PagerDuty Study Finds Pressure on Digital Services Increased by 80% Since the Start of Pandemic; 40% Expect the Worst is Yet to Come

62% of Dev and IT practitioners work an extra 10+ hours per week resolving incidents

SAN FRANCISCO – September 10, 2020 – PagerDuty, Inc. (NYSE: PD), a global leader in digital operations management, today released a new worldwide study highlighting that more than 80% of organizations have experienced a significant increase in pressure on digital services since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. These same companies cited a 47% increase in the number of daily incidents, resulting in 62% of IT and DevOps practitioners spending more than 10 extra hours per week resolving incidents, compared to six months ago.

The global survey, which involved more than 700 DevOps and IT practitioners across North America, EMEA and APJ, also shows that 40% of organizations expect this digital pressure to get worse in the next six to 12 months.

“The pandemic has irreversibly changed the way we live, work, communicate, learn and shop. We now exist in a digital default world and the stakes are high. Downtime can mean millions in lost revenue and keeping digital services running perfectly is a complex job,” said Rachel Obstler, Vice President of Product at PagerDuty. “This research underscores the fact that every company is facing the challenge of accelerating their digital transformation to keep pace with customer expectations and needs, while grappling with increased digital complexity and strain. It also candidly points to the human cost of this dramatic change - an immense strain on the practitioners charged with keeping digital services running which can lead to massive burnout.”

Since the pandemic began, 55% of respondents divulged that they are asked to resolve incidents during their personal time five or more times a week, and 39% say they are firefighting or focused on unplanned work 100% of the time, which leaves no room for proactive, innovative work. As a result, organizations have had to cancel or delay an average of 7.6 projects in the last three to six months.

Other survey highlights include:

IT and DevOps practitioners feel they play an important role in the digital economy.

  • The top reason respondents stay at their jobs is because of the teams and the camaraderie in DevOps/IT (71%).
  • 58% said they are grateful for the opportunity to play an integral role in the digital economy.

However, they are worried about keeping up with the significant volume of work.

  • 53% of survey respondents said the pressure to keep digital services running perfectly has reached unprecedented levels in the last 3-6 months.
  • 46% of practitioners feel overwhelmed when thinking about the next 12 months and feel the volume of work in the future will be significant.
  • 79% of DevOps and IT practitioners believe digital acceleration has to be their company's number one priority in 2021.

Practitioners and teams believe intelligent insights and automation will be critical to the success of their job.

  • 51% cite intelligent data and insights that help prioritize where to spend time are critical.
  • 64% believe automation that removes manual processes will be critical to do more with less and meet increased demand on digital services.
  • 69% believe smart integrations are critical to doing their job better.

“As organizations strive to capitalize on the new norm of digital first, they must modernize and automate how they manage their digital operations, because the old approach doesn’t work anymore. You need AI and machine learning, and automation, in order to remove complexity and be proactive and predictive,” Rachel Obstler continued. “Any company that fails to mature their approach, compromises customer experience, employee health, critical projects and risks significantly impacting cost structure.”

About PagerDuty, Inc.

PagerDuty, Inc. (NYSE:PD) is a leader in digital operations management. In an always-on world, organizations of all sizes trust PagerDuty to help them deliver a perfect digital experience to their customers, every time. Teams use PagerDuty to identify issues and opportunities in real time and bring together the right people to fix problems faster and prevent them in the future. Notable customers including GE, Vodafone, Box, and American Eagle Outfitters. To learn more and try PagerDuty for free, visit www.pagerduty.com. Follow our blog and connect with us on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube and Facebook.

Media Contact:

Frances Ward
media@pagerduty.com