Small firms lagging behind in IT race
IT can help drive business growth, but Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) are missing out, according to new research.
New research from Cisco suggests that UK businesses that embrace new technologies grow faster and hold on to their employees for longer.
The study showed that smaller businesses still lag behind their larger counterparts in adopting technology.
In particular, wireless network adoption (41 per cent compared to 64 per cent) and remote or home working technology capabilities (46 per cent compared to 67 per cent) were lower in SMEs than in larger businesses.
“With British companies competing for business against a global market, every aspect of their offering is important to ensure they are competitive” comments Derrick Cameron, from business IT specialist Eximium. “Margins are increasingly tight and, with key labour shortages at home, companies are turning to technology to give them the edge they require. However, it is also important to consider carefully what you really want from your systems, and look at how you can achieve your objectives by improving and adapting them – just bringing new technology in is rarely the right answer”.
Business managers’ top concern was finding and retaining the most talented staff, according to the study.
Home working ranked as the lowest influencing factor on IT managers’ technology investment priorities over the next 12 to 18 months.
The survey polled more than 600 business and IT directors across the UK in companies ranging from 20 to 1,000 employees, split into firms with 20-249 employees and larger companies with over 250 employees.
This entry was posted on Friday, July 6th, 2007 at 2:27 pm and is filed under Business Solutions, IT Advice, News . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
