Analyst Perspectives

Chief revenue officers are being asked to scale growth at a time when revenue systems are under more strain than at any point in the past decade. Buyer journeys are longer and less linear, sellers are operating across an expanding set of digital and partner channels and revenue technology stacks have grown faster than the operating models meant to govern them. In this environment, revenue...

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HR and Finance rarely agree on the same numbers, and the reasons run deeper than a simple spreadsheet mismatch. It’s a symptom of siloed business processes and disconnected data models that create misalignment at every turn. Underneath that are unclear data definitions, governance strategies without real accountability and cultural priorities that pull the two functions in different directions....

Enterprise customer experience (CX) usually focuses on the moment of communication between a customer and a business, assessing the customer’s state of mind and the outcomes of specific, limited interactions. But there’s another important context that drives customer behavior, and that’s the on-site experience of technical support. Field service is often out of the line of sight of CX planners,...

Payroll is no longer a back-office function. It has become a frontline trust engine that touches every worker, every pay cycle and the moments that matter most. When pay is right, confidence grows quietly and people focus on the work in front of them. When it is wrong, trust fractures instantly and the damage is disproportionate to the size of the mistake. Frontline employees feel this most...

Chief Revenue Officers (CROs) are under growing pressure to deliver predictable, scalable growth. They are surrounded by expanding go-to-market (GTM) teams, a sprawling sales technology stack and boardroom expectations that demand more than last quarter’s growth playbook. Sales leaders have never had more access to data, automation and point solutions, and yet the path to actual revenue...

The term SaaS-pocalypse has been popularized lately to summarize the idea that the traditional business software providers’ business model is about to undergo a tectonic structural shift because artificial intelligence will change how work is performed, rendering applications and their subscription pricing models obsolete. In this telling, AI assistants or agents can reduce the need for humans to...

Buying HR technology is a significant decision. It requires months of software provider reviews, internal alignment, business case development and implementation planning. When the contract is signed and the system goes live, it often feels like the hard part is over. In reality, the work that determines actual success is just beginning.

Revenue leadership is under pressure. Pipeline predictability is eroding, seller productivity is stalling and artificial intelligence (AI)-generated noise is clouding decision-making. While boards demand consistent growth, the operational scaffolding beneath most revenue engines remains outdated, over-reliant on siloed KPIs, fragmented tech stacks and an overpromised customer relationship...

I have been using the term “data pantry” (somewhat tongue in cheek) to describe a curated, governed and readily accessible collection of enterprise data that business users can draw on to support the use of core business software. This includes ERP, CRM and supply chain management software, as well as essential business processes such as analytics, forecasting and planning. This form of data...

I previously stated that too many enterprises allow the IT department to be wholly responsible for data and analytics, with the risk that strategies become divorced from business objectives and KPIs. I also stated that a pragmatic approach to organizing and operating data, analytics and artificial intelligence (AI) initiatives is essential to treating data as a business discipline. There are...

We are kicking off our Supply Chain Planning Buyers Guide™ for 2026. ISG Software Research defines supply chain planning (SCP) as the business discipline of coordinating the future supply of materials and services used in the creation of specific products and services with the expected demand for them. The purpose of planning is to optimize the flow of goods and materials with related services...

There are many reasons why the contact center market is in flux, but chief among them is the drive towards convergence: traditional telephony, digital channels, customer relationship management (CRM), workforce tools and analytics are expected to operate as a unified system, rather than as a set of disconnected point solutions. This creates a problem for enterprises: how to modernize their...

Let's be blunt: The pressure to adopt AI in HR is a panic button being hit by the C-suite. The mandate from the boardroom is clear, and the pressure is intensifying: HR must adopt AI to remain competitive. This directive often lands on the desks of HR leaders who are already managing complex environments, creating a dangerous disconnect between executive ambition and operational reality.

Digitally transforming finance operations has been a priority since 2020. Especially with the application of artificial intelligence in all its forms, software can streamline purchasing and the procure-to-pay (P2P) cycle, shorten process times, reduce unnecessary costs, provide greater visibility into cash flows, increase control and improve results. The application of AI will increasingly...

Time is a critical element in business decision-making. To make decisions at the speed of business, it is fundamentally important that enterprises have access to relevant data in a timely manner. It is also essential, however, that data is processed and analyzed in the correct time sequence. In order to decide when to buy or sell, a trader needs to be sure that the price data they are analyzing...

Revenue organizations are running out of room to hide. With increasingly complex buyer journeys, longer sales cycles and rising expectations for personalized outreach, today’s CROs face a mounting challenge: deliver predictable growth in a market that’s anything but predictable while simultaneously building a team that doesn’t burn out.

Prophix One is a finance and accounting platform that provides enterprises a single point of entry and common authentication for financial applications. It uses in-memory cube technology to enable enterprises to handle complex planning tasks built on very large datasets to eliminate barriers to integrated business planning. The platform and its dedicated data store support the use of artificial...

I previously described data intelligence as fundamental to providing data analysts and business users with governed self-service access to data across an enterprise by delivering information about how data is produced and consumed across the organization. Data intelligence relies on a combination of technical and business metadata and functionality for knowledge graph, data inventory, data...

Integration has evolved from a technical requirement into a strategic cornerstone in today’s HR technology landscape. Yet many organizations still treat connectivity between systems as a back-end IT concern rather than the foundation of the employee experience. That mindset is rapidly becoming a liability. The reality is simple: If your systems cannot connect, your strategy cannot connect either.