Today it seems we're more willing than ever
to embrace businesses and let them into our
lives, even as they're gathering data while
they power our everyday routines.
But this does demand a heightened responsibility
- a new form of social contract between the
companies providing those services and their
customers, employees, governments and partners.
For those companies getting it right there’s
massive opportunity ahead, but is business
ready?
I'm talking to Paul Daugherty, Michael Biltz,
Marc Carrel-Billiard, and Elise Cornille.
Paul, the Intelligent Enterprise Unleashed,
what does that mean?
What is the new kind of relationship that
businesses are seeing with not just their customers,
but actually their own employees and other
groups in society?
What the Intelligent Enterprise Unleashed
means is that it's creating a new obligation
for companies - and a new opportunity for
companies - to engage with people differently.
The obligation part of it is that to interact
with consumers in their home, talking to your
device on your kitchen counter, you need a
different level of trust with consumers if
you're going to expect them to trust you,
to let you ‘into their home’ so to speak
– which, in reality, you’re doing - to
provide access to services.
And engendering that trust in an era where
technology becomes that pervasive is the new
level of responsibility that we're talking
about - a level of obligation with the Intelligent
Enterprise.
The opportunity is that as you engender that degree of trust and that degree of interaction
with consumers - and with your workers - it
opens up a whole new world of opportunity
for new services, more powerful ways of working
with people than what you had previously.
And I guess some companies have been really,
really good at that.
So, I’m thinking Amazon, for example, where
actually we have built up such a deep embedded
relationship with them that we are trusting
them more and more - to the extent that they
recently launched Amazon Key, where you can
literally give the driver access to your home.
You're letting somebody into your home, literally,
physically letting them into your home.
It's a great metaphor I guess for this new
deepening relationship.
Where we see things moving is that companies
are starting to redefine what their relationships
are with people and I don't just mean consumers
but consumers, governments, your employees,
your society in general and more and more
companies are seeing the advantage of earning
that trust and are starting to change from
where they currently are to really looking
for partnerships.
And so there's a different impression and
then there's different trust level that people
will give you if they feel that you're on
their side.
And that's just it - if you have a company
that you're always worried is trying to take
advantage of you, every little step that they
try to make, every piece of information they
grab about you - even if it's for your own
benefit or to give you a new service - you're
going to distrust.
But once you become that trusted member of
the family that says my nieces and nephews
use Alexa as often as their parents, in order
to ask questions - now I can start to do different
things like say ‘let's get rid of the problems
I have with my supply chain’ - one of them
being packages stolen, packages left in a
doorway - by doing something as simple as
giving a key, but that key is more a symbol
of your trust than anything else.
So, I guess what we're talking about here
is a new form of social contract, but that's
very much a relationship built on trust isn't
it?
How do companies make sure that they go about
earning that trust?
I mean there's a survey that we just released
which is very interesting because - it's not
so much about the numbers which is important
– it’s just to understand which way it
goes.
But in fact to say, let’s say that the company
says ‘OK Richard I'm going to take your
data from services that I'm providing you,
but with your data I'm going to study your
profile and I'm going to enhance these services
and then make a better service for you.
And you get my guarantee that this data will
stay in my company with all the security and
safety that we need.
And I will not release that to someone else.’
Most of the time, 80 percent of people say
‘OK I'm fine, because it's going to serve
me’.
Now, eventually if the company, the same company,
says ‘Well, you know what, I'm going to
provide this data to other providers to work
with me to provide service’.
Well, then it drops dramatically and then
it doesn’t just go to 40 percent, I mean
like goes to 10 percent, something like that.
So, you see there's a big difference between
the know-how, so people know and they trust
a company to say ‘OK I can deal with this
company.
But eventually, the company is basically using
my data for doing some other stuff and I don't
know exactly what it's going to be used for’.
Then we can’t trust it anymore.
And that's going to have a direct impact on
the service they provide.
So, as companies become more embedded into
our lives, I suppose, they need to rethink
- internally - how they approach this with
seeing the rise of whole policy units, ethical
officers at companies.
What is the best way to approach this?
I think first it is having an organization
whose responsibility is to understand how
the innovations, the services that they are
developing, will impact policy and regulations
and things like privacy, the competitiveness
and different groups like that.
I think, secondly, you need to understand
- employees need to understand - that it's
not just someone else's job.
Within the company, as all other the employees,
you have an obligation to ensure that we're
behaving ethically, that we are serving our
customers in a transparent and honest way.
You're representing the brand, and it's not
just a brand providing a product or a service
- it's something that's deeply embedded into
people's lives.
It's becoming very much - companies are becoming
very much - about lifestyle.
They are becoming a part of your lifestyle.
And when you're part of someone's life, there
is an element of responsibility that comes
along with that, and also authenticity - being
clear about that.
I think I would also add that companies - you'll
see more and more - like Facebook and others
are forming partnerships and consortia to
- as an industry - help proactively address
policy considerations, privacy and other issues
that are arising, that technology is outpacing
governments’ ability and regulators’ ability
to understand the impact.
There's something called a ‘Partnership
on AI’ that we've recently joined that's
looking at those questions with other like-minded
companies.
So just give me a very brief outline of how
the trends that you've gleaned this year all
tied together.
You know, we've really covered a huge expanse
in the Vision this year - everything from
Citizen AI, to the Frictionless Business,
to Data Veracity and other things along the
way.
And if I think about the key message coming
out of the vision, for me, this year, it's
that in some trend forecasts and in some of
the vision reports we've done, you could see
the destination of where we're headed towards.
I think the difference with the Vision this
year - and a key takeaway - is that this isn't
about a destination, it's about a journey.
We're in a period of innovation - continual
innovation - and this is about developing
the Innovation Architecture in your organization,
the ‘innovation muscle’, so to speak,
that's going to help you ingest and thrive,
regardless of what innovation comes along
and figure out how do you capitalize on that
in your business.
