The New Normal in IT E-Book

Gregory S. Smith

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Serie: Wiley CIO
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 427

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

Learn how IT leaders are adapting to the new reality of life during and after COVID-19 COVID-19 has caused fundamental shifts in attitudes around remote and office work. And in The New Normal in IT: How the Global Pandemic Changed Information Technology Forever, internationally renowned IT executive Gregory S. Smith explains how and why companies today are shedding corporate office locations and reducing office footprints. You'll learn about how companies realized the value of information technology and a distributed workforce and what that means for IT professionals going forward. The book offers insightful lessons regarding: * How to best take advantage of remote collaboration and hybrid remote/office workforces * How to implement updated risk mitigation strategies and disaster recovery planning and testing to shield your organization from worst case scenarios * How today's CIOs and CTOs adapt their IT governance frameworks to meet new challenges, including cybersecurity risks The New Normal in IT is an indispensable resource for IT professionals, executives, graduate technology management students, and managers in any industry. It's also a must-read for anyone interested in the impact that COVID-19 had, and continues to have, on the information technology industry.

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

COVER

TITLE PAGE

COPYRIGHT

DEDICATION

PREFACE

Approach

Target Audience

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

PART I: The Postpandemic New Normal

CHAPTER 1: Lasting Business Impacts and Resource Sourcing After a Global Pandemic

Introduction

Impacts from Covid-19 on Businesses and Organizations

Impacts in Academia

Unemployment Impacts in the United States and Around the Globe

Some Bright Spots During the Pandemic

Impacts on Consultants and Organizations Sourcing Strategy

Lessons Learned

Things I've Done in My Career to Prepare

Recommendations and Predictions

Notes

CHAPTER 2: The Shrinking Office of the Future: Cloud and Mobile Dominate

Corporate Footprint During the Pandemic

The Corporate Office of the Future

IT Infrastructure and Telecommunications

Cloud and Mobile Will Dominate Post Pandemic

Things I've Done in My Career to Prepare

Recommendations and Predictions

Notes

CHAPTER 3: Voice Systems and Collaboration in the New Hybrid Office Environment

Voice Systems

Collaboration Tools

Things I've Done in My Career to Prepare

Recommendations and Predictions

Notes

PART II: Risk Mitigation and Disaster Recovery Is Your New Friend

CHAPTER 4: Never Be Unprepared for a Pandemic Again: Business Continuity and IT Disaster Recovery Going Forward

Business Continuity and IT Disaster Recovery: Defined and Purpose

Technologies to Scan and Reduce Covid Risks in the Workplace

Business Continuity and IT Disaster Recovery Failures During the Height of the Covid-19 Pandemic

Business Continuity Going Forward – Remote Staff Where Possible but It Varies Greatly by Sector

ITDR Going Forward – Remote Staff, Co-lo, and Cloud-based IT Solutions

Things I've Done in My Career to Prepare

Recommendations and Predictions

Notes

CHAPTER 5: IT Security for Corporate Resilience

The State of IT Security Today

IT Security Going Forward

The State of IT Security Standards and Frameworks

Managed Detection and Response (On-premise Network, Endpoint, Cloud)

Managed Risk

Securing Email

Privileged Access Management (PAM)

SIEM versus SOCaaS versus MDR?

CIO Security Best Practices

Things I've Done in My Career to Prepare

Recommendations and Predictions

Notes

PART III: IT Governance to Performance Management

CHAPTER 6: IT Governance: Keep It Simple

IT Governance Defined and Purpose

IT Governance – Frameworks and Methodologies

IT Governance Myths

Best-Practice IT Governance Today

Things I've Done in My Career to Prepare

Recommendations and Predictions

Notes

CHAPTER 7: Key Performance Indicators for the New Normal

KPI Defined

Common KPIs Pre-Covid-19

Updated KPIs Influenced by the Pandemic

Things I've Done in My Career to Prepare

Recommendations and Predictions

Notes

CHAPTER 8: Updated Research and CIO Priorities

Updated Research

Reflections on the Global Pandemic

CIO Priorities Going Forward

Recommendations and Predictions

Notes

INDEX

END USER LICENSE AGREEMENT

List of Illustrations

Chapter 1

Exhibit 1.1 The Johns Hopkins University of Medicine Coronavirus Resource Ce...

Exhibit 1.2 Historical Unemployment Rate in the United States (1948–2021)...

Exhibit 1.3 Unemployment Rates by Racial Group in the United States (2020–20...

Exhibit 1.4 IT Budget Impacts from Covid-19

Chapter 2

Exhibit 2.1 Open Floor Plans

Exhibit 2.2 Additional Smaller Conference Rooms

Exhibit 2.3

Chapter 3

Exhibit 3.1 Cloud VOIP IT Architecture

Chapter 4

Exhibit 4.1 IT Journey Map for Business Transformation

Exhibit 4.2 Factors That Impeded Response

Exhibit 4.3 Impact on the IT Budget

Exhibit 4.4 IT Actions to Improve Readiness

Exhibit 4.5 View of IT Post-Covid

Exhibit 4.6 Ready.gov Business Continuity Plan

Exhibit 4.7 Ready.gov Business Continuity Plan Management Structure

Exhibit 4.8 Empowering the New Work Experience

Exhibit 4.9 Types of Data Protection/Disaster Recovery Services

Chapter 5

Exhibit 5.1 IT Security Spending (2020–2025)

Chapter 6

Exhibit 6.1 IT Governance, Riverbed Technologies

Exhibit 6.2 Elements of Trust Pyramid

Exhibit 6.3 IT Governance Styles

Exhibit 6.4 Practices to Drive Digital Transformation

Exhibit 6.5 IT Governance Model Sample

Exhibit 6.6 Project Scorecard

Exhibit 6.7 IT Project Framework Organizational Structure

Chapter 7

Exhibit 7.1 A Framework for Metrics That Matter to the Board

Chapter 8

Exhibit 8.1 IDC FutureScape: Worldwide CIO Agenda 2021 Top 10 Predictions...

