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State of Observability 2021: Early Investments in Observability Improve Performance, Customer Experience and Bottom Line

With every organization now being a digital organization, observability should be viewed as a core competency, not a cutting-edge differentiator, according to The State of Observability 2021, a report from Splunk in collaboration with Enterprise Strategy Group.

The research finds that observability delivers tangible, essential results and high maturity observability practices are correlated with:

■ Much greater visibility across hybrid, multi-cloud infrastructures, resources and performance areas. Mature observability users are 2.9 times as likely to report better visibility into application performance and enjoy almost 2 times better visibility into public cloud infrastructure.

■ Accelerated root cause identification, meaning complex, service-crashing crises are fixed much more quickly, or averted entirely. Leaders are 6.1 times likelier to have accelerated root cause identification (43% of leaders versus 7% of beginners).

■ Faster digital transformation, with more successful results. Organizations with the most advanced observability practices are 4.5 times more likely to report successful digital transformation initiatives.

■ Exploding innovation, with leaders reporting 60% more new services, products and revenue streams than organizations with beginner-level observability.

"The pandemic accelerated digital transformations this past year and observability simply is no longer optional in a real-time economy where multicloud complexity has become standard," said Sendur Sellakumar, SVP, Cloud and Chief Product Officer, Splunk. "Having a robust observability practice means fewer service disruptions, better customer experiences and more successful digital transformations. Observability means full fidelity data visibility not only at the infrastructure level, but also at the application and service level, with end-to-end transaction visibility no matter the technologies involved."

A significant percentage of respondents also say they have suffered material consequences for service failures that better observability practices could have prevented:

■ Lower customer satisfaction (45%)

■ Loss of revenue (37%)

■ Loss of reputation (36%)

■ Loss of customers (30%)

Additionally, gaps in observability hurt the bottom line and customer satisfaction:

■ 53% of leaders reported that app issues have resulted in customer or revenue loss.

■ 45% reported lower customer satisfaction as a result of service failures.

■ 30% reported losing customers as a consequence.

The report also highlights concrete recommendations for organizations as they look to improve their observability practices, including prioritizing data collection and correlation, as well as making use of AI, ML and automation.

Methodology: The global survey was conducted from mid-February through mid-March 2021 and in partnership with the Enterprise Strategy Group. The 525 respondents, IT and ITOps leaders and practitioners, were drawn from nine global regions and from organizations with more than 500 employees and an existing observability practice.

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State of Observability 2021: Early Investments in Observability Improve Performance, Customer Experience and Bottom Line

With every organization now being a digital organization, observability should be viewed as a core competency, not a cutting-edge differentiator, according to The State of Observability 2021, a report from Splunk in collaboration with Enterprise Strategy Group.

The research finds that observability delivers tangible, essential results and high maturity observability practices are correlated with:

■ Much greater visibility across hybrid, multi-cloud infrastructures, resources and performance areas. Mature observability users are 2.9 times as likely to report better visibility into application performance and enjoy almost 2 times better visibility into public cloud infrastructure.

■ Accelerated root cause identification, meaning complex, service-crashing crises are fixed much more quickly, or averted entirely. Leaders are 6.1 times likelier to have accelerated root cause identification (43% of leaders versus 7% of beginners).

■ Faster digital transformation, with more successful results. Organizations with the most advanced observability practices are 4.5 times more likely to report successful digital transformation initiatives.

■ Exploding innovation, with leaders reporting 60% more new services, products and revenue streams than organizations with beginner-level observability.

"The pandemic accelerated digital transformations this past year and observability simply is no longer optional in a real-time economy where multicloud complexity has become standard," said Sendur Sellakumar, SVP, Cloud and Chief Product Officer, Splunk. "Having a robust observability practice means fewer service disruptions, better customer experiences and more successful digital transformations. Observability means full fidelity data visibility not only at the infrastructure level, but also at the application and service level, with end-to-end transaction visibility no matter the technologies involved."

A significant percentage of respondents also say they have suffered material consequences for service failures that better observability practices could have prevented:

■ Lower customer satisfaction (45%)

■ Loss of revenue (37%)

■ Loss of reputation (36%)

■ Loss of customers (30%)

Additionally, gaps in observability hurt the bottom line and customer satisfaction:

■ 53% of leaders reported that app issues have resulted in customer or revenue loss.

■ 45% reported lower customer satisfaction as a result of service failures.

■ 30% reported losing customers as a consequence.

The report also highlights concrete recommendations for organizations as they look to improve their observability practices, including prioritizing data collection and correlation, as well as making use of AI, ML and automation.

Methodology: The global survey was conducted from mid-February through mid-March 2021 and in partnership with the Enterprise Strategy Group. The 525 respondents, IT and ITOps leaders and practitioners, were drawn from nine global regions and from organizations with more than 500 employees and an existing observability practice.

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According to Auvik's 2025 IT Trends Report, 60% of IT professionals feel at least moderately burned out on the job, with 43% stating that their workload is contributing to work stress. At the same time, many IT professionals are naming AI and machine learning as key areas they'd most like to upskill ...

Businesses that face downtime or outages risk financial and reputational damage, as well as reducing partner, shareholder, and customer trust. One of the major challenges that enterprises face is implementing a robust business continuity plan. What's the solution? The answer may lie in disaster recovery tactics such as truly immutable storage and regular disaster recovery testing ...

IT spending is expected to jump nearly 10% in 2025, and organizations are now facing pressure to manage costs without slowing down critical functions like observability. To meet the challenge, leaders are turning to smarter, more cost effective business strategies. Enter stage right: OpenTelemetry, the missing piece of the puzzle that is no longer just an option but rather a strategic advantage ...

Amidst the threat of cyberhacks and data breaches, companies install several security measures to keep their business safely afloat. These measures aim to protect businesses, employees, and crucial data. Yet, employees perceive them as burdensome. Frustrated with complex logins, slow access, and constant security checks, workers decide to completely bypass all security set-ups ...

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In high-traffic environments, the sheer volume and unpredictable nature of network incidents can quickly overwhelm even the most skilled teams, hindering their ability to react swiftly and effectively, potentially impacting service availability and overall business performance. This is where closed-loop remediation comes into the picture: an IT management concept designed to address the escalating complexity of modern networks ...

In 2025, enterprise workflows are undergoing a seismic shift. Propelled by breakthroughs in generative AI (GenAI), large language models (LLMs), and natural language processing (NLP), a new paradigm is emerging — agentic AI. This technology is not just automating tasks; it's reimagining how organizations make decisions, engage customers, and operate at scale ...

In the early days of the cloud revolution, business leaders perceived cloud services as a means of sidelining IT organizations. IT was too slow, too expensive, or incapable of supporting new technologies. With a team of developers, line of business managers could deploy new applications and services in the cloud. IT has been fighting to retake control ever since. Today, IT is back in the driver's seat, according to new research by Enterprise Management Associates (EMA) ...

In today's fast-paced and increasingly complex network environments, Network Operations Centers (NOCs) are the backbone of ensuring continuous uptime, smooth service delivery, and rapid issue resolution. However, the challenges faced by NOC teams are only growing. In a recent study, 78% state network complexity has grown significantly over the last few years while 84% regularly learn about network issues from users. It is imperative we adopt a new approach to managing today's network experiences ...

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