New Gartner analysis has revealed a mismatch between commercial and IT departments within financial services firms in terms of their response to the Coronavirus crisis.

The report stated that chief information officers tasked with driving digital business strategy in financial services must align with business leader priorities to ensure a coordinated response and recovery, suggesting automation technology could help sustain and improve remote working.

“Financial services CIOs moved quickly to respond to the immediate impact of the COVID-19 pandemic by addressing the needs of their teams as they moved to remote work, or, for employees considered essential, ensured that they had the proper equipment and physical space,” said Nicole Sturgill, research vice president at Gartner.

“Now, in order to successfully reset and emerge from this crisis, it’s critical that these CIOs align their next steps with business executive leadership’s strategy.”

Gartner's latest financial services COVID-19 Pulse Survey, conducted online in April among business and IT leaders from various lines of business across financial services, found that more than half of business leaders indicated their technology infrastructure was a weakness, compared with just 20 per cent of financial services CIOs.

“This disconnect will be an ongoing, perhaps even growing, challenge if left unaddressed,” said Sturgill. “CIOs must take immediate action to understand why business leaders felt that technology was a weakness - their answers can provide the path forward for which new technology investments need to be prioritised.”

The survey showed that 65 per cent of financial services CIOs plan to increase spending on infrastructure technologies such as APIs, micro-services and cloud in the coming year, while more than half plan to invest in automation that reduces the need for high-touch processes and contributes to cost optimisation.

In the short-term, Gartner recommended that CIOs create a priority map that draws a clear line between business and IT goals and identifies how such technologies will help achieve each goal. While in the long-term, financial services CIOs can proactively prevent future gaps by engaging business partners in prioritisation sessions early and often and by clearly articulating which investments will make them more resilient as an organisation.

“Fixing what’s broken will always be a near term priority for CIOs but planning ahead, while harder in uncertain times, is critical to securing the future success of the organisation,” added Sturgill.

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