Splunk Report Reveals How Observability Is Shaping The Future Of Cutting-Edge Organizations

Splunk Inc. in collaboration with the Enterprise Strategy Group, released the State of Observability 2022, an annual global research report that examines how observability is shaping the future of cutting-edge organizations. The report surveyed 1,250 observability practitioners, managers and experts worldwide, revealing that observability is already powering digital transformation, while highlighting its potential to create significant savings and attract the best talent to help power businesses to new heights.

The report reveals that the most sophisticated observability practitioners (leaders*) are able to cut downtime costs by 90%, from an estimated $23.8 million annually to just $2.5 million, compared to observability beginners. What’s more, leaders in observability are more innovative and more successful at achieving digital transformation outcomes and other initiatives: 

• Observability leaders have launched 60% more products or revenue streams from AppDev teams in the last year compared to beginners.
• Observability leaders report a 69% better mean time to resolution for unplanned downtime or performance degradation thanks to investment in observability.
• 66% of leaders report that their visibility into application performance is excellent (compared to just 44% of beginners). Similarly, 64% of leaders report that visibility into their security posture is excellent (versus 42% of beginners).
• Twice as many leaders can detect problems associated with internally developed applications within minutes, resulting in an estimated 37% better MTTD.

“Our research confirms just how vital observability is for every business,” said Spiros Xanthos, SVP and General Manager, Observability, Splunk. “The most sophisticated observability practitioners have given themselves an edge in digital transformation while massively cutting costs associated with downtime and boosting their ability to out-innovate the competition. These observability leaders are more competitive, more resilient, and more efficient as a result.”

Increased cloud complexity also highlights how imperative becoming an observability leader is for all enterprises. Organizations have been moving to the cloud for more than a decade and in more recent years, hybrid architectures and multicloud operations have complicated many organizations' cloud ecosystems. Seventy percent of respondents are using multiple cloud services, and the shift to multicloud has increased complexity:

• 75% of respondents have many cloud-native applications that run in multiple environments, whether multiple public clouds, on-premises and in a public cloud. 
• Leaders are even more likely to report commonly running cloud-native applications (92% versus 68% of beginners),
• 36% of organizations (and 47% of leaders) that use the public cloud to run internally developed applications use three or more different public clouds today, and 67% expect to do so within 24 months.

While the challenges of observability are global, the report reveals that Indian organizations are further along in the observability journey as compared to their global counterparts:

• Only 29% of Indian organizations are rated as beginners, versus 62%, on average, across other countries.
• 69% of Indian organizations were more likely to report that their start in observability was in part driven by a top-down mandate from leadership, versus 45% on average across other countries, and with an eye toward bolstering talent recruitment (73% versus 61% elsewhere)
• Compared to their global peers, Indian organizations were more likely to report that they are more likely to keep observability separate from digital experience monitoring (48% versus a 23% average across other countries) and security monitoring (47% versus 23% globally)
• Indian organizations lead in AIOps usage, with 47% using the technology extensively versus an average of 32% globally
  • As a result, 72% of Indian organizations were more likely to report achieving faster MTTD (Mean Time To Detect) versus 58% elsewhere

For organizations across the globe looking to invest in observability, a lack of staff is one of the biggest hindrances in improving observability. Among respondents, 95% reported challenges in finding staff to monitor and manage infrastructure and application availability, while 81% of enterprises said a lack of staff had led to projects and initiatives failing.

“Organizations that use the right observability tools and practices and build to attract talent stand the best chance of becoming leaders in observability,” said Xanthos. “By tackling data volume and variety with AI, organizations can alleviate staffing concerns, while at the same time investing in skills training to draw in the very best talent available. Consolidating vendors and rationalizing tools will also allow companies to curate the set that gives them the most visibility with the least drag, lessening the potential for staff burnout in the process.”