Guide

Cover

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Preface

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Begin Reading

Index

End User License Agreement

Pages

ii

iii

v

vi

vii

xiii

xiv

xv

xvii

1

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

29

30

31

32

33

34

35

36

37

38

39

40

41

42

43

44

45

46

47

48

49

50

51

52

53

54

55

56

57

58

59

60

61

62

63

64

65

66

67

68

69

70

71

72

73

74

75

76

77

78

79

80

81

82

83

84

85

86

87

88

89

90

91

93

95

96

97

98

99

100

101

102

103

104

105

106

107

108

109

110

111

112

113

114

115

116

117

118

119

120

121

122

123

124

125

127

128

129

130

131

132

133

134

135

136

137

138

139

140

141

142

143

144

145

146

147

148

149

150

151

152

153

154

155

156

157

158

159

161

163

164

165

166

167

168

169

170

171

172

173

174

175

176

177

178

179

180

181

182

183

184

185

186

187

188

189

190

191

192

193

194

195

196

197

198

199

200

201

202

203

204

205

206

207

208

209

210

211

212

213

214

215

216

217

218

219

220

221

222

223

224

225

226

227

228

229

230

231

232

233

234

235

236

237

238

239

240

241

242

243

244

245

246

247

248

249

251

252

253

254

255

256

257

258

259

260

261

262

263

264

265

266

Founded in 1807, John Wiley & Sons is the oldest independent publishing company in the United States. With offices in North America, Europe, Asia, and Australia, Wiley is globally committed to developing and marketing print and electronic products and services for our customers’ professional and personal knowledge and understanding.

The Wiley CIO series provides information, tools, and insights to IT executives and managers. The products in this series cover a wide range of topics that supply strategic and implementation guidance on the latest technology trends, leadership, and emerging best practices.

Titles in the Wiley CIO series include:

The Agile Architecture Revolution: How Cloud Computing, REST-Based SOA, and Mobile Computing Are Changing Enterprise IT

by Jason Bloomberg

Architecting the Cloud: Design Decisions for Cloud Computing Service Models

(

SaaS, PaaS, and IaaS)

by Michael Kavis

Big Data, Big Analytics: Emerging Business Intelligence and Analytic Trends for Today's Businesses

by Michael Minelli, Michele Chambers, and Ambiga Dhiraj

The CEO of Technology: Lead, Reimagine, and Reinvent to Drive Growth and Create Value in Unprecedented Times

by Hunter Muller

The Chief Information Officer's Body of Knowledge: People, Process, and Technology

by Dean Lane

Cloud Computing and Electronic Discovery

by James P. Martin and Harry Cendrowski

Confessions of a Successful CIO: How the Best CIOs Tackle Their Toughest Business Challenges

by Dan Roberts and Brian Watson

CIO Best Practices: Enabling Strategic Value with Information Technology (Second Edition)

by Joe Stenzel, Randy Betancourt, Gary Cokins, Alyssa Farrell, Bill Flemming, Michael H. Hugos, Jonathan Hujsak, and Karl Schubert

The CIO Playbook: Strategies and Best Practices for IT Leaders to Deliver Value

by Nicholas R. Colisto

The Complete Software Project Manager: Mastering Technology from Planning to Launch and Beyond

by Anna P. Murray

Decoding the IT Value Problem: An Executive Guide for Achieving Optimal ROI on Critical IT Investments

by Gregory J. Fell

Enterprise Performance Management Done Right: An Operating System for Your Organization

by Ron Dimon

Information Governance: Concepts, Strategies and Best Practices, Second Edition

. by Robert F. Smallwood

IT Leadership Manual: Roadmap to Becoming a Trusted Business Partner

by Alan R. Guibord

Leading the Epic Revolution: How CIOs Drive Innovation and Create Value Across the Enterprise

by Hunter Muller

Managing Electronic Records: Methods, Best Practices, and Technologies

by Robert F. Smallwood

On Top of the Cloud: How CIOs Leverage New Technologies to Drive Change and Build Value Across the Enterprise

by Hunter Muller

Straight to the Top: CIO Leadership in a Mobile, Social, and Cloud-based World (Second Edition)

by Gregory S. Smith

Strategic IT: Best Practices for Managers and Executives, Second Edition

by Arthur M. Langer and Lyle Yorks

Trust and Partnership: Strategic IT Management for Turbulent Times

by Robert Benson

Transforming IT Culture: How to Use Social Intelligence, Human Factors, and Collaboration to Create an IT Department That Outperforms

by Frank Wander

Unleashing the Power of IT: Bringing People, Business, and Technology Together, Second Edition

by Dan Roberts

The U.S. Technology Skills Gap: What Every Technology Executive Must Know to Save America's Future

by Gary J. Beach

THE NEW NORMAL IN IT

HOW THE GLOBAL PANDEMIC CHANGED INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY FOREVER

Gregory S. Smith

Copyright © 2022 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved.

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.

Published simultaneously in Canada.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as permitted under Section 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written permission of the Publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate per-copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center, Inc., 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, [phone], fax [phone], or on the web at www.copyright.com. Requests to the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, [phone], fax [phone], or online at http://www.wiley.com/go/permission.

Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty: While the publisher and author have used their best efforts in preparing this book, they make no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this book and specifically disclaim any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. No warranty may be created or extended by sales representatives or written sales materials. The advice and strategies contained herein may not be suitable for your situation. You should consult with a professional where appropriate. Neither the publisher nor author shall be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damages, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages. Further, readers should be aware that websites listed in this work may have changed or disappeared between when this work was written and when it is read. Neither the publisher nor authors shall be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damages, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages.

For general information on our other products and services or for technical support, please contact our Customer Care Department within the United States at [phone], outside the United States at [phone] or fax [phone].

Wiley also publishes its books in a variety of electronic formats. Some content that appears in print may not be available in electronic formats. For more information about Wiley products, visit our web site at www.wiley.com.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Smith, Gregory S., 1963- author.

Title: The new normal in IT : how the global pandemic changed information technology forever / Gregory S. Smith.

Description: Hoboken, New Jersey : Wiley, [2022] | Includes index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2021056410 (print) | LCCN 2021056411 (ebook) | ISBN 9781119839767 (cloth) | ISBN 9781119839781 (adobe pdf) | ISBN 9781119839774 (epub)

Subjects: LCSH: Data processing service centers. | Information technology. | COVID-19 Pandemic, 2020—Influence.

Classification: LCC HD9696.C62 S548 2022 (print) | LCC HD9696.C62 (ebook) | DDC 005.74—dc23/eng/20211228

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021056410

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021056411

Cover Design: Wiley

Cover Image(s): © amtitus/Getty Images, Who is Danny/Shutterstock

In memory of Sondra Lundy Schaeffer.

This book is dedicated to all the professionals in the medical community, first responders, essential employees, and IT experts for getting us through the worst of the global Covid-19 pandemic.

PREFACE

For the past 30 years, I've had the pleasure of working in the IT industry across a variety of sectors (financial services, Big 5 management and IT consulting, U.S. national security/defense, environmental, public policy, education, and healthcare). During my career, some areas of knowledge and experience have become more important in the strategic role as a chief information officer/chief technology officer (CIO/CTO) than others. Until 2020, the information technology (IT) operational and strategic playbooks for various industries were pretty set and focused around deploying applications, knowledge management systems, technology infrastructure via a mix of cloud and on-premises installations, and security – mostly centered around physical office buildings and data centers where most staff worked. As a result of the global Covid-19 pandemic that originated in early 2020, everything IT related has changed and will likely remain different forever. Companies are moving to full or partial remote workers with more tolerance for broader geographical ranges of resources. In addition, they are shedding corporate office locations or at a minimum, reducing the office footprint significantly to reduce costs. Why? Because the pandemic of 2020–2021 showed how valuable information technology can be to an organization and that we have proven that organizations are more productive working remotely away from expensive corporate office buildings.

The role of the CIO/CTO going forward will change globally forever as a result. The purpose of this book is to share with others my experience and predictions alongside other CIOs across a diverse set of sectors (energy, manufacturing, academia, transportation, consumer products, financial services, and nonprofits) regarding the future strategy deployment of technology post Covid-19. I plan to cover three broad areas. First, what the postpandemic new normal looks like for IT leaders regarding resource sourcing, the office of the future and how collaboration tools will continue to accelerate a hybrid office/remote work force across the globe. Second, I will discuss how risk mitigation and specifically disaster recovery testing and planning will adapt to include worst-case scenarios. Third, my CxO (CIO, CISO, COO, and CEO) panel and I will share how today's CIOs are adapting their IT governance approach to meet the new IT normal and how key performance indicators will likely change as a result.

Approach

The Contents takes the reader on a logical path to learning and obtaining the key skills and approaches best-practice IT leaders are adapting as a result of what they've learned from the recent global pandemic. I leverage my own experience, along with a group of CIOs, chief information security officers (CISOs), chief operations officers (COOs), and chief executive officers (CEOs) from a variety of sectors to communicate the best and most helpful approaches used by leading CIOs today. I'll also seek research support from the best IT advisory research firms on the market to support my conclusions and predictions.

Target Audience

The target audience of this text includes IT professionals from middle-management (managers, directors, VPs) to senior management up to and including the roles of the CIO and CTO. As a result, the market opportunity for this book is quite large, given the large-scale audience of middle managers to the top information technology (IT) spot in most organizations – the CIO.

In addition, the audience includes a large number of global undergraduate and graduate technology management or information systems academic programs.

I believe that there is a significant need for a book of this type at this time. First – many organizations that were technically unprepared for the pandemic suffered greatly. This text will serve as a road map for how to move forward with a technology strategy so that prior mistakes are not made twice. Second, I will draw on the expertise of CIOs and other executives across a wide swath of sectors to tell their story on how well they handled the pandemic and what changes they are making going forward. This will reveal the path forward for middle IT management (managers and directors), who I see as a large target market opportunity. Third, since the technology revolution that started in the 1990s through 2019, the world has never seen something as disruptive to companies and organizations as the Covid-19 pandemic. It literally impacted all industrialized and technology advanced nations. This text will provide predictions and strategies based on my experience and my research panel regarding where technology development, adoption, and spending will go post-Covid-19 for one key reason: so organizations across the globe are prepared when another global event happens again, which it will.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

A number of folks were instrumental in the development of this book, my fifth. First and foremost – thanks to my wife and family for continuing to support my dreams of academic and publishing excellence. The number of hours it took to research and develop this book were significant, taking time away from my family. Second, I'd like to thank the CIO, CISO, COO, and CEO contributors to this book. Your insights, experiences, lessons learned, and projections going forward will help organizations around the globe better prepare to live with expected future disruptions associated with Covid-19 and other disrupters that will inevitably challenge us all that we simply can't foresee at the moment.

