Intelligent CIO Middle East Issue 57 | Page 53

FEATURE: REMOTE WORKING How are you working with your customers to meet their current needs? On the front lines of business, we’re seeing how digital technology foundations enable companies to develop great experiences for employees and customers. Now more than ever, enterprises must leverage technology to deliver great experiences, unlock remote productivity and fuel innovation. Our customers and new prospects are approaching us now more than ever to use a single ‘Platform of Platforms’ to reduce complexity, drive down costs and duplication of expenses and technology and to ensure the workforce is enabled for the new way of work. What will be the long-term impact of this new way of working? We will see a massive shift from office bound to work from home which will change every industry, massive office blocks and big sales conferences while regular business class flights will be something of the past. Digital experiences for employees and customers will matter more than ever. The best companies will identify the experiences and related digital workflows that are the most important and improve them to build better customer relationships and attract new customers. Our customers will need an innate understanding in order to make the shift to online marketing, sales and communication channels, not only in the consumer world, but also in sectors such as insurance, banking and telecommunications. Leading companies will make significant improvements to their digital channels, eliminating inefficiencies, and will prioritise important customer ‘moments that matter’, such as late payments, cancellations and moves to online service. How important is it that businesses implement smart workflows to ensure they are future-proof? Organisations that focus on digitisation are 30% more profitable and productive because they maximise the value from their entire workforce, recent studies have shown. Leadership is about learning from adversity and looking ahead. Talented organisational leaders who can see past this pandemic will be quicker to develop agile workflows that address employee and customer requirements while consumerising the experience. They’ll be faster to adjust operating models to respond to changing business conditions. They will be able to harness the full potential of their employees and the customer-base. What are the implications for organisations which do not reassess and adapt their workflows? Organisations who hang onto the past and are not able to adopt and change to a digital workplace will most likely not be around for very long. What best practice advice would you offer CIOs looking to implement a smarter workflow? Firstly, get executive support. We’ve all been there. Amazing plans with no support from leadership often die on the vine. Buy-in from the C-suite is critical. Period. This approach allows for the right mixture of carrot and stick to prioritise work across multiple teams. Let me elaborate on our own workflow and Digital Transformation within ServiceNow. From the very first internal meeting of those tasked with ServiceNow’s Digital Workflow Transformation, there was crossdepartment agreement on two goals: unlocking productivity and delivering great experiences. These were defined as such: • Goal 1: Unlocking productivity: This means finding ways to automate and digitise workflows across every department, on every type of device and across all relevant stakeholders, and personas served. • Goal 2: Delivering great experiences: We wanted to focus on what people encounter or experience over the course of their interaction with our applications, products or services. Mark Ackerman, Senior Director – Middle East & Africa, ServiceNow Simply put, increased productivity plus great experiences translate into happy employees. Happy employees plus increased productivity means happy customers. And happy employees plus happy customers lead to greater profits. Research bears this out. Happy and engaged employees, on average, have 17% higher productivity, 10% higher customer satisfaction metrics and generate 21% higher profitability. Can you tell us about ServiceNow’s Knowledge 2020 event? The Knowledge 2020 digital experience will showcase all the ways you can unlock productivity through modern digital workflows, highlight the latest customer and platform innovations, and inspire the ServiceNow community to continue to create great experiences for businesses. • Get inspired: Hear success stories and best practices from customers and thought leaders. • Get educated: Choose from hundreds of breakout sessions and labs to help you transform your work. • Get connected: Network with our community of customers, partners, and experts who can help you work better. The Knowledge 2020 content is available on demand until June 10. • www.intelligentcio.com INTELLIGENTCIO 53