There was a time when IT within a business simply meant computers sitting on a desk in an office. These days, however, IT is a key player in how businesses run and how various operations are integrated and executed. This IT-business relationship is largely affected by the kind of self-service cloud apps and platforms IT departments use.

One global survey of 378 business and IT professionals from midsize to large enterprises sought to define the current relationship between IT and line-of-business (LoB) leaders as it relates to the cloud. The survey found that public cloud apps are not making IT departments obsolete. Rather, they are offering new kinds of IT-business partnerships where business leaders become much more involved in the selection, development, and deployment of public cloud applications.