...................................................................................................................................................................................... TRAVELSPORTGAMES
How will these factors manifest themselves ? We see a couple of key trends that provide challenges and opportunities in any sector , whether IT , healthcare , financial services , retail or in other verticals . Pay particular attention if you think your business is immune : The landscape is littered with companies ( Kodak most recently comes to mind ) that once defined the marketplace , and then lost ground while the rest of the world changed around them , redefining their relevance .
Innovative Change
Change is scary and it ’ s not easy , but innovation and change are what carry businesses forward and keeps them relevant . You can ’ t be so in love with your past and present that you impede your future . Innovation is not a light switch that you can flip . The challenge is that many organisations hand their supposedly breakthrough innovative ideas to the parts of their organisation that have been doing it the same way for a long time . But of course , the part of the organisation that maintains operations doesn ’ t typically want to embrace disruption , and especially not failure . So you need to protect the innovative ideas off to the side , even if it ’ s a tough decision . Microsoft ’ s Garage is a great example of how a legacy company established an idea incubator within the organisation .
The Variable Workforce
There is an interesting shift already taking place and that is projected to increase over the decade , to a much higher proportion of temporary or variable staffing . By 2020 , 40 percent of the total U . S . workforce is expected to be contract or contingent workers . That ’ s a big impact and offers a tremendous amount of flexibility , with a view to a shorter time horizon for ROI and having the agility to innovate for fast changes in market conditions . At the same time , there are new risks in motivating a more variable workforce , managing staffing contracts and maintaining control of strategic capabilities . The right partner will work closely with clients to determine the most effective model for staffing , much like our Managed Services and TrueBridge teams approach engagements .
Agility , Dis-intermediation & C onstant Learning
As Uber has shown taxi companies , removing the inefficiencies is easier than ever and that lesson will be expanded into more verticals . This transformative approach creates more opportunities , more transactions in the landscape , while it also takes out the middleman . The sheer volume of disruption is demonstrable proof that change is faster than ever and that your horizon for reliable ROI forecasting is shrinking . That shortened lifecycle is why organisations must create greenfields for innovation and embrace the flexibility that variable workforces provide .
This is only skimming the surface for 2015 , so check out our blog for more perspectives on leadership and CIO topics :
blog . northhighland . com
ABOUT DAN REARDON :
Dan is CEO of North Highland . Prior to being named CEO , he served as President and Chief Operating Officer and as a Vice President heading the company ’ s process , strategy , and enterprise customer relationship management service areas . Dan has more than 25 years of experience in strategic planning , merger integration , organisational change , and operations management . He joined North Highland when there were only 25 employees and has been highly instrumental in the growth of the firm .
CIO Magazine Spring 2015 Issue
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