Gartner: Top Predictions for IT Organizations and Users for 2022 and Beyond

Predicting the future is a risky business, particularly in the current environment of huge uncertainty. But once again, Gartner this week announced its Top Predictions for IT Organizations and Users in 2022 and Beyond during its virtual Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo 2021 Americas event.

“The lesson of this pandemic has been to expect the unexpected and be prepared to move in multiple strategic directions at once,” says Daryl Plummer, Gartner distinguished research VP and fellow. “Leaders that embrace options for workers, enhanced enterprise efficiency, and accelerated transformation plans have greater resilience in dealing with change.”

Plummer says Gartner’s predictions align with three trends that the firm is seeing now -- the desire for sovereignty over personal data and actions, the expansion of resilience to everything, and the need to reach beyond our expectations.

There’s plenty of change ahead, according to Gartner’s 2021 list. To follow are Gartner’s top predictions for IT organizations and users in 2022 and beyond.

1. By 2025, synthetic data will reduce personal customer data collection, a change that will enable organizations to avoid 70% of privacy violation sanctions. Gartner defines synthetic data as data that is “generated by applying a sampling technique to real-world data or by creating simulation scenarios where models and processes interact to create completely new data not directly taken from the real world.” This approach lets organizations create models without the need for collecting so much customer data. For CIOs it will enable a lower cost of data and a faster time to AI. Organizations can develop a synthetic data competency as part of the initiative.

2. By 2024 40% of consumers will trick behavior-tracking metrics to intentionally devalue the personal data collected about them, making it more difficult for data-collecting organizations to monetize that data. Consumers want personal sovereignty, Plummer says, so they are withholding data and providing false data such as burner email addresses and temporary facial tattoos to fool facial recognition software. Gartner recommends that companies consider eliminating third-party tracking and that they advocate against monetization without consent.

3. By 2027 a quarter of Fortune 20 companies will be supplanted by companies that “neuro-mine” and influence subconscious behavior at scale. Plummer says similar tactics have been around for a long time -- subliminal advertising to influence consumer behavior, and elevator Muzak to improve moods. “Tapping into human motivation is a value proposition for some companies,” he says. Gartner recommends that CIOs prepare by developing in-house behavioral expertise that targets customer benefits and employee engagement while also assessing ethical privacy and legal issues.

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