When the pandemic hit, existing workplace practices and operations began an immediate transformation. Now, as we enter a post-pandemic era, we can begin to assess how organizations and their employees both fared and altered.

Over the past two years, we’ve seen businesses across the globe bounce back to pre-pandemic levels of performance while others emerge stronger than before, breaking business records.

In addition, we have witnessed business users experiencing heightened levels of trust and empowerment, especially around application choice. Now that they’ve had a taste of this unprecedented level of technology autonomy business users are unwilling to give any of it up.

With a shift in overall business operations, what is the difference with businesses reaching new heights? What are businesses doing differently to emerge stronger and better than before while others remain content or fall back? How are employers keeping employees happy and empowered?

State of employee choice post-pandemic findings

To better understand the answers to these questions, we partnered with Osterman Research, to survey over 500 business professionals in North America and the UK employed by companies with more than $100M in annual revenue. We wanted to take a deeper look at how technology, specifically Shadow IT, had shifted during the pandemic. Once the results compiled, the findings showed that employers should strongly consider solutions that accommodate the new normal around application choice.

  • Bans on application choices? No thanks.
  • Working with IT or security to get applications approved while in the office or working from home? No thanks.

Worst of all? Fifty nine percent (59%) of employees viewed bans on their favorite or preferred applications - legacy or not - as undermining their trust in and satisfaction with their employers.

Perceptions on application choice

Nine out of 10 employers and managers want full control over work applications. Remember when, in March 2020, you were told to go home and stay home but keep working? It was a “do whatever it takes” time and COVID fueled a “make it work” mindset enabling use of unmanageable applications today.

IT and Security leaders were once at the forefront of application choice and security. Today, our research reveals that a staggering 91% of employees believe they should have full control over the applications. Consider the following:

  • Shadow IT spending - applications acquired and used by business professionals with company funds but without IT authorization - now represents more than 50% of enterprise IT outlays
  • 90% of technology spend will be in the hands of end-users by 2030
  • 86% of cloud-based services in the average enterprise now represent ‘unmanageable applications’, either in the shadow IT category, or not adhering to industry standards, creating security gaps
  • Innovative architecture mitigates risk by empowering employees to register their own applications, allowing organizations to detect and automatically correct security lapses

As the world’s first and only security platform for unmanageable applications, we are committed now more than ever to enhancing security practices by empowering both employees and security teams.

I invite you to check out the report and learn more about the shift in employee perceptions on application choice post-pandemic and the birth of unmanageable applications.

Stay tuned this fall for more insights from our survey.