Compared to other organizational departments, security teams generally embraced automation on the early side. Frontline analysts facing ever-evolving cyber attacks, hampered by too much work and not enough staff, were quick to take advantage of technology that could automate tedious tasks and mission-critical workflows. 

Now, departments throughout organizations are following security’s lead. From infrastructure to IT, engineering to product, teams are finding that smart automation can effectively break down silos, streamline processes, and make data easier to access and act on. 

The increasing adoption is evident. The worldwide market for low-code development technologies is projected to total $26.9 billion in 2023, according to Gartner, while spending on hyperautomation-enabling software is forecasted to reach $720 billion. Why are companies investing so heavily in automation? The answer is simple: to maximize the investments they’ve made in their people and systems. 

My company’s 2023 Voice of the SOC report, which surveyed 900 security professionals, found that 63% of them are experiencing burnout and more than half are likely to switch jobs in the next year. Those figures should set off alarm bells for business leaders aiming to avoid employee churn. Notably, the challenges the respondents identified – growing workloads, shrinking budgets, too much data, and not enough information – are not unique to security. 

Fortunately, neither is the solution: automation. Nine out of 10 security teams are automating at least some of their work, the survey revealed, and 93% of respondents believe that more automation would improve their work-life balance. While engineering and product teams may lag behind in their adoption of automation, they’re beginning to appreciate its impact. 

Beyond security, organizations are leveraging automation to develop integration workflows for their end customers, create self-service engagement portals, and automate entire user lifecycle management programs, to name just a few applications. Now that generative AI and no-code technologies have swept away barriers to entry, automation can be brought into those areas of an organization that don’t have developers on standby to implement it. 

Automation can solve many of the most repetitive and error-prone aspects of data collection, communication, and reporting, including building workflows across systems and business units. Unique workflows can automate internal and external communications – as well as data enrichment and reporting – thereby increasing a team’s productivity and freeing employees to focus on more valuable work. 

As organizations turn to AI and automation to transform data and enrich information across systems, leaders must ensure that they do so securely. By using tools grounded in security and instilling a company-wide culture of cybersecurity, enterprises can embrace automation on every team throughout the organization with confidence.