters Business
Technographics Global Priorities And Journey Survey, 2015.
23
Source: Forresters Global Business Technographics Telecommunications And Mobility Workforce Survey, 2015.
24
Source: Ted Schadler, Josh Bernoff, and Julie Ask, The Mobile Mind Shift: Engineer Your Business to Win in the Mobile
Moment, Groundswell Press, 2014.
25
According to Jeanne Ross, director and principal research scientist at the MIT Center for Information Systems
Research, Digital capabilities accrue to those that are focused and clear about what theyre doing.
26
Improving delivery speed requires not only automating your delivery pipeline, but also changing the way you engage
the business and customers, charter initiatives, and manage workflow. Once the business realizes it can deliver
faster, direct feedback from your customers lays the foundation for continuous delivery and continuous improvement.
Forresters framework for continuous delivery improvement and accompanying assessment tool frames the essential
questions you need to ask yourself to improve your ability to deliver business value through software. See the Use
Forresters Continuous Delivery Assessment Model To Increase Delivery Speed Forrester report.
27
Low-code platforms are an important strategy to speed delivery of software to win, serve, and retain customers.
Because application development and delivery professionals adopt low-code platforms by starting small and then
growing, the question of whether these platforms will scale to support large apps and high numbers of apps is crucial.
Low-code platforms will scale up as vendors architect them to do so. Look for product architectures designed to
support high scale, features to coordinate the efforts of multiple development teams, fully expressive tools, support
for governing large portfolios of applications, and flexible pricing models. See the Low-Code Platforms Deliver
Customer-Facing Apps Fast, But Will They Scale Up? Forrester report.
28
Enterprise architects, in particular business process architects, face a new frontier for driving process change.
Business process management (BPM) has always focused on improving and automating business operations. But
customer expectations and the accelerating pace of competition is forcing a sea change in how enterprise architects
adopt and implement BPM into their change strategies. Delivering better customer experiences demands greater
process flexibility and contextual awareness, placing a bright spotlight on the need for unstructured business
processes and dynamic case management, as well as the need to support mobile solutions. See the Prepare For
2015s Shifting BPM Landscape Forrester report.
36
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FOR ENTERPRISE ARCHITECTURE PROFESSIONALS

The Top 10 Technology Trends To Watch: 2016

Why Read This Report

Five years into the age of the customer,

Customer-Obsessed Firms Need End-To-End

FOR ENTERPRISE ARCHITECTURE PROFESSIONALS

The Top 10 Technology Trends To Watch: 2016 To 2018

Notes & Resources

2 The Age Of The Customer Changes How

Forrester interviewed IBM, KPMG, MIT, and

5 Forresters Top Technology Trends To Watch:

Related Research Documents

7 Visionaries Invest In Point Solutions In The

The Top 10 Technology Trends EA Should Watch:

11 Accelerators Point Solution Investments

The Top Emerging Technologies To Watch: Now

22 Mainstream Firms Use End-To-End

Top Technology Trends To Watch: 2014 To 2016

29 Help End-To-End Customer Experiences

30 Acceptance Of End-To-End Solutions Will

Forrester Research, Inc., 60 Acorn Park Drive, Cambridge, MA 02140 USA

FOR ENTERPRISE ARCHITECTURE PROFESSIONALS

The Top 10 Technology Trends To Watch: 2016 To 2018

The Age Of The Customer Changes How Firms Invest In Technology

FIGURE 1 End-To-End Solutions Differ From Traditional Rationalization Approaches

Traditional enterprise approach

Architecture qualities Conformance to standards;

Requirements drivers Lines of business; defined from

Ecosystemwide customer journeys;

Executed by Portfolio rationalization and tech

Flexible sourcing; fast-cycle

FOR ENTERPRISE ARCHITECTURE PROFESSIONALS

The Top 10 Technology Trends To Watch: 2016 To 2018

Technology Investments Shift Toward End-To-End Solutions In Three Phases

FOR ENTERPRISE ARCHITECTURE PROFESSIONALS

The Top 10 Technology Trends To Watch: 2016 To 2018

High appetite for

Growing appetite for

High appetite for

Driven by new inventions

Driven to solve complexity,

Mostly delivered as part of

Little tech management

FOR ENTERPRISE ARCHITECTURE PROFESSIONALS

The Top 10 Technology Trends To Watch: 2016 To 2018

Forresters Top Technology Trends To Watch: 2016 To 2018

FOR ENTERPRISE ARCHITECTURE PROFESSIONALS

The Top 10 Technology Trends To Watch: 2016 To 2018

A smart, connected world delivers

The Internet of Things Will Transform Customer

Systems of insight power digital

Digital Insights Are The New Currency Of Business

APIs help firms react to and

How APIs Reframe Business Strategy

Digital CX delivery struggles with

Transform Customer Processes And Systems To Improve

Digital reality drives new security

Top Security And Risk Priorities For The Business

The Future Of Business Is Digital

Customer obsession accelerates

The CIO Mandate: Engaging Customers With Business

Infrastructure capability snowballs

Service Design Is Your New Approach To Infrastructure