Welcome to the 2017 Databarracks Data Health Check. This is our seventh annual snapshot of the continually evolving IT industry, as experienced by the directors, managers and technicians working within it.

Every year the landscape shifts in new and unexpected ways, as innovations create new ways of working, old platforms are phased out by new standards, and the changing socio-political landscape introduces fresh challenges.

We’ve done a few things differently this year.

First of all, we’ve tweaked the number of employees in our definition of Medium (51-249) and Large (250+) organisations to align with a more standardised model.

We’ve also introduced a new demographic angle by splitting respondents according to the size of their IT department.

Finally, the questions this year introduce a new focus towards cyber security and business continuity.