The secret to successful digital initiatives is pretty simple, according to Gartner

A new Gartner survey suggests that almost nine in ten companies intend to ramp up investments in key technology areas, boosting expenditures by at least one-third over current levels. But, so far, returns on investment for digital technologies have been fuzzy for most companies. 

According to the survey of 4,312 technology and business executives, 87% of business and technology executives intend to ramp up investments in cybersecurity and generative artificial intelligence (gen AI) in 2025. Only 2% have any intention of cutting back in these areas. The consultancy finds that the average planned budget increases per company are 37% for gen AI and 31% for security technologies.  

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Operational AI will also see significant gains; the average increase in operational AI spending will be about 30%. In addition, 84% of survey respondents plan on increasing operational AI spending, with an average increase of 32% per company. Other areas expecting increases include business intelligence/analytics (82%), cloud (79%), and application modernization (74%). 

The survey also shows slow, disappointing progress in the decades-old digital revolution. Only 48% of digital initiatives meet or exceed their business outcome targets. Even with the added flavor of artificial intelligence (AI), most businesses are still trying to figure out how to make digital technologies pay off.  

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As with all technologies, seeing results from AI comes down to focusing like a laser beam on the problem at hand: "In my experience, the businesses that start with a real use case and problem are seeing an ROI," Julian LaNeve, chief technology officer at Astronomer, a data platform company, told ZDNET. "They define a well-scoped, impactful problem and use gen AI to solve [it], and it's easy to measure success and ROI. The most successful business cases identify how to solve a problem that the business already cares deeply about and [will] deliver additional value to customers."

Technology maturity also makes a difference in success rates. "Previous generations of AI were narrower in scope but have been successful," said Dominic Sartorio, vice president at Denodo, a data management provider. "AI is helping with predictive maintenance of manufactured goods, predicting demand spikes in [the] markets, and finding the optimal routes for logistics, and [has] been successful for many years."

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Furthermore, according to Gartner, companies that treat their digital initiatives in a collaborative fashion -- between business and IT leaders -- rather than leaving all things digital up to their IT departments are successful with technology. "This is a radical departure from the traditional paradigm of IT delivery and business 'project sponsorship' that predominates in most enterprises," said Gartner analyst Raf Gelders.

These companies taking a more collaborative approach report at least 71% of their digital efforts deliver business benefits. In addition, Gartner estimates that 26% of staff on the business side are now building and deploying technology. Of course, with a higher degree of collaboration comes much greater communication about deliverables. However, awareness of business outcomes is critical to seeing the success of investments. 

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In addition, executives within more collaborative enterprises dedicate more of their personal time and resources to digital delivery, the Gartner researchers explain. "They co-own digital delivery end to end with their CIOs, as well as dedicate 35% of their business area staff to do technology work -- versus 21% of less-collaborative organizations. 

At least 43% of CIOs overall in the Gartner survey said they expect to decrease their investment in legacy infrastructure and data center technologies. Interestingly, the survey finds that 33% expect to increase investments in on-premises infrastructure. The researchers attribute some of this investment to a desire to experiment and produce gen AI solutions in a secure fashion.