Research released today by Agilitas IT Solutions has revealed that optimism and confidence in the channel’s future remain high despite a challenging year.
The outfit’s Channel Confidence Index 2021 said that decision-makers give an overall confidence score of 7.4 out of a possible 10.
Marketing Director of Agilitas, Richard Eglon (pictured) said decision-makers across the channel were asked to rate their feelings of confidence on a scale of 1 to 10 (1 being very pessimistic, 10 being very optimistic) in response to various topics.
New for 2021, Agilitas asked respondents to score their optimism for emerging trends, including sustainability, resilience, customer experience and productivity, in addition to the report’s staple themes of people, finance, technology, disruption, innovation, collaboration, globalisation and relevance.
Overall confidence has slightly declined from the 7.6 levels recorded in the first Channel Confidence Index in November 2019. However, within the same context, such a marginal decrease proves that optimism is generally holding firm across the board, even as businesses face new challenges and transformation due to the pandemic.
Channel decision-makers give an average score of 7.2 across business transformation, global innovation and disruption, regulation, and political factors.
This represents a drop from the last report (7.5), but is yet another score that should encourage the sector about its commitment to withstanding both internal and external market challenges. As is the nature of channel partners, ‘stronger together’ categories of investment and culture and alliances were also positively scored with the same combined average of 7.2.
Marketing Director of Agilitas Richard Eglon said: “This past year has been one of the challenges, opportunities and lessons learned for the IT Channel community, and seeing such strong levels of confidence is hugely promising for the times ahead. It is also a celebration of the positive outlook from channel businesses to turn a moment of crisis into one of reinvention and betterment for the future of people and business.”
This year’s report revealed a significant shift in confidence levels between different channel sectors among many trends. In 2019, managed service providers (MSPs) were the most optimistic, whilst IT distributors showed the lowest confidence. This year unveiled a complete role reversal between the two sectors, scoring 6.9 and 7.9, respectively.
General technology solutions providers also responded with high levels of optimism at 7.9, as did independent software providers and IT resellers, each with a score of 7.5.
“Amidst a period of unforeseen and unavoidable change, the channel has been forced to accelerate its transformation to both survive and thrive. Many of the sector’s ‘disruptors’ quickly became the ‘disrupted’ and businesses have adapted in endless new ways to stay productive and drive efficiency through uncertain times. Our latest Channel Confidence bought the pace and scale of this change into sharp focus”, Eglon said.
Other findings from the report include:
- The most senior decision-makers continue to have the most positive outlook with Managing Director and CEOs the most optimistic at 8.5
- Larger companies are generally the most optimistic for another year. Those with 500+ employees were unchanged at 7.9, whilst smaller companies (10-99 employees) showed the lowest levels at 7.1
- 64 percent ranked their optimism to improve resilience at 8 and above on the confidence scale, versus 10 percent that ranked 5 and under
- 71 percent of channel partners ranked the evolution of the customer experience at 7 and above, where 10 was ‘very significant.
- Almost a third of channel businesses (29 percent) hope to implement an effective sustainability strategy in the next 6-12 months
- When asked how important productivity is to their business, confidence scores reached an 8.3 out of a possible 10 (with 10 being very important)
