How to move from frankenstack to flow

The following is adapted from a column by Freshworks CIO Ashwin Ballal on Forbes. Read the full article here. 

Every CIO has inherited—or built—a Frankenstack. That patchwork of software stitched together over years that's held together by custom integrations, workarounds and the institutional knowledge of a few key people.

The numbers tell a sobering story. Poorly integrated tools waste significant portions of IT budgets, while employees lose nearly a full working day each week just fighting fragmented processes. Gartner's 2025 CIO Report confirms what we're all feeling: 59% of applications face technical or business-fit issues, and 62% of strategy leaders say their legacy operating models can't support where their business needs to go.

These three steps help companies move from frankenstack to flow:

1. Audit and consolidate ruthlessly.

2. Introduce technology as a partner, not as a shortcut.

3. Make simplicity measurable and incentivize it.

Read the full article on Forbes.