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The post-COVID era has resulted in the emergence of many IT trends across the world. As more and more businesses are switching to digital platforms, the importance of building and maintaining robust IT infrastructures has increased substantially. This makes it essential for IT operations leaders to take the right steps to drive digital transformation. Our struggle with a global pandemic has made us realize that a digital shift is inevitable to survive in the current day and age. With adequate IT operations and seamless implementation of the same, business leaders can help their team attain the desired goals and objectives in the best way possible.

Before looking at the different ways of driving digital transformation in the post-COVID era, let us understand the different assumptions about how businesses evaluate incentives for digital transformation:

Common Assumptions Regarding Digital Transformation

• The "Human Touch" Is Still Effective
  
  In the age of digitization, businesses need to understand that the famous "human touch" is no longer relevant and effective the way it was a few years earlier. Organizations operating in all major industries have come up with digital alternatives for almost every activity that was carried out physically. From communicating and collaborating with peers to solving customer issues, digitization has made the human touch redundant.
  
  
• It Is Not Possible For IT To Match Digital Transformation
  
  According to another common misconception about digitizing business processes, IT operations often fail to match the pace of digital transformation. However, that is certainly not the case, as organizations are implementing a range of solutions to leverage their IT infrastructure based on the up-and-coming digital trends in the market. Businesses across the board are doing their best to leverage their IT operations and drive home the desired revenue.
  
  
• Consumers Are Not Willing To Pay Full Price For Digital-only Products/Services
  
  This is not true, especially in the post-COVID era. Consumers are more than willing to pay the full price for digital products and services. With cryptocurrencies getting increasingly popular, the trend will only get more relevant in the years to come.
  
  

Driving Digital Transformation With IT Operations In The Post-COVID Era

Here are some of the most critical ways in which IT operations leaders can drive digital transformation in the post-COVID era:

• Implementation Of Modern Employee Service Desks
  
  The traditional IT service desks and HR helpdesks can no longer be used to provide seamless support to your employees. Now that the trends of working remotely and setting up hybrid workplaces are prevalent, it becomes crucial to have a service desk that provides quick and automated support to your employees. 
  
  Modern employee service desks use AI and machine learning to understand the context of the issues raised by your employees and tailor solutions based on their specific requirements. These platforms support your employees by making them interact with dedicated AI chatbots. Instead of getting every case routed to a support agent and waiting for it to be resolved, the AI-driven service desks provide the first level of support to your employees via chatbots within a few seconds.
  
  
• Emphasis On Process Automation
  
  Process automation is certainly the need of the hour. IT staff around the world are often required to perform repetitive processes to handle the employees' requests. It is advisable for IT operations leaders encourage process automation and implement tools that facilitate the same. 
  
  For example, most modern IT service desks provide users with the feature of routine task automation. This feature allows users to automate repetitive IT processes such as obtaining access to documents, changing/resetting passwords, installing software platforms, and more. This relieves the IT staff of an organization from performing repetitive processes regularly by automating them using a centralized platform. 
  
  Read More: How Routine Task Automation Helps Companies to Work Effectively?
  
  
• Undertaking Platform Integration
  
  Digital transformation is incomplete without platform integration. Along with implementing advanced tools and platforms to streamline your business processes, it is always advisable to encourage integration between different platforms. This helps users work on unified platforms and prevents them from switching platforms while performing specific activities.
  
  For example, integrating your employee service desk with your collaborative platform allows your employees to obtain seamless support while working remotely. Platform integration helps you achieve more with fewer resources, thereby helping you optimize your IT infrastructure.
  
  
• Encouraging Investments In Cybersecurity
  
  With organizations switching to digital platforms and storing valuable records on shared digital warehouses, IT leaders need to encourage investments in cybersecurity. Cybercrimes in the age of digitization are far more subtle and destructive.  To drive digital transformation in the post-COVID era, IT operations leaders need to encourage the implementation of robust data security and data privacy solutions. This would allow businesses to safeguard their records and adhere to the data compliance standards in customers' interests.
  
  
• Making The Most Of AI And Machine Learning
  
  Technologies like AI and machine learning are no longer considered niche and limited to large-scale enterprises. Increasing digitization and the need for smart data analysis have prompted businesses operating at all scales to implement these technologies to leverage their processes.  AI and machine learning provide your IT operations a much-needed boost and simplify the processes undertaken by your team members. These technologies strengthen your IT infrastructure from storing and analyzing big data to providing personalized support to your customers and employees.
  
  The most significant advantage of implementing AI and machine learning solutions is that they make your system grow over time. As more data is fed and more interactions are made with the users, the system starts understanding the users better, improving the results obtained.
  
  
• Optimizing Knowledge Management
  
  It is always important to optimize knowledge management to leverage your IT processes. Your enterprise knowledge base is the storehouse of all the valuable information required by your employees and customers. Automated and personalized dissemination of this information allows you to streamline your IT processes and provide better support to users.
  
  

Conclusion: Digital Transformation to Enhance IT Operations and Efficiency

The above-mentioned points were how IT operations leaders could drive digital transformation in the post-COVID era. The age we live in calls for a digital makeover, and it is advisable for businesses operating across all industries to make the much-needed shift before it is too late.