Maria Raymond, CEO of Aplo.
getty
For decades, organizations have been trying to solve the same problem. The business wants to move faster. Technology teams are under pressure to deliver more. Demand keeps increasing. Backlogs grow. Priorities compete.
So we redesign. We centralize. We decentralize. We introduce agile teams, product teams, platforms, squads, tribes and new governance models. Many of these changes improve the way work flows, but they often avoid a more fundamental question: What if the operating model we built around technology no longer matches the role technology now plays in organizations?
For most of my career, technology has been treated as a specialist function.
The business identifies a need. Requirements are gathered. Funding is approved. A project is created. IT delivers the solution. The organization adopts the change.
That model was logical.
Technology was scarce. Expertise sat in a small number of specialized teams. Systems were large, expensive and relatively slow-moving. IT became the place organizations went to access technology. But the conditions that created that model have changed.
Today, almost every part of an organization is enabled by technology. Customer experience, operations, workforce productivity, decision-making and service delivery all depend on digital capability. AI is now accelerating that shift. The question is no longer simply, “How does IT deliver technology faster?” It is increasingly, “How does an organization build the capability to continuously evolve?”
Technology is no longer something a business occasionally implements. It is becoming part of how the business operates.
We Have Confused Technology Ownership With Technology Enablement
One of the biggest challenges I see in organizations is the assumption that because something involves technology, it belongs to IT.
A business process needs improvement? IT project.
A team needs better insights? IT request.
An operational problem needs automation? IT backlog.
Over time, the technology function becomes the constraint on organizational improvement. Not because IT has failed, but because the demand model has changed.
We built structures designed for a world where technology capability was concentrated in one place. We are now entering a world where technological capability needs to be present throughout the organization. The role of IT is not disappearing. If anything, it is becoming more important. But the role is changing.
The Next Evolution Of IT
The future technology function is not simply a larger delivery engine. It enables the entire organization to use technology safely and effectively. That means shifting from owning every solution to building organizational capability.
The future IT function creates the foundations:
• Secure and scalable platforms
• Strong architecture
• Trusted data
• Responsible AI practices
• Reusable capabilities
• Clear guardrails
• Technology literacy across the organization
The business then becomes better able to solve problems closer to where they exist. This is not shadow IT. Shadow IT emerges when people work around systems because they cannot get what they need.
Instead, it is an intentional approach to designing an organization in which technological capability is distributed but connected.
Will Accelerate This Shift
AI makes this conversation more urgent. For years, IT teams have been asking the business to prioritize demand because capacity is limited. But AI changes the equation. The number of people who can create, automate, analyze and improve processes is about to increase dramatically. The bottleneck will be whether organizations have designed themselves to use that capability well.
Without the right operating model, AI will create more disconnected tools, more complexity and more governance challenges. With the right foundations, it can unlock a new level of organizational capability.
The Future Of IT Is A More Capable Organization
The next generation of technology leadership is not about moving IT out of the center of the organization. It is about redefining its role.
Rather than acting primarily as the central point for every technology decision, IT increasingly enables the organization to make informed decisions closer to where work happens. Success depends less on controlling demand for technology and more on building the organization’s ability to adopt, adapt and use technology effectively.
Over the next decade, the organizations that perform best may not be those with the largest IT functions. They are more likely to be the ones that have embedded technology capability throughout the business, making it a shared responsibility that shapes how people work, solve problems and respond to change.
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