By Greg Enenmoh – Head of Professional Services at Counterpart
The word ‘Transformation’ is used often with good reason. From the birth of the universe and throughout our lifetimes everything around us has always been in constant flux. Nothing ever remains the same. No, not even death and taxes despite the popular idiom.
So, what is Business Transformation? It is a fundamental change in business operations. This shift or realignment is defined by a change management strategy that will help your organisation improve productivity, increase growth and add value.
As the world moves firmly into a new decade, we have seen an acceleration of global factors increasingly and directly affecting all of us. According to a Gartner list, there is several factors ‘driving business disruption’.
Global Pandemic
The economic and human impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is well documented and discussed; the positives included a temporary fall in carbon emissions that provided rest for the Earth and some of its other inhabitants. It also provided the opportunity for individuals and organisations to rethink how they work.
Increased systematic mistrust of others
As we stumbled into the 2020’s more citizens increasingly distrust their leaders, corporations and even fellow citizens. A business can be one social media message from significant turmoil. In this climate, businesses have a challenge to continuously forge and maintain reputations to survive.
The Environment
Climate change is steadily moving to the forefront of conversations when framing long term country and business strategy. The environment belongs to all of us but increasingly to the younger generations who take their role very seriously as custodians driving environmental change. For example, cryptocurrencies that were designed to demand vast amounts of processing power for mining are already being held to account and the development direction for newer token creation has already changed to less harmful strategies.
Talent
Retaining skillsets and talented people is a challenge that has only been exacerbated by the pandemic. The increase in remote working has resulted in a workforce that is now used to more choice and, in turn, demand a better work-life balance. Obtaining and retaining the services of the best in-demand and talented people will require equally talented, inspirational and innovative leadership. Better communication skills allied with flexibility are also needed to accommodate differing patterns of collaboration to achieve the final aims of the business.
Technology
New technologies have always been disruptive but the confluence of AI, quantum computing and blockchain technologies allied with smart contracts and billions of ‘machine customers’ means that we are at the start of a new dawn for organisations, governments and society. This will make the internet related growth and changes of the past three decades seem small by comparison. As the internet revolutionised consumer shopping habits, blockchain technologies will change the financial industry and smart contracts will change the way that governments, businesses and individuals interact forever.
Productivity
COVID-19 caused, in part, a global drop in productivity. Business operations were compromised and a large magnifying glass was placed on the fragility of the generally unwieldy practices most businesses currently have defined. Those that embrace the opportunity to re-engineer the way that they do business will have an advantage moving forward.
People
Inspirational leaders with evangelical vision and communication skills will still be Kings and Queens in the business world. They will retain their crown as long as they can enthuse and motivate the bright and talented (who are working from home or on the beach) while also steering a clear environmental course for their organisation.
Process
The process has always been about automating the way that people work and do business. The future of process is technology-based with Smart contracts built on blockchain technologies. These are already revolutionising and reducing the time and cost of transactional processes between businesses, organisations and individuals. Expect an explosive growth of The IoT (Internet of things) which already consists of smart devices that can take direct advantage of these blockchain technologies, further removing the need for human interaction.
So, what does this mean for you?
Embrace change. With so many factors to consider, transforming how we do business can seem like a daunting task. However, the old business consultancy adage still applies. People, Processes, Technology are what make up a business. By successfully navigating the waves of change across all the current and new challenges, you are sure to see your business do well.
If you would like business transformation advice, contact us today!
https://www.counterpart.com
