Rose Pest Solutions

Andrew Abela

Business Technology Integrator

When I build an IT strategy, I start by looking at the business as a whole. That means the everyday users, the managers, the executives and the clients. Each of these groups works with technology in a different way, and each one feels the results of the decisions IT makes. A strategy built at only one of those levels will usually miss the details that make a program work across the organization. I've found that getting input from all of them leads to a stronger strategy, and one that holds up better once it's put into practice.

Working in both technology services and client success has shown me that IT has always needed to be flexible. The environment changes quickly. Years ago it was cell phones becoming standard business tools; today it's AI. There is a pace we have to keep to stay relevant, and it's easy to get wrong. If we move too fast, we risk setbacks. If we move too slowly, we can lose market share to companies that adapted sooner.

The client's needs have to stay in the conversation the whole time. A new technology or software platform might look like an improvement on our side and still take away a service or a metric that a client relies on. When that happens, it can affect their business as well as ours. Vendors play a part here too, since many of these decisions depend on what the companies we work with can support.

For service-based industries, I believe AI and automation are the trends to watch most closely. These tools can handle much of the time-consuming work of calculations and reporting, the busy work that takes up a large part of a service technician's day. When that work is lifted off their plate, technicians can spend their time on the service itself and on building stronger relationships with clients.

I would add one caution. With AI and automation, people tend to stop paying attention to details. When a system produces a report, it's easy to assume the report is correct. To get good results, an experienced person needs to review the output and confirm that it's accurate and matches what was expected. I don't see that review step as optional.

Deciding which emerging technologies to adopt comes back to the needs of the business. I start by identifying the pain points and inefficiencies that need to be addressed. Then I rank them by how much trouble each one causes and work through the list, looking at whether a new technology can resolve the problem. If it can, it's worth a closer look. If it can't, I leave it alone, no matter how much attention it's getting in the industry.

Every business will end up with a different list. What I like about this approach is that it opens the door to feedback, and it keeps IT focused on the most pressing needs of the organization overall rather than on what one department sees as most urgent.

For technology professionals who want to move from technical roles into broader IT leadership, my advice is to step back and look at the entire business and its clients before making a technology decision. A change that seems simple from a technical point of view can affect department roles, change what people expect from their work and add costs that weren't part of the original plan. Part of leadership is seeing those effects ahead of time.

I'd also tell them to put automation where it works and not to trust it blindly. Make sure you have people on your team who understand what the expected results are, who can define them and who will keep an eye on the technology you've put in place. They are the ones who will catch a problem before it reaches a client.

Technology will keep changing, and nobody can predict every development. In my experience, though, the strategies that work are the ones built with the whole business in mind, from the newest user to the clients we serve.