3. Technologyat workplace:Digital Transformations
Digital transformation technologies:
Industry, organizations and businesses are changing rapidly and nature of change is
transformational. Information has become the “key” for success in job and accessibility to it at
employee’s will is paramount. Automation has resulted into well managed and highly controlled
processes at workplace. “Want for technology use” in employees is something that corporations had
never experienced before and lot of “IT or process transformations” are now internal-driven.
Advances in technologies such as computing, electronics, data management, automated
processes, analytics, anytime-anywhere access to workplace resources and inter-or-intra office
collaboration and technologies effective use in workplace has created highly efficient workplace for
“performing employee” of today. Following diagram maps prevalent digital technologies in use at
today’senterprise onachart that showsrelative technology-use sophistication of a company on y-axis
and increasing complexity of technology itself on x-axis. (Companies which use most of these digital
technologiesandsolutionsor have supportforthese technologies in their solutions would rate high on
digital development scale.)
Service relationship levels through technology cycle of a “digital transformation”:
In today’sworldof competitivecorporationscompetingonbasis of speed, agility and quality, it
is very natural to see use of myriad of technologies for doing their work or for making employees and
research and development processes at workplace highly effective and efficient. However, with
4. complexityof technological inter-webatworkplace comesneedforbroad technical skill-setinemployee
base so that moderntechnologyuse iseasy foreveryoneandit is well supported through organization.
It isnot easyto have or to developfullexpertise in-house thoughandhence comesthe need for
partnership or technology sourcing (in-sourcing, out-sourcing, auto-support/intelligence, self-
learning/self-support etc) arrangements. Relationship between expert source for “transformation
services”andcompanyimplementing digital solutions in-house goes through many phases. Following
diagram charts one very high level possible relationship “journey” of a partnership that is working its
way through a digital transformation project or sourcing expertise for its digital solution:
Digital Transformation Strategy: Relationship Value chain
Technology
Cycle
Consult
Transform
Design
Integrate
DeployValidate
Manage
Train
Maintain
5. Workplace changes:
Workplace of today is very different workplace from work place of 1980ies or 1990ies.
Technologyuse atworkplace is notonlywelcomedbutalsoappreciated.There isa mix of “age-groups”
in workforce. You would see “Baby Boomers” from Pre-1965 time frame work along with Gen Z
employees, who were born in early 1990ies or later, in same kind of work, working with same kind of
tools, having similar skill-sets and using similar technology. Their learning curve and their learning
methods mightdifferthoughi.e.you might have to train “Pre-1965” employee in class room so that he
wouldstartuse of some workplace technologytoolsvs.someone fromGenZ who use some technology
in his person chores and would want access to same in office place (such as BYOD). Productivity
benchmarking, up-skilling and talent evaluation becomes difficult in such setups and has to be
generational aswell. Careerladderswouldneedtobe properlydefinedandstructured with the help of
human resource calibration experts in such workplaces.
Type of technology products employees have at their disposal are very different from office
productivity tools you had in early 1980ies. Back then use of computers in data management or
documentation management or use of email at workplace for inter-personal communication was
considered high end of “techno-savvy’ness”. These days there is lot more automation at workplace.
Processes are computerized. Average employee in good workplaces get access to 100’s of technology
products such as IT tools, data management tools and software, collaboration technologies,
communicationanddocumentationtools,remoteaccesstools.Insummary,here is awork place culture
“change” chart that highlights typical preferences, technology needs and wants of generational
employment at work place.
Conclusion: Many companies would bring in or implement newer digital technology solutions at
workplace andtheywould have touse third-parties for their transformation work as needed expertise
6. wouldbe veryhard to findor develop in-house. Consulting companies in digital transformation space
shouldenjoygoodbusinessenvironment formany more yearsto come as expertise in newer and more
complex technologies is very hard to develop in house and it is going to be way too more time
consumingprocessincase everycompany wouldwanttodo “it” on itsown.Some consultingcompanies
have just started working on building up their “digital transformation” consulting practices. In my
opinion,it’snottoolate as we are inveryearlyphases of adaptation of some of these newer and more
complex technologies whichare again veryhardto learnforeveryone. Hence,thereisplentyof time for
consultingcompaniesto ramp up on their learning curve around new developments in computing and
electronics technologies suchas use of nano-electronics, machine leaning, text analysis and realities of
all typesindigital transformation technologies like data visualization, analytics development, process
automation and tools design.
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Bullet Points: Overview of corporate digital transformation ramp-up: Data, internet, collaboration,
security, analytics, automation, cloud, anywhere anytime access, reality, mobile and mobility
Baseline computing, electronics, process control technologies advancements: expertise in data use,
deep learning, machine learning, text analysis, automation, augmented/virtual reality, collaboration,
telepresence, operating systems, access, storage, networking and compute innovations
Complex “IT,R&D and Processmanagement” world and developments of partnership/support models
(Service development and management levels): Manage, consult, design, deploy, integrate, validate,
transform, maintain, train
Note:Thisisan article on future of digital transformation technologies and their development. Service
industryarounddigital transformationtechnologieshasstartedgrowingnow.Itwill take probably years
before use of digital technologieswouldreachlowerlevels of industry i.e. small and medium size orgs.
Since expertise developmentisdifferentandspecializedskill-setisrequiredfor implementation, newer
digital technologies’implementationwould need consulting companies help. This should come up as a
rewarding consulting practice to build.