- Leaders and executives are preparing for “when” the next major IT disruption will occur.
- 83% of companies caught off guard by CrowdStrike 2024 disruption
- More than half of IT leaders now view readiness as an ongoing effort
Business leaders are preparing for the next big disruption as we approach 2025, new research from PagerDuty claims.
The research explores how mindsets have changed following the widely reported outages of July 2024, when an unreliable CrowdStrike update caused approximately 8.5 million Windows Server devices to go offline.
Nine in 10 (88%) now believe another major incident is inevitable over the next year.
Leaders prepare for the next big blackout
Business leaders have significantly increased their cybersecurity spending in recent years amid growing attacks and threats from state actors; However, 86% now believe they have prioritized security at the expense of their preparation for disruptions similar to the CrowdStrike-induced disruption in 2024.
A similar number (83%) also said they were taken by surprise by the July blackout, with British businesses being the most surprised by the outage (89%).
“The…study shows that executives around the world are shifting their leadership priorities in light of major incidents, and 100% of respondents reported an increased focus on preparing for future service disruptions in their companies” said PagerDuty CIO Eric Johnson.
The effects of July’s disruptions were widely felt, with more than a third (37%) of businesses surveyed saying they lost revenue or were unable to process sales transactions. As a result, almost half (44%) had to revert to old manual processes or workarounds, highlighting the dependence on digital tools.
Looking ahead, between 78% and 91% of leaders (depending on the country) are now preparing for “when” the next major outage or disruption will occur, rather than “if” they are likely to be affected by it. one.
PagerDuty calls for more real-time data tools, and more than half (55%) of IT leaders and executives now view disruption preparedness as an ongoing effort rather than a one-time investment.
