Breaking Down Tech Debt: Strategies for a Healthier Tech Ecosystem

When considering critical issues regarding technology used by businesses, technical debt is a concept that often gets overlooked, yet its effects can ripple through an organization significantly hindering growth and efficiency. The recent webinar “Tech Debt Unmasked: The Culprit Behind Your Costliest Blind Spots and Bottlenecks” brought together industry experts from TSIA and Kantata to shed light on this problem.

Technical debt refers to the consequences of poor technology decisions or compromises made either in software development or in the implementation of digital tools and systems. These decisions may speed up a process in the short term, but often at the cost of long-term efficiency, reliability, and scalability.

What creates technical debt? How does technical debt impact your resources and clients? And how do you eliminate technical debt? Discover insights from the webinar regarding business-altering aspects of technical debt, the high cost of ignoring it, and more.

Uncovering Tech Debt

During the webinar, TSIA Distinguished Researcher and Vice President of Technology Ecosystems, John Ragsdale, revealed the results of a recent survey he issued, including how approximately half of the companies surveyed identified technical debt as having a high or very high impact on their operations.

Ragsdale also found that the implications of technical debt are far-reaching, with 88% saying it’s resulting in poor employee experience and negatively impacting productivity and 75% saying it’s delivering poor customer experiences. The damage on employees and customers has long term effects on a business’ ability to renew, expand, and sell, causing issues with annual recurring revenue. In addition, 44% of respondents said their tech debt was prolonging their quote to cash process due to the number of manual processes they must use, with many still working on spreadsheets for quoting and proposal generation.

Companies grappling with technical debt find themselves mired in manual processes and slow quote-to-cash cycles, impeding business agility and efficiency. Many legacy systems were designed and implemented to perform a rigid series of tasks, but the professional services industry has undergone a massive evolution over the last few years, taking on new types of work, delivery models, and revenue sources. These older, custom-made solutions are simply not built for this type of work, and as time passes without companies adopting software that can match these demands, their technical debt grows.

Industry experts from Kantata, Melissa Korzun, ​​VP of CX Operations, and Brent Trimble, VP of Value Engineering, delved deeper into the causes and consequences of technical debt. They stressed that it often goes unrecognized until its symptoms—such as the high cost and difficulty of maintaining customized solutions—become too severe to ignore. Furthermore, technical debt hampers organizations from adopting new and innovative technologies like AI, making it crucial for companies to address their outdated systems proactively. Solving technical debt doesn’t just improve your operations today, it opens up the possibilities of tomorrow.

How to Combat Technical Debt

Addressing technical debt requires more than acknowledging its presence; it necessitates a strategic approach to untangle and remediate the deep-rooted issues within an organization’s technological framework. As suggested during the webinar, combating technical debt involves several key steps:

1. Recognize and Quantify Technical Debt: Begin by understanding where and how technical debt exists within your organization. TSIA’s survey found that the software solutions that were in the most technical debt for respondents were professional services automation (PSA) software and enterprise resource planning (ERP) billing systems. But whether it’s through homegrown systems that have become unwieldy or outdated technologies that hinder new functionalities, recognizing technical debt is the first step towards resolution.

2. Align Technical Debt Remediation with Business Goals: Tech debt strategies must align with overarching business goals to help create a compelling case for change due to the number of software systems that will likely need to be updated, changed, or replaced in the process. As Melissa Korzun mentioned, linking technical debt resolution to specific business outcomes can galvanize organizational alignment and foster a sense of urgency to address the issues.

3. Make an Effective Business Case for Change: Articulating the cost of technical debt is critical to securing buy-in and resources for remediation. As Brent Trimble pointed out, conducting a cost-benefit analysis that quantifies the impact of technical debt on the organization can help stakeholders understand the necessity of addressing the issue. Overhiring, underhiring, gaps in utilization, extensive staffing time, and more can be caused by inefficient processes and technology and all come with a steep price tag.

4. Embrace a Strategic Approach to Technology Adoption: To prevent future accrual of technical debt, organizations must adopt a more strategic approach to technology selection and implementation. This involves choosing solutions that are scalable, flexible, and capable of adapting to evolving business needs, thus avoiding the pitfalls of previous technology compromises.

Ignoring technical debt not only exacerbates operational inefficiencies but also puts businesses at a competitive disadvantage against competitors who are eliminating their tech debt and making game-changing advances in their business operations. By recognizing, quantifying, and strategically addressing technical debt, companies can pave the way for transformational change, positioning themselves for growth and innovation in an increasingly digital world.

Investing in Kantata for the Future

The Kantata Professional Services Cloud is purpose-built for both established businesses that are looking to overcome their technical debt caused by reliance on old systems and growing businesses that are investing in key software for the first time. Find out more about Kantata and see how we help businesses across the professional services industry and around the world to deliver remarkable results to their clients and employees.