BetterCloud’s Jim Brennan Chats With Cybernews About the Ongoing Challenge of Securing SaaS

It’s no secret to anyone that the way most of us work has changed forever. But as we’ve seen since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, many IT organizations have been overwhelmed by the complexity of managing and securing large SaaS environments—especially those that haven’t embraced an automation-first, zero-touch IT mindset. 

Cybernews recently chatted with Jim Brennan, Chief Product Officer at BetterCloud, about how IT can provide a best-in-class software and security experience to your employees, while also establishing itself as a strategic partner across the entire business. You can read the entire interview here, but let’s discuss some of the top takeaways from their wide-ranging conversation. 

IT has even less time for strategic projects than anyone realized

Long-time readers of our blog know that we constantly write about how a zero-touch mindset improves the employee experience and gives IT valuable hours back to work on more strategic projects. But as Brennan told Cybernews, many IT teams have virtually no time to work on anything beyond help desk tickets.

“According to Forrester, nearly 70% of IT workers don’t have the time for security-related projects due to the demands of their workloads, and over 50% can’t fulfill their regular responsibilities.”

Jim Brennan, Chief Product Officer at BetterCloud

Although SaaS enabled millions of people to work remotely during the pandemic, Brennan added that many IT teams weren’t prepared for an uptick in SaaS adoption. Managing a cloud-first environment was challenging before remote work became the norm, and Brennan said that these challenges were exacerbated by the pandemic.

Debunking two major misconceptions about SaaS security 

Still believe that your security team is responsible for SaaS security? Brennan says this couldn’t be further from the truth.

“Historically, IT teams managed SaaS applications, and they still do. That’s why the SaaSOps movement is coming into play now and encourages IT and security teams to increasingly align and collaborate.”

Jim Brennan, Chief Product Officer at BetterCloud

Another major misconception about IT that Brennan put to bed was the perceived simplicity of securing your SaaS environment. No longer can you achieve SaaS security by managing permissions and privileges in each application’s admin dashboard.

Brennan told Cybernews that protecting data has become much more difficult thanks largely to the growing complexity of even the simplest SaaS applications.

IT is still fighting the perception that it’s a cost center

Everyone at BetterCloud has championed IT’s status as a mission-critical function that each team across the business relies on. However, Brennan told Cybernews that many organizations still view IT as mere ticket-takers—and that it’s a more pervasive reputation than even he realized.

“IT gets the bad rap of being a cost center that handles low-value tasks. IT should be seen as a strategic group that allows businesses to become more agile, proactive, and nimble, and not a tactical arm of the company.”

Jim Brennan, Chief Product Officer at BetterCloud

Brennan’s advice for CEOs who are stuck in this mindset is fairly straightforward. “I’d like to see CEOs tell CIOs: ‘Do whatever’s necessary so your people spend just 25% of their time on maintenance and keeping the lights on,’” he continues. “‘But we want 75% of your resources on digital transformation and creating more revenue for this enterprise.’”

Want to learn how BetterCloud can enable your IT team to focus on more strategic projects and establish itself as a strategic business partner? Schedule a demo.