I'd like to thank my supporting research teams. Special thanks to Joseph Poye, Christian Morrison, and Timothy Scannell at IDC. Access to your research and team was invaluable in the development of this book. I'd also like to thank my friend and colleague Rick Pastore at The Hackett Group for access to some of your terrific research studies and reports. They were especially helpful in showing readers the impacts IT planning had on the degree of impact from the pandemic.

I'd also like to thank the wonderful team of professionals who provided compelling endorsements for this book. Thank you Ed Anderson, Rick Pastore, Frederic Lemieux, and Kendra Ketchum.

Lastly, and most importantly, I'd like to thank my team at John Wiley & Sons. It's hard to believe that this is my third book with your esteemed publishing brand. What an honor it is to be backed by Wiley. Special thanks go out to Sheck Cho, executive editor; Susan Cerra, senior managing editor; and Samantha Enders, editorial assistant and lead for the cover design, for all your efforts to make this book a global leader.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Gregory S. Smith is an internationally recognized IT executive with 30 years of experience managing complex IT and business systems. Mr. Smith serves as the Chief Information Officer (CIO) for a Washington, DC–area organization. Previously, Mr. Smith served for a total of 17 years as the CIO for various organizations including the Pew Charitable Trusts and the World Wildlife Fund (WWF). His for-profit experience combines IT and business acumen from a decade in U.S. national security, U.S. financial services 100, and consulting experience from PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP. Gregory S. Smith is an honoree of several awards including: SmartCEO magazine's Top 10 CIOs in Washington DC, Computer World magazine's Premier 100 IT Leaders, CIO magazine's CIO 100, and eWeek magazine's Top 100 CIOs. He was also recognized as one of the Top 100 Most Influential CIOs by CIO Insight magazine. In 2017, he received an excellence in teaching award from Georgetown University.

Mr. Smith is the author of CIO 2.0 (in Mandarin), Straight to the Top: CIO Leadership in a Mobile, Social, and Cloud-based World (John Wiley & Sons), How to Protect Your Children on the Internet: A Road Map for Parents and Teachers (Greenwood Publishing), and Straight to the Top: Becoming a World-Class CIO (John Wiley & Sons). He received a BS in computer science from a top-10 national program from the University of Maryland at College Park and an MS in business from the Johns Hopkins University. He served for over 10 years as an adjunct professor at Johns Hopkins University in the Carey Graduate Business School. Mr. Smith currently serves as an adjunct professor at Georgetown University's graduate programs.

Mr. Smith has spoken at a number of prestigious conferences across the globe including keynote presentations in Canada, Denmark, India, Indonesia, Turkey, China, Singapore, and Belgium. He also keynoted the famous Interop conference in both New York and Las Vegas. As a practicing CIO and academic professor, he keeps his pulse on today's changing IT landscape and continues to apply those trends to business practice.

PART IThe Postpandemic New Normal

CHAPTER 1Lasting Business Impacts and Resource Sourcing After a Global Pandemic

Occurrences can be unpredictable. If we have to endure a cascade of rumpling coincidences, it's fate that dictates our lives, taking over the common procedure of “timing,” and, thus, sealing the bondage of our free choice. Once our choice is kidnapped and strangled to the core, fate checkmates our destiny.

—ERIK PEVERNAGIE1

Introduction

As I start writing this text, there have been 144,108,248 Covid-19 cases globally with 31,873,253 in the United States and 3,062,945 deaths globally and 569,530 in the United States, respectively (see Exhibit 1.1).2 I am relatively sure, as many public health professionals have discussed in the past several months, that there are far more cases and deaths globally as a result of various factors including improper counting, deaths occurring outside of hospitals, fatalities due to untreated fatal diseases such as cancer going undertreated during the height of the pandemic, and suicides. The global pandemic of 2020–2021 will go down in history as the most devastating impact on human life in our generation. The pandemic will have lasting effects on trade, commerce, travel, human behavior in business operations, and how employees work around the globe going forward.

Combine the likelihood that a fair percentage of the United States and global population will not opt to receive a Covid-19 vaccine with likely future variants that develop that make current vaccines less effective, this pandemic is long from over. CNN recently reported that 40 percent of U.S. Marines have opted to not receive the Covid-19 vaccine.3 The pharmaceutical maker Pfizer, which makes one of the Covid-19 vaccines, recently announced that for people to stay protected, they will likely need another dose within 12 months of their first pair of doses.4

Exhibit 1.1 The Johns Hopkins University of Medicine Coronavirus Resource Center

Source: The Johns Hopkins University of Medicine Coronavirus Resource Center.

From a historical perspective, smallpox remains the only human disease to be globally eradicated after killing 300 million people alone in the twentieth century.5 It took 184 years from the first-ever vaccine in 1796 to its eradication in 1980.6 Polio was almost previously eradicated except in Pakistan and Afghanistan until Covid-19 hit globally, which set back progress in 2020.7 However, cases are now on the rise and expected to climb even further in the coming months.8 “So far this year officials have tallied more than 200 cases of wild polio and nearly 600 cases of the vaccine-derived form of the disease.”9 Most of the vaccine-derived strains of polio are in Afghanistan and Pakistan, but now these rogue strains of polio are also turning up across much of sub-Saharan Africa, Yemen, Malaysia, and the Philippines.10

The combination of individuals opting out of the initial vaccine and those who don't take or have access to recurring booster shots with likely variants of the virus make for a longer-term cyclical Covid-19 transmissible virus. Combine this with the anticipated return of the annual flu virus in the fall and we have all the makings for cyclical resurgence and fear. Thus, the world will be dealing with a Covid-strained virus for years to come and, simply put, businesses, organizations, and universities need to adjust their operating environments including technology strategy to properly adapt and prepare for waves of reoccurrences. From a technology perspective, that includes more cloud-based solutions accessible via mobile devices. The traditional desktop computer will die a slow death as a result of Covid-19 as more organizations' employees leverage all mobile solutions including laptops, tablets, and smartphones.

