Horizon 3 is no longer ‘five years away’ — it is unfolding right before our eyes

HFS recently launched its new Horizons vendor assessment framework, designed to aid enterprises in forward-looking value creation.

The new Horizons framework intentionally aligns with HFS’ Enterprise Innovation Framework – which showcases how enterprises are driving innovation across three horizons:

1. Digital is Horizon 1. Digitally optimized processes to drive superior business outcomes across business functions
2. OneOffice is Horizon 2. End-to-end organizational alignment across front, middle, and back to drive unmatched stakeholder experience
3. OneEcosystem is Horizon 3. Collaboration across multiple organizations with common objectives around driving completely new sources of value

Our recent Pulse study of 602 IT and business leaders across Global 2000 enterprises underscored the point that digital is no longer some exotic future state. Digital optimization is now according to 63% of our respondents. It is heavily focused on driving optimization within key functions such as IT, finance and accounting, customer service, procurement, supply chain, human resources, etc.

As enterprises contemplate their post-pandemic realities, they are planning for swift innovation-driven evolution over the next two years. The data showcases that enterprises will increasingly focus on enterprise-wide innovation and the adoption of the OneOffice mindset (44%). Enterprises are also increasingly looking outside their four virtual enterprise walls to cultivate new forms of value with ecosystem partners (27%). Vaccine development during the pandemic is a spectacular example of the OneEcosystem trend in action. We expect the pursuit of the unique value propositions contained within each Horizon to unfold in parallel, not in a neat linear sequence.

The Bottom Line: Digital is now. Enterprises need to continue embracing this Horizon 1 reality, while actively investigating and investing in Horizon 2 and 3 opportunities. Enterprises that ignore this push across the value horizons risk disintermediation and the purgatory of perpetual projects in silos.

Explore the HFS Pulse Dashboard

Take a look at the breadth of data in our Pulse Dashboard, which showcases data about current and future demand trends for technology and business services and related emerging technologies. See more here.