Nitin Rakesh is the CEO and Managing Director of Mphasis and coauthor of the award-winning book “Transformation in Times of Crisis.”
Tennis legend Roger Federer, who retired from the professional game in September 2022, returned to capture the public imagination recently with a one-of-a-kind commencement speech for the 2024 graduating class of Dartmouth College.
By turns wise, wry, emotional and witty, the former grass-court champion compared his current predicament as a “retired” tennis player with that of the gathered students who needed to figure out what they were going to do next. But he did proceed to share a few “tennis lessons,” which he later summarized in 14 words:
“Effortless is a myth.”
“It’s only a point.”
“Life is bigger than the court.”
Far removed as the world of sports and tennis may seem from that of business and technology, a closer look at what’s underway all around us makes Federer’s words resonate powerfully. If references and conversations about technology were, until a few years ago, considered either nerdy or relevant only to those who worked within its ambit, nothing currently could be further from the truth.
Accelerating DX
Every business and domain, from banking to healthcare, is aware of the need to adopt and accelerate digital transformation (DX), not as a fanciful option but as a necessity. The compulsion stems from what customers are accustomed to and demand nowadays and the reality of how sophisticated, lithe and ubiquitous tech has become.
It’s no wonder why enterprises are looking at newer, smarter, customized ways to execute their DX journeys without having to focus solely on taking on costs. This is why a relatively new approach—the savings-led digital transformation, which focuses on enabling businesses to invest in new tech without incurring technical debt while freeing up resources to do more with their time and skills—is being met with understandable curiosity and interest.
But what, you might wonder, does this have to do with Federer or his pithy 14-word summary of his address at Dartmouth? It’s a lot more than meets the eye.
Being More, Doing Less
Moving from legacy architecture to cloud-first, artificial intelligence (AI)-led and machine learning (ML)-enabled enterprise technology—all crucial elements to a savings-led transformation—isn’t “effortless.” As Federer explains, it takes time, practice and patience, but eventually, a solid, strong game can become “effortless,” just as a DX that results from this new approach can. Additionally, being new and relatively untested, savings-led transformation may not always follow a predictable arc or deliver a sure-shot “point.” But what it can do is up the game, change the rules and win the match.
Further, although its newness may spark concern, apprehension and criticism, “Life,” as Federer says, “is bigger than the court.” Once a savings-led transformation lens is brought into play in an enterprise setting, its effects can bring about a radical change in the way leaders and businesses perceive, manage and extract value, thereby expanding the meaning of growth, efficiency and productivity.
Moving From Sickness To Wellness
Let’s take a look at how this can play out in a couple of scenarios. Consider, for example, how advanced tech like AI and ML are transforming the healthcare space. In some cases, these technologies can scan MRI reports and detect anomalies faster and better than their human counterparts, thus freeing physicians up to focus on their patients’ wellness journeys rather than only fixing their symptoms or sickness.
Now, think of CIOs. In the current context of fast-paced transformation, on any given day, they’re deluged by hundreds of requests from their companies, all of which seem equally urgent. But in actuality, they can pick up and turn around only a small fraction of these requests. Now, what if, with the help of AI and ML, they can automate some of this backlog and turn their attention to the projects that demand their undivided attention? Not only will time be saved and more get done, but they’ll also be delivering far higher value because they’re now finally able to use their skill sets.
The interesting thing is that none of this fulfills fearful prophecies about making people redundant. Instead, when you improve efficiency, the demand for the relevant process or product goes up, not down. So, instead of making teams or individuals redundant, the demand for them will only rise because when systems can be built faster, companies on the cusp of change will only have more systems for people to build, not less.
In many ways, a savings-led transformation approach marks a full circle of the journey that technology has been on since its rapid acceleration over the last few decades. While previous developments focused on tech specializing in specific applications and domains, some of the latest approaches are focused on unifying these solutions to free up talent and expertise to “be more by doing less.” In this way, human ingenuity can be rightfully reinstated in its place.
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