India experienced a really bad second wave of Covid-19 in April 2021. According to CNN.com, “healthcare and other essential services across India are close to collapse as a second coronavirus wave that started in mid-March tears through the country.”11 The article goes on to report that hospitals are running out of oxygen, beds are running low, and testing is nearly impossible to get.12

Impacts from Covid-19 on Businesses and Organizations

According to the consulting company McKinsey & Company, it could take various sectors more than five years to recover to 2019 level contributions to GDP.13 Specifically, the worst projected sectors globally that have the longest recovery period (up to 2025 and beyond) include arts; entertainment; recreation; hotels and food services; educational services; transportation and warehousing; manufacturing; and mining, oil, and gas extraction.14 McKinsey goes on to suggest that economic impacts across the globe could take one of three paths:

A quick recovery during which lower fatalities occur in younger people and working adults.

A global slowdown that assumes most countries are not able to control the spread of the virus, especially in heavily populated areas, affecting small- to medium-sized companies more acutely.

A pandemic and recession arise, assuming that the virus is not seasonal.

15

During the early peak of the pandemic in 2020, there were 20,500,000 people who lost their jobs in the United States alone (14.7 percent) between February and April.16 The 10 most impacted sectors of the United States job markets included the following areas:

Hotels lost 42.7 percent of jobs.

Sports and performing arts lost 45.4 percent of jobs.

Furniture and home furnishing stores lost 46.3 percent of jobs.

Restaurants and bars lost 48.1 percent of jobs.

Motion picture and sound recording lost 48.3 percent of jobs.

Dentist offices lost 53.3 percent of jobs.

Laundry and professional services (pet, parking, dating, etc.) lost 53.5 percent of jobs.

Clothing and accessory stores lost 58.9 percent of jobs.

Amusement parks and casinos lost 59.9 percent of jobs.

Scenic transportation lost 62.1 percent of jobs.

17

Impacts in Academia

In academia, K–12 and higher education included, both had significant impacts as a result of Covid-19 during the 2020 academic year. According to the University of Southern California Dornsife Center for Economic and Social Research (CESR), “only about two-thirds of households with income less than $25,000/year had computers and Internet access for children's remote learning, compared to 91 percent of families with household incomes of $75,000–$149,000.”18 In addition, “students receiving critical services, like free or reduced-priced meals” and other education services dropped dramatically once schools started closing their doors by April 2020.19 By October 2020, approximately 68 percent of K–12 children in the United States were either learning fully or partially remote.20 In addition, nearly 40 percent of parents indicated that their children needed tutoring and indicated that their schools were not providing those services.21 Parents were also polled with regard to the overall quality of their children's education during 2020. Parents of remote learners graded it as “less engaging, and of lower quality across all content areas.”22 Parents of in-classroom learning or hybrid in-class/remote learning indicated no change or a small decrease of concerns compared to fully remote learning.23 Unions representing K–12 teachers across the country fought to have teachers return to in-classroom instruction. Parents looking for alternatives sought private-school education where they offered in-person learning.

According to the New York Times, “online schools are here to stay, even after the pandemic.”24 Bloomington, Minnesota, Public Schools “has decided to keep running online school even after the pandemic” due to preferences by families.25 Other school districts in some states are doing the opposite. In March of 2021, Governor Phil Murphy of New Jersey indicated that there should be “no remote learning option for children in New Jersey” in the fall semester.26 New York State's Department of Education recently announced that it's canceling snow days.27 Some parents are simply not happy. “This is preposterous. These people are joyless bureaucrats. And you can quote me on that!”28 said one New York parent of four.

Higher education was also greatly impacted during the 2020 academic year, both financially and with in-person learning. Georgetown University, where I teach in a graduate technology management program, went virtual for most of 2020 and through May of 2021. The transition to online learning tools like Canvas and Zoom had mixed results of a transition. Those professors who had previously taught in either all online or hybrid-online courses were better prepared than those who had traditionally taught in-person courses for the majority of their careers. Courses needed to be migrated from in-person to online formats, specifically on Canvas. An aggressive training program was conducted to assist faculty with the transition to online learning.

Colleges and universities around the world had big impacts to their operations and revenue in 2020 and into the first half of 2021. In many instances, parents reevaluated whether their children would attend university programs for cost and safety purposes. Universities across the globe lost millions in revenue from a variety of sources including:

Tuition from international students

Room and board fees

Parking fees

Food and catering fees

Many universities compensated parents by offering them a reduced tuition fee for remote-learning options. According to the Understanding America Survey, a U.S. nationally represented study of American parents on the impacts of Covid-19, the following core conclusions were identified:

The overall impact on parents planning to send their children to university in the fall of 2020 fell by 2 percent.

Another 3 percent of parents indicated that they had changed where their children would go to university in the fall as a result of Covid-19.

The impacts to two-year community school and graduate programs had the largest impact with 20 percent of two-year programs and 8 percent of graduate programs' students indicated they would take fewer classes.

There were sizable gaps in impact by race, class, and institution type. White respondents (3 percent) and upper-middle-income respondents making between $75,000 and $149,000 per year (5 percent) stated plans to take fewer classes compared to Asian (29 percent), Hispanic (24 percent), and low-income households making less than $25,000 annually (18 percent).

