REDMOND, Wash., May 6, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- On Thursday, the
Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) released the results of an
in-depth study of how the relationship between technology, business
and people evolved during the COVID-19 pandemic. The EIU heard from
business leaders across eight distinct industries about the
challenges and opportunities the disruption created for
organizations and how digital initiatives shifted to confront a new
reality.
Overwhelmingly, business leaders cited digital preparedness as
key to their ability to adapt. The mass move to remote work also
led to a heightened focus on employee engagement — so much so that
empowerment topics like skill-building, well-being and creating
lasting benefits for society at large now lead the transformation
agenda for many organizations.
"We've long seen the advantages that digital transformation
brings customers — and this data gives us concrete insights into
how industries have handled the challenges of the past
year," said Deb Cupp,
Microsoft's corporate vice president for enterprise and commercial
industries. "The findings confirm trends we've seen
emerging and reinforce our commitment to delivering
insights, products and services that help customers in every
industry pivot when they need to, empower workers of all kinds and
achieve more."
Commissioned by Microsoft, the EIU research seeks to unlock
insights from the past year and focus on the way forward. The study
looked specifically at supply chains, remote work, predictive
analytics, decision-making, and employee safety and well-being.
Researchers connected the dots between organizations' digital
maturity and their ability to weather the unprecedented disruption
and found a strong correlation: The more focused companies were on
digital transformation, the faster they were able to recover
operations and empower people to move forward.
"The COVID-19 pandemic showed how digital tools are critical in
allowing businesses to create agility and respond to major
disruption," said Michael Gold,
managing editor, The Economist Intelligence Unit. "But this study
shows that it's not just about business. Companies overwhelmingly
see digital transformation as crucial in overcoming skills gaps,
engaging employees and delivering broader benefits to society."
Focus on employees and societal impacts expressed across the
board
The study showed a renewed focus across industries toward
engaging and connecting people to each other, to their work and to
a shared sense of purpose. The percentage of all respondents citing
employee engagement as a technology imperative shot up from 24%
pre-pandemic to 36% in the COVID era, and was up by 10 or more
percentage points in manufacturing, financial services, retail and
education.
Concern for people and society showed up in other ways as well,
with most companies saying that the pandemic has highlighted the
need to contribute more powerfully to social outcomes — 75% said
digital transformation should go beyond business success to support
societal improvements like creating a more inclusive, accessible
workforce and addressing carbon footprints and climate change.
Technology investments accelerating worldwide
Digital tools became indispensable infrastructure across
industries. Those with robust digital footprints reported more
agility in facilitating remote work, supporting distributed roles,
recovering disrupted supply chains and transacting with customers
in new ways. But although digital transformation enabled business
continuity, the study also revealed gaps in skilling, privacy,
security and compliance as organizations apply new
technologies.
Prepared or not, organizations across industries accelerated
their transformation initiatives and began to rely more heavily on
digital tools. Here cloud technology led the way, with 50% of
organizations saying it played a critical role in their COVID-era
operations. That was followed by technologies to enable remote work
(40%), artificial intelligence and machine learning (33%), and the
Internet of Things (31%).
Pandemic's impact on industries shows human side of digital
priorities
Because each industry operates differently, the pandemic exposed
digital gaps in different ways. Educators expressed concerns about
access and inclusion, while automakers focused on climate change.
Across all industries, the human side of technology transcended
their responses and, in some ways, overshadowed benefits to
business. Study highlights by industry include the following:
- Automotive respondents were far more likely to cite
climate change as a primary benefit of digital transformation. The
industry also is investing in automation, process efficiency and
enhancing digital skills among the workforce.
- Education respondents cite skill-building and
inclusivity as top benefits of digital transformation in their
industry, but they're concerned about a lack of tools creating a
barrier to digital progress, as well as the fragmented application
of technology across departments.
- Financial services organizations were the most prepared
digitally to meet the challenges of regional lockdowns and
supply-chain disruptions. Financial services respondents were the
most likely to agree that the pandemic highlighted the competitive
edge of digitally prepared companies.
- Government organizations had an easier time obtaining
budget to invest in technologies once the pandemic hit and
generally prioritized tools to facilitate remote work and
collaboration. However, skills and talent gaps — as well as
perceived negative impacts associated with new technology — remain
barriers to digital transformation.
- Healthcare organizations relying heavily on in-person
interaction may have had the most transformation to do when the
pandemic hit, with regard to remote employee and patient
experiences. While maintaining strict compliance with patient
privacy regulations, administrators and clinicians rapidly expanded
and adopted virtual capabilities as the pressure of COVID forced
increased investments.
- Manufacturing, pre-pandemic, was already working to
address a skills gap. The sector also cited diversity and
inclusion, skill-building and climate change among their top
concerns that digital transformation can help address.
- Media and communications respondents expressed concerns
about keeping up with the pace of technological change and shared
their belief that combatting disinformation will be the key benefit
of digital transformation in the industry.
- The retail and consumer goods industry expressed
optimism that digital transformation would enhance job prospects
and was the industry most likely to focus on the positive societal
impacts of the shift to distributed and remote working.
How to get the report
The full digital report is available now from the EIU and
Microsoft. More information about the findings and how it will
affect Microsoft's strategy can be found on the Microsoft News
Center.
In addition to the cross-industry report, the microsite includes
eight companion industry snapshot reports that take a deeper look
at the concerns and technology drivers for the industries included
in the EIU study.
The study spanned 15 countries in the Americas, Asia-Pacific and Europe, surveying 800 senior executives, 100
from each of these eight industries: automotive, consumer goods and
retail, education, financial services, government, healthcare,
manufacturing, and media and communications.
About The Economist Intelligence Unit
The EIU is the thought leadership, research and analysis
division of The Economist Group and the world leader in global
business intelligence for executives. We uncover novel and
forward-looking perspectives with access to more than 750 analysts,
experts and in-country contributors that produce best-in-class
intelligence for over 200 countries and regions. More information
can be found on eiuperspectives.economist.com. Follow us on
Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook.
About Microsoft
Microsoft (Nasdaq "MSFT" @microsoft) enables digital
transformation for the era of an intelligent cloud and an
intelligent edge. Its mission is to empower every person and every
organization on the planet to achieve more.
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SOURCE Microsoft Corporation