It’s the start of the year, which is the ideal time to refresh your outlook, especially when it comes to technology and how it can continue to improve our lives. What’s your technology vision for 2020? Sunny with passing showers? Or not so clear and partly cloudy?

I believe we’re at the tipping point of how technology can drive business and influence our day-to-day lives. Why? Because today all of the main drivers for technology adoption, which are connectivity, compute power and consumerization, are in place.

Technology has become so prevalent in our lives to a point where most of us can’t imagine a world without it. All of this is enabled by the availability of connectivity. The world has gotten smaller as so many things from apps to appliances have become smarter, more powerful and more easily accessible, thanks in part to the Internet of Things (IoT).

Consumerization is the impact of introducing popular technologies and devices that were originally designed for and utilized in the consumer market into the workplace. Think about it — things like smartphones, laptops and cloud-based sharing technologies, to name just a few.

Voice assistants are a great example. Many of us remember looking up research topics in encyclopedias when we were kids. Today our children regularly ask Alexa or Siri for help with everything from their math homework to ordering snacks from Amazon. Voice assistants are rapidly growing in popularity as business IoT devices because when linked to your task management system, notes and calendar, they are transformed into efficient assistants. For example, I can ask Google Assistant to tell me about my day, and it will read my appointments, take notes for me and schedule follow-ups without me ever touching a device. Since I don’t have an assistant at work, all of this is extremely helpful in keeping me organized and on time for my appointments.

As demand for broadband continues to increase, it’s important for local businesses to be aware of this and to create a plan to meet this growing demand. Some questions to ask: How much more bandwidth will your business need? How will you maximize broadband accessibility for your employees and/or customers? How will you secure and manage this? Businesses also need to look at how they are using these technologies and the expectations that come along with them.

Take a moment to think about how your business is addressing connectivity, compute power and consumerization. Now more than ever, these things are important to consider.

Marcus Yano is executive director of architecture and cloud services delivery at CBTS. Reach him at marcus.yano@cbts.com.