New survey of 600 enterprise leaders reveals growing investment in IT asset management, yet alarming visibility and alignment gaps persist across organizations.
BOULDER, CO / ACCESS Newswire / August 12, 2025 / WanAware, an innovator in intelligent observability, today released a new report titled Closing the ITAM Confidence Gap: 2025 Survey Insights for IT Leaders, uncovering a stark divide in how IT teams and the broader business perceive the value and performance of ITAM systems. While IT managers express growing confidence in their tools, data, and ROI, most other departments remain unconvinced and often left in the dark.
According to the survey of 600 professionals across IT, operations, and general management at multi-location enterprises, 95% of IT leaders say they trust their asset data, and 80% report growing investment in ITAM initiatives. But outside of IT, that confidence quickly erodes. Less than half of analysts feel good about ROI, and only 35% of other managers trust the accuracy of asset data.
"This isn't just a perception problem, it's an operational one," said Jeff Collins, CEO of WanAware. "When confidence in IT asset data drops by half outside the IT department, it creates real risk, wasted spend, and delays that fly under the radar until it's too late."
The report highlights how manual effort, fragmented tooling, and poor visibility continue to plague ITAM workflows. Nearly a quarter of IT teams still rely on spreadsheets and email threads to track assets. And even as IT leaders consolidate systems and adapt, the rest of the organization sees little progress. Non-IT respondents report fragmented tools, slow onboarding, and inconsistent data, undermining trust and making collaboration harder across finance, procurement, and compliance.
The gap is more than frustrating, it's expensive. The survey estimates up to 25% of IT spend is wasted on "ghost assets" including devices and licenses that are no longer in use but remain on the books. These blind spots often fly under the radar, exposing companies to unnecessary tax, security, and compliance risk.
When asked what would improve ITAM most, IT leaders weren't asking for bells and whistles. They pointed to real-time updates, automated responses to risky assets, and simplified tools that remove the burden of manual tracking. The goal is clear: fewer roadblocks, not more features.
The disconnect also appears to be widening. Half of IT managers say missing assets cause significant disruption, compared to just 9% of their peers in other departments. And while IT teams report improved visibility since shifting to remote work, analysts and ops managers see no such benefit. These perception gaps fuel disengagement, workarounds, and wasted time, ultimately weakening the business case for ITAM investment.
Still, WanAware believes alignment is possible. The report calls on IT leaders to take a more strategic role by proving the value of ITAM in business terms, integrating it with cybersecurity and service management tools, and making data and dashboards accessible to non-technical teams.
"Asset management shouldn't be a gatekeeping function," said Collins. "It should be a command center. When asset data is real-time, trusted, and actionable, it becomes the foundation for smart operations, secure systems, and scalable growth."
WanAware's own platform is built to solve exactly these issues, eliminating ghost assets with automated discovery, providing a shared real-time view across departments, and triggering policy-based remediation the moment an asset goes missing or risky. That combination of observability and automation is already helping enterprises close the confidence gap and regain control over sprawling, hybrid IT environments.
Download the full 2025 ITAM Confidence Gap survey report here. Organizations can also now capitalize on a free 14-day trial of WanAware AIM to uncover gaps in their own environment and see real-time results: https://engage.wanaware.com/free-trial-sing-up
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ABOUT WANAWARE:
WanAware is an innovator in intelligent observability, dedicated to solving the most pressing challenges in IT performance, availability, and security monitoring. By leveraging advanced technologies, including AI and machine learning, WanAware delivers actionable insights that empower organizations to achieve operational excellence. For more information, visit www.wanaware.com.
MEDIA CONTACT:
Nina Pfister, MAG PR at nina@mooringadvisorygroup.com; T: 781-929-5620.
SOURCE: WanAware
View the original press release on ACCESS Newswire:
https://www.accessnewswire.com/newsroom/en/computers-technology-and-internet/wanaware-survey-finds-itam-confidence-gap-is-costing-enterprises-1059049