Hispanic (27 percent) and low-income respondents (27 percent) were much more likely to say that Covid-19 affected a household member's reenrollment decisions, most commonly impacted by financial difficulties.

29

Clemson University in South Carolina recently announced that it was freezing undergraduate tuition for the 2021–2022 academic year.30 The board of trustees “cited the financial and emotional stress of the coronavirus pandemic on many students and the families” as the primary reason for not increasing tuition.31 I believe many universities will follow suit because the impact to students and parents throughout the pandemic has been significant. I personally know many families who are pulling their kids out of high-cost universities and sending them to local community colleges for the first two years of their higher education experience as a result of complications (financial and housing) related to global pandemic. The cost savings is massive and the students don't need housing or food plans, saving parents considerable money. Once they complete two years, they plan to re-engage with their four-year school of choice. I also believe universities will start adjusting their tuition pricing for hybrid-online and all-online programs. I'm confident that smaller admission pools will drive universities to offer more affordable solutions for students that are accepted to hybrid or fully remote programs.

I asked some colleagues at several colleges and universities around the globe a few questions regarding the impacts of the global pandemic on their universities. Their answers are listed below.

Higher Education Question:What revenue impacts occurred in your university during the height of the pandemic in 2020?

University of Texas, San Antonio

We experienced a 10% budget reduction in the first year of the pandemic, which required a reduction in force in open positions while investments in remote tools increased as did adoption of the tools which really drove the value proposition positively.

—KENDRA C. KETCHUM,Vice President for Information Management and Technology, The University of Texas at San Antonio

Collegis Education

This is highly dependent on the school and their funding sources. Some schools discount tuition heavily and make up for that in residential revenue, which was disrupted by COVID. These institutions suffered. However, schools that had expensive athletic programs saw savings from canceled events and functions, which helped the bottom line. Most tuition-funded schools had some revenue volatility, some up and some down.

—DR. JASON NAIRN,VP of IT and Security at Collegis Education

University of Akureyri, Iceland

At the peak in 2020, revenue increased by 1–10%.

—HOLMAR ERLU SVANSSON,Managing Director, University of Akureyri, Iceland

Higher Education Question:Has revenue recovered to pre-Covid levels? If yes, when?

University of Texas, San Antonio

We never really gained the 10% back but our enrollments have increased, thus increasing our funding.

—KENDRA C. KETCHUM,Vice President for Information Management and Technology, The University of Texas at San Antonio

Collegis Education

In most cases no. Student enrollment numbers for Fall are still down, and we are not sure where or when the students will return. The job market is a good one for job seekers, and in those periods students will sometimes defer education for good paying jobs. Collegis and universities tend to see increases in revenue in recessive markets and decreases in bullish job markets.

—DR. JASON NAIRN, VP of IT and Security at Collegis Education

University of Akureyri, Iceland

We didn't suffer a decrease in revenue during the pandemic in 2020. We got extra funding and we had to take on extra student applications that we had rejected.

—HOLMAR ERLU SVANSSON, Managing Director, University of Akureyri, Iceland

Higher Education Question:Did your faculty and students go to remote learning during the peak of the pandemic in 2020?

University of Texas, San Antonio

Our leadership was meeting in early February to ensure we had plans in place. The beginning of March, we decided to move the IT division remote to ensure we had all kinks and issues solved prior to sending the entire workforce home during lockdown. This gave us almost two weeks to prepare and iron out issues with connectivity and the like. March 16, we went remote with all courses being moved to online and all workers being sent home. We have research labs and we had to ensure those were positioned to be staffed as well.

—KENDRA C. KETCHUM, Vice President for Information Management and Technology, The University of Texas at San Antonio

Collegis Education

Yes, remote or hybrid were offered. We have one partner that really doubled down on on-campus learning during COVID but that meant a portion of the students were in the classroom and some students in other rooms or in their dorms. Other schools went either hybrid or full remote, closing their campus partially or fully.

—DR. JASON NAIRN, VP of IT and Security at Collegis Education

University of Akureyri, Iceland

Yes and no. Our program is what we call flexible learning so part of the student population is on site but others off site. Those on site went off site but it was more or less available.

—HOLMAR ERLU SVANSSON, Managing Director, University of Akureyri, Iceland

Higher Education Question:How many semesters did your students/faculty go to remote work?

University of Texas, San Antonio

Our campus went full remote in March of 2020 and remained that way until Fall 2021.

—KENDRA C. KETCHUM, Vice President for Information Management and Technology, The University of Texas at San Antonio

Collegis Education

Typically beginning sometime in the Spring of 2020 and going through Fall of 2021 in most cases. So, most schools had at least 5 terms affected – Spring 2020, Summer 2020, Fall 2020, Spring 2021, and Summer 2021. Fall 2021 may be affected in some locations due to the increasing infections among the non-vaccinated.

—DR. JASON NAIRN, VP of IT and Security at Collegis Education

Georgetown University

Five semesters, starting with the spring semester of 2020 and ending in the summer of 2021.

—GREGORY S. SMITH, Adjunct Professor, Technology Management Graduate Program

University of Akureyri, Iceland

Three semesters.

—HOLMAR ERLU SVANSSON, Managing Director, University of Akureyri, Iceland

Higher Education Question:What tools did your students and faculty use most during remote work?

University of Texas, San Antonio

Primary tools such as secure VPN for faculty and staff connecting remotely. For students, tools included Blackboard and Office365.

—KENDRA C. KETCHUM, Vice President for Information Management and Technology, The University of Texas at San Antonio

Collegis Education

Zoom for teleconferencing

Learning management systems (Blackboard, Canvas)

Google Suite of products

Microsoft Teams

—DR. JASON NAIRN, VP of IT and Security at Collegis Education

Georgetown University

Canvas LMS, Zoom for online meetings, Google Suite of products

—GREGORY S. SMITH, Adjunct Professor, Technology Management Graduate Program

University of Akureyri, Iceland

Microsoft Teams, Canvas, Blackboard, Zoom.

