COVID-19 Accelerating Rates of Digital Transformation
The Pandemic has Compressed Years of Digital Transformation into Months
The COVID-19 Pandemic has accelerated tech adoption and digital transformation in businesses
Tech adoption and digital transformation have been the talked of the town in recent years. Yet, many businesses were reported to be ill-prepared for digital disruption in the workplace. That was until the COVID-19 pandemic swept the globe and forced many to expedite their digital transformation journey to remain afloat.
Fostering Changes for Long Term Productivity
The Pandemic has sped up time significantly; what would have taken two years of digital transformation is now done in two months. We have reached an inflection point where conventional ways of doing business would not suffice. The dynamic economic challenges posted by global restrictions on health, commerce and travel became the catalysts to this expedited change. Organisations must now realign their focus and priorities by developing their own digital capabilities.
This could entail moving operations to the cloud, or automating processes within their respective industries. In aviation, Etihad Airways used Microsoft Teams, power apps, and Power BI to move an unprecedented 70% of its employees to remote work in just two weeks and will continue using these tools to improve other areas of the business.
In healthcare, Daman Health Insurance has activated Microsoft Health Bot solutions to conduct patient assessments for Covid-19, to share general medical information and doctor recommendations, a practice that may well outlast the pandemic and ring in a new era of telemedicine for the provider.
Remote work and work-from-home culture is now being espoused across the globe; the trend will continue to remain high once the pandemic ends. The traditional 9-6 at the office is no longer a "must" and one thing the pandemic has shown is that many jobs can be done remotely. The nature of work, its impact and productivity levels are now common topics of discourse.
While a majority of workers have reported upsides to working from home, work trends index paints a different picture - many are dealing with burn out and fewer boundaries around their personal lives.
COVID-19 Stimulated Tech Adoption
Across the globe, organisations have propelled their own digital transformation by utilising the power of the intelligent cloud to accommodate remote working conditions. This advancement was done out of necessity to optimise operations, engage customers and empower employees, and to many, altered the very core of their products and services.
In fact, despite the hits to IT budgets, market research company International Data Corporation (IDC) predicts that digital transformation spending will continue to grow in 2020.
The UAE is a hub for innovation, with a tech-savvy approach, and over the course of this year we have seen businesses embrace a reimagining of their industries. Majid Al Futtaim ventures, for one, is undergoing a retail transformation through Dynamics 365 and Office 365, transforming customer experiences and cross-selling and up-selling opportunities across business units, as revenue is increased.
Those businesses that have had the foresight to engage in a digital transformation journey are seeing the fruits of their labour. The scalability offered by the cloud is increasing cost savings, as businesses can adapt fit and cost according to need. And with efficient, agile, and self-sufficient tools, cloud services are keeping employees productive across organisations.
Hybrid Working Model
The pandemic has simultaneously introduced a hybrid working and learning model to industries all around the world on a grand scale for the first time. From this shared experience, all of us have collectively learned the value of hybrid working and the benefits to be gained from this approach.
Many experts are seeing these changes as permanent and all the signs are that remote working will shape the new decade to come for workplaces and for industries. A study by Forrester Consulting found that 57% of business leaders are introducing more flexible work from home policies. And the Microsoft Work Trends Index report is aligned with these findings.
More broadly, seven in 10 employees reported a desire to continue working from home at least part-time, finding this results in higher productivity and better use of time. The report also found that remote working drives more empathy among colleagues. Some 62% of respondents said they feel more empathetic toward their colleagues now that they have a better view of life at home.
Tech Investments Anticipated
Certainly, for the short to medium term, there are tighter budgets as companies address business resilience measures. So, there won’t be large-scale spending until the longer-term. We can expect to see an increase down the tracks however, with research from IFS showing that people concerned with economic disruption were 20% more likely to plan increased spending on digital transformation.
The digitalisation of global GDP will beat the 60% of global GDP previously predicted for 2022 – we could see a figure in excess of this now. The planning on technology has seen 52% of organisations stating they will increase their spending on DX.
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