Technology Enabling Businesses to Successfully Ride the Digital Transformation Wave

Simon Long, Director - Technology Strategy & Transformation, CBRE Asia Pacific

In an exclusive conversation with Asia Business Outlook recently, Simon shared his thoughts on the current digital transformation phenomenon and technologies playing a part in this regard. Below are the extracts from thee exclusive interview –

What are some of the major challenges businesses face while embracing digital transformation?

The biggest barrier for an organization in its digital transformation journey is the lack of a clear understanding of the various business functions and the market as a whole. When a company begins its digital transformation journey, there is a set of pre-determined goals that it wants to achieve by digitizing their systems. A lot of businesses fail to clearly define the main reason for their digital transformation and therefore lack proper awareness of what a proper outcome must be. When you look at it as an outcome that is experience-based, you will be able to look at broader topics for transformation. Looking from this perspective enables businesses to engage with all their internal departments more effectively in order to achieve the best outcomes. Additionally, the management can also have a proper expectation of what the outcomes will be once the project is successfully completed.

Budget allocation is yet another major challenge, wherein organizations look at digital transformation as a huge investment and fail to realize the massive advantages that it can offer in the long run. I believe that organizations must always keep their long term aspirations in mind whenever they analyze the TCO of digital transformation initiatives, as this not only optimizes their process efficiencies, but also builds trust and transparency with their customers. Understanding this right from the initial phase plays a key role in successfully overcoming any challenges in today’s dynamic business landscape.

Suggest a few aspects to keep in mind while selecting a cloud simulation tool for implementing big data security concepts.

There is no one-size-fits-all when it comes to cloud simulation tools. When you are looking at anything related to security, there are three key aspects that come into picture. First is the technology – whether the technology that you are using is secure, is the data encrypted automatically, is there a firewall in place and many such technical infrastructure questions about the system that you are using. Second is the process – what are your processes, do they involve being stored in any local server or device, is it securely encrypted, and many others. The third aspect is people – people not being aware of what they need to do, how to work with that tool and how to test it is a potential security risk. Looking at these three aspects is paramount when you are selecting a tool to use.

Collaboration within the workspace is paramount in formulating successful strategies for both employees and the customers

What according to you is a wise choice for businesses – data-first or cloud-first strategy?

Since storing data on the cloud costs money, I personally believe that it is important to understand your data before storing it onto the cloud. Storing all data irrespective of their nature of importance will result in the organization unnecessarily spending hefty monies on cloud solutions. Thus, it is important for the organization to carefully analyze the data, determine its need base, the value it beings-in, and then accordingly prioritize which data will be going into the cloud. Thus, a data-first approach will be my go-to strategy.

How can organizations leverage technology to optimize process efficiencies at the workplace?

Collaboration within the workspace is paramount in formulating successful strategies for both employees and the customers. The covid pandemic has completely transformed the way businesses usually functioned, and this transformation is still ongoing and not come to a halt. The biggest challenge that every organization is currently facing regardless of whether their employees are following remote working or hybrid working or working from office itself is to maintain en effective collaboration between all employees. Thus, it is very much necessary for companies to relook at how they want their people to collaborate with each other. Collaboration technologies act as true enablers in this regard, wherein they enable people to connect with each other and share information irrespective of their geographical locations.

"AI has the ability to efficiently sift through the organization’s massive database and provide the necessary information just by keying-in a simple search query into the AI-integrated system"

Explain a few major use cases on how implementing AI can be beneficial to businesses.

There is no doubt that AI will be the next big thing in digital transformation globally. When it comes to how AI can benefit business today, we need to look at two major aspects. Firstly, what will AI do internally within your organization? For this, we need to understand the opportunities that can help optimize internal services as HR, payroll and knowledge management by leveraging this technology. For instance, AI has the ability to efficiently sift through the organization’s massive database and provide the necessary information just by keying-in a simple search query into the AI-integrated system. This way, organizations can significantly optimize their internal processes and free-up more time for the company to focus on its core business functions. The second aspect is the impact AI can have on the company’s external services. For example, if you are offering services to people or having a website where they try to find information, interactive AI chatbots help you clear user queries in the most efficient way and thus enhance the their trust and loyalty towards your brand.

After carefully analyzing these two aspects, you need to decide on which one offers the most value to your company – be it optimizing your internal systems, optimizing services to your clients or a combination of both. Getting a clear picture of this and deciding on how you will utilize AI to your advantage will go a long way in staying ahead of your competitors in the market.