—HOLMAR ERLU SVANSSON, Managing Director, University of Akureyri, Iceland

Higher Education Question:Describe the students' satisfaction level with remote learning.

University of Texas, San Antonio

Our students reported a satisfaction with the remote tools and support, including our TechCafe services that we continued to provide remotely.

—KENDRA C. KETCHUM, Vice President for Information Management and Technology, The University of Texas at San Antonio

Collegis Education

This is highly variable. I attended 3–4 SGA meetings during the COVID crisis and a lot of the feedback was positive. Students are aware of the circumstances. Their concerns were mostly around disruptions. They need these tools and systems to work consistently in order for them to be able to meet their deadlines and course requirements. They also need training and helps that can support them when they are working remotely and need help. Schools that have a good help infrastructure had happier students during the pandemic.

—DR. JASON NAIRN, VP of IT and Security at Collegis Education

Georgetown University

Average but not as good as in-person instruction. Students often expressed to me (via Canvas, email, course feedback) that online learning was not as effective as in-person instruction. I ended up evolving my courses to include optional (but highly encouraged) weekly live lectures for key topics and chapters in support of each course. Students overwhelmingly responded to these real time lectures in a positive way. I intentionally did not record them to encourage participating in the live sessions, where they could interact with me and their graduate student colleagues.

—GREGORY S. SMITH, Adjunct Professor, Technology Management Graduate Program

University of Akureyri, Iceland

High. Students miss the social events but learning as such has been fine as our programs are not in “accidental remote learning.” It is our strategy.

—HOLMAR ERLU SVANSSON, Managing Director, University of Akureyri, Iceland

Higher Education Question:Did your university offer a discount to students (undergraduate and graduate) during the 2020 calendar as a result of Covid-19 and the shift to online learning?

University of Texas, San Antonio

We did not offer discounts, but refunds on services such as housing and meals were made. We also offered loaner laptops and Wi-Fi devices to students.

—KENDRA C. KETCHUM, Vice President for Information Management and Technology, The University of Texas at San Antonio

Collegis Education

No, but there were direct payments for students from several COVID relief programs. These programs sent funds to schools and required that a portion (i.e. 50%) be paid directly to students. The rest was available to schools to use in support of programs and COVID-related changes, like technology enhancements.

—DR. JASON NAIRN, VP of IT and Security at Collegis Education

Georgetown University

Yes. The university offered undergraduate students a 10 percent discount if they did not return to the university in person. In addition, students were offered a 20 percent discount for housing and dining fees as certain semesters were shortened.

—GREGORY S. SMITH, Adjunct Professor, Technology Management Graduate Program

University of Akureyri, Iceland

No.

—HOLMAR ERLU SVANSSON, Managing Director, University of Akureyri, Iceland

Unemployment Impacts in the United States and Around the Globe

Although the global pandemic will likely come to an end at one point as a result of herd immunity and a global vaccine push with likely annual booster shots, unemployment rates in the United States and globally will take years to recover to pre-Covid-19 levels. According to the World Economic Outlook released by the International Monetary Fund in October 2020, “the pandemic had and will continue to have especially severe effects on the most economically vulnerable,” specifically women and younger workers.32 Recognizing that unemployment is typically measured by dividing the unemployed individuals by the total number of individuals in a particular country's labor force, it can be a misleading number.33 The primary reason is that if a person lost a full-time job and settled for a part-time job – they are still considered employed. Thus, the published unemployment numbers include full unemployed individuals, but not underemployed, or those who accept part-time positions in the labor force. As a result, the real unemployment numbers for countries is typically higher than what is published by governments.

The International Monetary Fund leveraged the United Nation's (UN) International Labour Organization (ILO) and concluded that “the reduction in work hours in the second quarter of 2020 was equivalent to the loss of 495 million full-time jobs, “which added to the equivalent of 160 million full-time jobs lost in the first quarter” of 2020.33 The UN's ILO goes on to predict the following impacts across the globe:

Losses to continue into the third quarter of 2020 equal to 345 million full-time positions

19.8 percent in the Americas

12.4 percent in the Arab states

11.6 percent in Europe and Central Asia

11.5 percent in Africa

10.7 percent in the Asia-Pacific region

Losses are projected for the fourth quarter of 2020 to be 245 million full-time jobs

34

How long it takes to recovery jobs lost worldwide is anyone's guess. Economists are struggling to determine by industry how long if ever certain job sectors will recover to pre-Covid-19 levels.

According to the United States Congressional Research Service (CRS), the impact from the recent 2020–2021 coronavirus pandemic on the U.S. job market was worse than compared to the end of the Great Recession in 2009.35 The Congressional Research Service reported that unemployment increased from 5 percent in 2007 to 10 percent in October 2009 compared to the Covid-19 pandemic unemployment rate of 3.5 percent in February 2020, before peaking at 14.8 percent in April 2020 (see Exhibit 1.2).36 The Congressional Research Service indicated that “the peak represents the quickest month-over-month increase in employment rates and the highest overall unemployment rate since the CRS data started being collected in 1948.37

The Congressional Research Service went on to indicate the following other impacts in the United States:

During the first three months of the pandemic in 2020, unemployment was concentrated in sectors that provided “in-person services” such as leisure and hospitality, which experienced an unemployment rate of 39.3 percent in April 2020.

