COVID-19 is driving global business to go digital and there are no two ways about it. One of the most profound effects of this pandemic is going to be the need for every business, across the world, to construct a digital-existence, if it wants to survive the aftermath. Every CEO worth his salt will be forced to make changes to the business model and look at investing in a robust digital-capability! And that would just be the beginning of how business will be done in a post-COVID-19 world!
As we have realised after months of living under lockdown, the world is not the same anymore. Same holds true for our business practices as well. Gone are the days of high-end office spaces, state-of-the-art office equipment and round-the-clock office activities. Right from budget cuts to workforce restrictions, work-from-home roster to scaling down of operational expansion, things are undergoing massive transformation on the business front. The most prominently visible among these would be ‘digital transformation.’ Just like everything else, this transformation is beginning to happen on multiple levels within businesses and will spread further in the coming days, months and years! In other words, nothing can stop businesses from going digital now! Right from the e-commerce industry to the fashion sector, the digitalization of workforces is the latest trend on the rise. A little insight into it –
Workforce Goes Digital
As physical locations become redundant, the remote workforce is increasingly coming into the picture. Automation Anywhere, leaders in Robotic Process Automation (RPA) conducted a survey recently, in which it was found that more than 70% of the organisations feel that digital workers would make up for at least 50% of their workforce in the aftermath of COVID-19. The same survey also revealed that one in four organisations saw about 80% of its workforce digitalized in a post-COVID-19 world. As many as 57% of the respondents in the survey revealed that they were planning to acquire skills in RPA and Artificial Intelligence (AI) in order to re-skill themselves. The trend of digital workforce is visible in major industries such as banking, financial services & insurance, Pharma, healthcare and life sciences. Sectors such as manufacturing, retail and traffic, which have been hit the hardest during the current pandemic, however, remain positive about new technologies helping in understanding customer behaviour and engaging customers once the crisis is over.
Keeping Employees At A Safe Distance
Allowing employees to work-from-home has remained a central issue for businesses, especially in terms of its effect on productivity and retention of workforce. However, the COVID-19 crisis has pushed the employees to an even further distance from the physical office space. But a genuinely productive work-from-home staff can only be achieved through efficient & sensitive remote work-sharing tools, suitable to multiple channels of work. One more concept that is increasingly being discussed among business circles is “B2E” – Business to Employee. This means preparing work tools that are personalized, digital and employee-suitable!
Indian Businesswoman Joins Global Trend
With 70% of workforce set to go digital in the coming days, it makes sense to upgrade your personal skill-set to stay ahead of the curve. Among Indian entrepreneurs, Sonal Jindal, Founder, MEDUSA, has taken the lead in this regard by joining the distance learning Post Graduation in Diploma Digital Business of Columbia Business School & MIT Sloan. The program is aimed to help young CEOs design strategies and evaluate business models that help growth in the age of digitalization. The 39-week-long curriculum is primarily focused on digital aspect of businesses and Sonal’s course-mates include many CEOs and business owners, who are in it to sharpen their individual skill-set.
Having said that, this most certainly doesn’t mean that human workforce will become obsolete and computers will replace humans! Just that the humans will stay more at home and will be aided by various digital work tools, as they carry businesses on their shoulders!