It is interesting to me as a seasoned ICT professional how we love to over-complicate things. In many ways, “Digital” is falling victim to this again, with the industry re-labeling many of the tried and tested solutions, with re-imagined names and jargon and hoping the market repurchases the same tech, just with a different shade of lipstick.
One example is Robotics, this within a non-manufacturing environment to the layman can be very intimidating. We are finding more and more, especially with the financial services market, robotech solutions, which bring to the fore the likes of eAdvisors for policies and product advice. There has certainly been some amazing advancements in this space and great business benefits.
Then we find the likes of “robotics” from a process perspective, and this is often where I feel the industry is rebranding technology that has been around for years. Robotics is fundamentally the automation of a process, with built in verification and auto responding capability to a customer or end-user. Highly effective, and without a doubt hugely beneficial to any organization dealing with large volumes of transactions, the cost saving potential is obvious, never-mind the efficiency gains!
The reality though is this is not new tech, and many organisations have a lot of this type of technology in place already, so the question becomes more about the value of the new robotic tech versus the current applications an organization may be already running.
More current robotic tech might well provide a more integrated overarching solution for a business incorporating many applications for its use and benefit, but then one must take into account an exit plan for the current application(s). Many organisations fail to do this, leading to additional and unnecessary complexity within their IT environments. In my experience, this often happens simply because the current application takes on the name of a process or becomes the process, or is tied to another larger application such as an ERP or CRM system. Regular reviews of system and application landscapes is necessary, in my opinion, and it is important to see how one is able to leverage an investment in a technology broader than the initial purpose. Workflow and Business Process Management (BPM) applications have often fallen victim to this, where ERP applications have typically done better and have had far wider adoption within businesses.
It is still critical to adapt to the new digital opportunities with relevant and appropriate technology, enabling your business, both internally at a process level, as well as externally to enable your products and services to made available to the market. However, making the necessary transition to the, not new, but digital economy, can be achieved without unnecessary complexity and fanfare. Too many times we see our clients get caught up in the technology side of things forgetting what the underlying challenge or business opportunity is. IT is infamous for creating challenges in order to sell technology, lets focus on really understanding the real challenges and opportunities, and using technology to enable or fast track these.
At Adept Digital Advisory, our goal is to help organisations navigate through this complexity.