Exhibit 1.2 Historical Unemployment Rate in the United States (1948–2021)

Note: Shaded regions indicate recessionary periods as identified by the National Bureau of Economic Research.

Source: U.S. Congressional Research Service, April 14, 2021.

Part-time workers experienced an unemployment rate “almost twice that of their full-time counterparts” by April (24.5 percent compared to 12.9 percent)

Workers without a college degree experienced 21.2 percent unemployment compared to 8.4 percent workers with a Bachelor's degree or higher.

Teenage women experienced an unemployment rate of 36.6 percent compared to 28.6 percent of teenage men.

Women aged 25–54 years old experienced 13.7 percent unemployment compared to their counterpart males of the same age range of 12.1 percent.

Unemployment rates by ethnicity from the peak of the pandemic in April to the end of 2020 was reported as 16.7 percent for Black, 14.1 percent for White, 18.9 percent for Hispanic workers.

38

Unemployment rates recovered to lower levels by March 2021 but varied by racial group (see Exhibit 1.3) with Black unemployment at 9.6 percent, Asian unemployment at 6 percent, followed by White unemployment of 5.4 percent.39

The Hackett Group, a strategic consultancy and leading enterprise benchmarking firm to global companies, looked at impacts of the pandemic from a few different perspectives. In a recent study, the 2020 Covid-19 Poll, which included participation from 250 global companies, Hackett found that five times more high impact organizations cut their IT budgets as a result of impacts from the pandemic (see Exhibit 1.4).40

Exhibit 1.3 Unemployment Rates by Racial Group in the United States (2020–2021)

Notes: Black and Asian workers experienced their peak unemployment rate in May 2020. White workers' peak rate occurred in April 2020.

Source: U.S. Congressional Research Service, April 14, 2021.

Exhibit 1.4 IT Budget Impacts from Covid-19

Source: COVID-19 Poll, The Hackett Group, 2020.

Some Bright Spots During the Pandemic

Several companies in a variety of sectors did very well throughout the hardest hit portion of the Coronavirus pandemic between 2020 and 2021. With many indoor dining establishments closed due to state and local restrictions, food delivery services like Door Dash, Grub Hub, and Uber Eats, all gained a larger customer base during the pandemic.41 I personally witnessed fast-food restaurants doing well with car lines consistently high during meal times, especially for large chains like McDonalds, Chick-fil-A, Kentucky Fried Chicken/Yum brands, and others that operated through drive-through windows. Online retailers like Amazon and Walmart also did well during the pandemic as shoppers feared in-person store shopping during the height of the pandemic.42 Technology and online meeting vendors like Citrix, Microsoft, Cisco, and Zoom did especially well as organizations flocked to tools for online meetings and remote access solutions for corporate staff.43

Chipotle digital sales “jumped 134 percent as customers order ahead through ‘Chipotlanes' which allow customers to pickup orders through drive through lanes.”

44

The company reported the following information:The chain opened 40 new locations in the recent quarter with more than 50 percent of the new locations offering drive-thru lanes to pick up digital orders.

Digital sales accounted for over half of the companies total $1.7 billion in revenue, a 24 percent increase compared to the same period a year ago.

Chipotle reported that it closed only five stores during the quarter, bringing the total number of locations to 2,803.

Chipotle anticipates opening about 200 new locations in 2021.

45

Grocery stores and supermarkets did exceedingly well during the peak of the pandemic, with many large and small chains adapting their stores to delivery and pick-up aisle options for customers who didn't want to enter their brick and mortar stores.46 Hand sanitizer products and cleaning solutions like Clorox Wipes were hard to find commodities early into the Covid pandemic.47 I vividly remember stores rationing the number of products allowed per customer during the early days of fear when recently stocked shelves would become bare within minutes of announcing the product. My wife to this day still maintains a cache of these products, as she's anticipating recurring waves of Covid-19 as we enter the flu season in the fall.

Liquor, wine, and beer stores were an unlikely success to me, but it was validated recently when I spoke to a number of operators about their sales in the past year.48 They explained their rationale quite clearly to me. When patrons can no longer go to restaurants and bars to drink, people buy products to consume at home. It's just that simple. Also, these businesses were deemed “essential” due to the potential impact of a run on hospitals for people that abused alcohol in their daily lives. Hospitals didn't want a run on their businesses due to alcohol shortages as their primary focus was managing Covid-19 patients.

Lastly, streaming services such has Hulu, Disney+, Netflix, HBO Go, and so forth experienced a significant surge in customers and use through the peak period of the pandemic.49 Netflix alone added nearly 16 million new subscribers in the first quarter of 2020 and its growth numbers doubled what the company expected.50 The 2020 first quarter was Netflix's “largest three-month jump” in the company's 13-year history.51 As someone who doesn't like being cooped up in their home for over a year, Netflix and Hulu helped get me through this pandemic with some terrific programming options.

Technology companies did exceedingly well during the pandemic as organizations across the globe had to rapidly adapt to leveraging a variety of technologies (remote access, collaboration, online meetings, intranets, etc.) during the pandemic to keep knowledge workers staff productive while working remotely. Google's parent company, Alphabet, saw revenue jump 34 percent to $55.3 billion in the first quarter of 2021.52 Google also reported the following:

The company made close to $18 billion in profit.

The company announced a $50 billion stock buyback. Companies only do this when they think their shares are undervalued.

Google's cloud revenue increased 46 percent year over year to $4 billion.

53

Companies that offer enterprise-class hosting Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), such as Amazon, Microsoft, and Google, all benefited during the pandemic as organizations flocked to cloud services over on-premise solutions. Microsoft's revenue jumped 19 percent in the company's third quarter as “digital adoption accelerates.”54 Microsoft reported the following details surrounding the growth: