Tech sprawl, that endlessly growing stash of tech that the company owns, is now owning the company. “Layers of tools have accumulated organically, each introduced in response to a pressing need, but rarely revisited or retired,” explains Jean-Philippe Avelange, CIO at Expereo. The costs associated with housing, licensing, maintaining, integrating, securing, and otherwise managing unused or underused tech can be enormous, and it’s still growing over time.
But “this isn’t just a cost issue; it’s a clarity issue,” says Santiago Bassett, CEO at Wazuh. It’s hard to find your way to the future through a maze of tech and data silos, even with an inventory list and data center maps. If you even have an updated inventory and map. Is it time for a tech purge, or are you afraid you’ll lose important data and capabilities? Here are ways to digitally detox without harming the company’s health.
There are three camps when it comes to addressing tech sprawl: Purge, save the tech for the data, or fuhgeddaboudit. There’s also another option. Which approach any company takes depends on how tech leftovers are viewed as much as how often they’re reheated and consumed.
The ‘Fuhgeddaboudit!’ Camp
Ignoring the issue or deciding to let it continue its course is not a sustainable solution for most companies.
“The compounding effect is that IT teams spend more time maintaining disparate systems than innovating, while employees waste productive hours switching between tools and manually transferring data. The original intent to solve problems gets lost in the complexity of managing the solutions themselves,” says Travis Rehl, CTO at Innovative Solutions.
But there are hidden costs as well.
“Technology sprawl has become the hidden tax on agility. This is particularly true in areas like infrastructure and network management, where complexity is often underestimated,” says Avelange.
Another hidden cost is found on the developer side, and it likely won’t end.
“The cognitive load on developers increases incrementally with each new technology they need to integrate. Multiple API’s, ETL interconnects, and all the rest of the plumbing that goes into bolting these technologies into a solution becomes overhead on the business,” says Rick Houlihan, field CTO at MongoDB. “When it comes down to it, however, modern workloads have requirements that cannot be met without introducing new technologies into the mix.”
Legal liabilities pile up alongside the tech heap, too.
“There’s a growing misconception in many organizations that more technology equals more efficiency. But from a legal and risk standpoint, every additional tool in the tech stack introduces new surfaces for data exposure, increases the complexity of regulatory compliance, and often dilutes visibility and control,” says Jenny Hamilton, chief legal officer at Exterro.
Even so, there are those who think the issue of tech sprawl is overblown.
“Overall, I think ‘tech detox’ is mainly just another dog whistle from those opposed to technology in general. I’ve yet to see a company imposing so much tech that it disrupts everyone’s productivity,” said Nizel Adams, CEO and principal engineer at Nizel Corporation. Adams thinks the better reason for any tech detoxing is to “take a break from the digital world and increasing physical engagement amongst employees in-order to build camaraderie as well as improve soft skills.”
The ‘Purge!’ Camp
In any case, there are substantial reasons to forego purging or jettisoning old or unused tech despite the growing costs and liabilities.
“Simplification is indeed a competitive advantage, but it’s not without trade-offs,” Rehl says.
“While reducing the technology footprint typically enhances security through fewer attack surfaces, improves productivity by reducing context-switching, and lowers total costs, the challenge lies in finding that specific subset of tools that can truly handle everything end-to-end,” Rehl added.
And that’s not the only issue purging and consolidating can cause.
“While the goal of unifying systems and reducing overlap and redundancy in favor of consolidating technologies can certainly yield cost savings and improve productivity, it should also be balanced with the risk of a single point of failure in the event of an outage or breach,” says Nick Tausek, lead security automation architect at Swimlane.
And it may not be the boost to security that many expect.
“From a security perspective yes, less applications and hardware to manage means less strain on your security resources so it’s easier to manage, but if a company is also sacrificing security software/hardware in lieu of “detoxing” then of course it has the opposite effect by reducing security while improving the efficiency of employees hindered by those previous restrictions,” says Adams.
The ‘Save the Tech for the Data!’ Camp
All three camps tend to lean toward preserving data trapped within the tech bloat. But you guessed it! That’s not a surefire approach, either. The data may be redundant, outdated, or incorrect, depending on how old the data is and how often it is updated. But that doesn’t mean it’s safe to toss it either.
“CIOs today must think beyond performance and cost because legal exposure often lies in the blind spots created by sprawling systems. For instance, when data is fragmented across platforms like Salesforce, marketing tools, collaboration suites, and internal databases, it becomes exponentially harder to enforce policies around privacy, retention, and defensibility,” warns Hamilton.
Of course, old or sensitive data can come back from tech graveyards and zombie apps to haunt you later, too. Whether or not you keep the tech where the data resides now, review it carefully and then decide what data makes sense to keep and what is ok to toss. But be mindful of the fact that you may have to keep the associated tech in order to read the files in question.
The Other Option: Refocus and Consolidate
A rigid mindset toward tech sprawl limits your options. Instead, consider aiming for less redundancy, more visibility, and better controls.
“According to a recent IT Consolidation survey by Quickbase, nine in 10 IT pros are looking to consolidate their tech stack this year. For this reason, CIOs should assess the effectiveness of existing tech solutions before abandoning any tools or introducing new ones,” says Jon Kennedy, CTO of Quickbase.
“During the review process, they are likely to find a glut of digital tools that create information silos, making it difficult to have a cohesive view that supports strategic decision making. It also creates unnecessary “Gray Work” as employees hop from app to app in search of information they need to do their job,” Kennedy adds.
It’s smart to make a set of goals and decide on a set of metrics to help you decide what tech to keep and what to discontinue.
“What qualifies as ‘too much’ will vary by organization. Instead of focusing solely on the quantity of technology in use, enterprises should assess the return on investment of each tool or platform. If a system isn’t delivering meaningful business value, it’s absolutely worth reconsidering,” says Jim Olsen, CTO at ModelOp.
Quantifying by degree and reason for redundancy can help too.
“When every department is working with a different interface, dashboard, or logic model, it becomes harder to align around common goals, streamline processes, or make informed decisions at pace. In that context, reducing technology, or rather, reducing redundant or poorly integrated technology, can be beneficial,” says Bassett.
Beyond carefully weighing each tech against its purpose, usefulness to business lines and departments, lifespan, relevance to growth, and ROI, find a way to evaluate and act on the data stored within it too.
“Companies should have a standardized approach for application decommissioning that includes the associated data. If it’s necessary to retain the data, it should be archived on an alternate platform in accordance with your organization’s record retention schedule,” says Ben Potaracke, vice president of information technology at Locknet Managed IT.
And finally, develop a process that includes input from users but also curbs enthusiasm as a cause of ongoing sprawl.
“Unchecked enthusiasm for technology becomes a vicious cycle. Non-technical leaders demand innovation without fully understanding hidden costs — complexity, employee confusion, diminished productivity, and deteriorating security. Technology experts, meanwhile, urge caution and clarity, practically begging leaders to simplify and focus on what’s truly essential,” says Kevin Trowbridge, CTO at Qwoted.
Don’t avoid using new or additional tech or gathering user input, just make sure there’s a strong reason to do whatever you are going to do. If not, tech sprawl woes will continue in unexpected ways.
“I’ve personally worked on projects that never should have begun, such as a Facebook plugin for political fundraising that lacked realistic funding, and a custom publishing platform eventually replaced by WordPress,” says Trowbridge.
“How do unrealistic projects get started? One source is non-technical visionaries who underestimate the complexities because they have no personal understanding of how technology works. Another is the developers themselves: One hard won lesson is that it’s easier to write new code than it is to understand existing systems. Write large — this means many developers prefer starting over rather than understanding and improving existing solutions,” Trowbridge adds.
If nothing else, remember Olsen’s words: “Smart digital detox isn’t about dialing back on innovation; it’s about focusing resources where they actually make a difference.”