A Toast to You

It’s ok to say it: 2020 was a challenging year — a battering ram to certainty. There might never have been a time when so many of us wished for clairvoyance. And yet, while the months felt marked with adversity and ponderous moments, we carried on with fortitude and compassion — consistently putting people at the forefront of every decision, communication and action.

Despite the fact that we spent the majority of the year physically isolated from others, the year felt extraordinarily personal and intimate.

Meeting colleagues and clients virtually from their home offices — whatever that might mean — broke down a professional barrier that invited us to get to know each other on a much more personal level and our concern over each other’s health and wellness took priority over our agendas. Natural disasters and fires reminded us how much we valued the safety and comfort of our homes. Emotional and tragic events around race compelled us to have more honest conversations about who we are and what that meant for our place in an organization, in society. 

Sometimes the best we can do is just let our gut be our guide — to trust in our raw instincts to help us make decisions and urge us to understand the right thing to do isn’t necessarily easy or comfortable.

You see evidence of this in companies like Ignite Brewing when, at the earliest signs of a pandemic, the ownership team acted swiftly to make considerable changes to their business plans and operations in order to continue to serve their community while putting customers at ease (read it here).

Or in organizations like Cisco, which was among the first companies to rapidly transform a large in-person event into a virtual one, and also took on an outspoken and exemplary role during protests for racial equality.

Healthcare organizations rapidly adapted to remote care. Restaurants and retail augmented operations to support online ordering, delivery and curbside pickup. Parents working from home embraced their roles of both employee and teacher.

For this issue of the Tech Journal, we wanted to bring you not just sound IT guidance, but also a strong sense of optimism for the year behind us and the one just beginning. Inside, you’ll find strategies to turn IT into a profit center, guidance on navigating innovation in the cloud, inspiration from our CXO Corner and more.

2020 was a momentous year, but we made it, we’re learning from it, and we’re all becoming stronger for it. Whatever happened and wherever you are now, it is my sincerest hope you will look back on the year with some pride. Acknowledge the difficult decisions you and your organization had to make. Express gratitude for the sacrifices, large and small, as well as the extraordinary efforts from your teams to find a new way forward amidst the instability of our world. From all of us at Insight, cheers to you.

Explore our Winter 2020 issue.