To keep the flow of the conversation this
morning
we have a couple of key questions that
we hope to address to our panelists
and see where their thoughts are, having
expertise from walking the walk of
this space for some years.
Then we have a Q&A box and
we've a chatbox
for our audience to participate and
get a conversation going around this
area. We have
just under the hour to try and cover
as much as we can.
This is our second in our Expert
Series on Digital Transformation
So I'm a business psychologist and I
specialize in neurodiversity an
and which for those of you who don't know is
usually conditions like dyslexia, ADHD, 
autism, and asperger's. And
what we found is that the digital
transformation
really creates a more level playing
field for people with those conditions
and the way the work environment is
being shaped
at the moment it's really important that
we get that right for fairness
Thanks Charlie. I might go to you next
Jackie
sure thanks Grainne. So my name is Jackie
Gilmore. Good afternoon everybody.
Delighted to be here.
I'm a partner with EY in the area of
people advisory services
and I focus on organization
transformation and talent
and to that end the future of work
and more recently in the last three to
four months the return to work.
And we're re-imagining that
in the wake of COVID-19 as well.
So I work across
financial services in the private
sector and would be delighted to share any
insights and thoughts this afternoon.
Thanks Jackie and finally Brian
good afternoon Grainne and I thank you 
and thank UCC for the
opportunity. It's lovely to contribute.
I work with HSBC and based out of London.
Well i would be based out of London if
I could actually make it there. I've started
with them during COVID incidentally
so I'm working from home.
For HSBC I'm looking at the
future operating model
for data analytics for the HSBC business
for the the commercial bank and the global bank
My background is in transformation
and change and looking for how we
can challenge norms and challenge
the status quo and drive value
and really putting the customer as a
north star in all of that.
So hopefully i can contribute a few
insights. Great Brian - thanks a lot.
Let's start with a first question and
maybe i could address it to
you three in turn.
COVID-19 has brought a lot of change.
We are seeing, as Jackie
just mentioned, the returning of workforces.
Just a couple of months ago
we had nearly a dead end to some work
practices with people exiting their 
workplaces and trying a whole new
approach of working from home.
So the question is based on that and
how different do you feel
the workforces and workplaces of the
future will be in five years time and
what are some of the things
we need to look out for in moving
forward to this new future of work
Jackie i might start with you to begin if that's okay?  Sure Grainne and
thanks a lot as it's a great question
and I i'm not sure anybody
really has the answer to that because
there are
lot of unknowns which we've seen
evidenced by the pace of acceleration
that's come
on the wake of COVID-19 but
certainly what we do know
is that the future of work
is going to be very different and that's
moving from a concept to a realization
for many organizations. If we
look since 2000 over 52 percent
of fortune 500 organizations no longer
exist. We're now at over 50 percent global
internet penetration and we know that our that employees are
motivated by purpose.
More recently the new keyword
of biosecurity as well and how
employers respond to their biosecure needs and
the societal
impact of that for organizations as
a whole. So when we look ahead
we know that in the next 10 years there's going to be
almost 500 million additions to the
working population
and and they will have different needs
and there are suggestions that many
of those will most likely quit a role
due to say substandard technology so that certainly has a role to
play. I would categorize how this is
going to change
into four different buckets and really
looking at what the nature of
the work will be
in the future and to what extent
that is structured. Brain mentioned
operating models so what does that
operating model of the future look like
as we move from hierarchy to network
of teams.
How is that work enabled so the
overlap
and between technology and human and
human augmentation. 
And how that's best leveraged to
serve businesses, societies, and 
Customers. Then finally how that's felt.
So that customer experience / employee
experience and employee
value proposition coming into
the fore and the combination of those.
There's a a lot of new terminology
already being buzzed at us this morning!
Brian can you follow through and
share your thoughts on where you're at
Thank you. Yeah sure. Some of the
things Jackie's already said are echoing
straight away with me and are things
I would be saying as well.
I think
if we wind back a little and look at what kind of journey are we on over
a long period of time (and Jackie mentioned
employee experience and customer experience)
I think it was
about 10 years ago that the penny
dropped for us in that organisations
weren't always treating customers particularly well
and the customer experience came into vogue and
and how you design with the customer in mind
and that was almost a new thing at the time that
we'd lost sight of.That brought us into the  space
of employee experience where we
realized
an engaged employee was going
to change the dial
when it came to customer experience. So
seeing those two things together
was starting to be part of the journey that
we're on.
I think this is leading us to bring that into a team environment
and by team we mean
multi-disciplinary where we bring
our collective brain together to
solve problems. So I think fundamentally
the way we go about solving our problems
or opening up our opportunities is now
based on a completely different way of 
thinking and we break things down
and you know we're all probably
very familiar with
the likes of agile and working in
frameworks and being design-led and
thinking from the business perspective
and
thinking about the outcome. I think
there's a fundamental shift
in how we structure ourselves.
It's less about what we do we.
We'll figure out what we do when we get
ourselves in the right in the right
structure. 
I think in terms of COVID
and it's impact
i don't think this is necessary changing
the direction we are travelling. i think we're 
going in the same direction
but i think there's an acceleration.
So the government last year issued a
Future Jobs Ireland report
and they forecasted things for
2025 that needed to change
like low carbon, bringing more people
into the workforce, embracing technology
... in fact these are all the things
that are just after happening in the
last couple of months
So i'd argue that we've accelerated. I
don't think we've necessarily changed
direction.  We just are getting there a
bit faster
and and there's a lot of good in that
because i think that will make our
businesses more
resilient and sustainable ... because
there was it was a sustainability issue
there in our businesses. They have proven
to be fragile so we really need to
apply our brains to that.
So lots of key topics there that we could
hone in on and spend more hours discussing ...
Charlie we'll go to you for your thoughts
on it.
Sure I think Jackie's right when she says
that in five years nobody knows ... i think
five months is quite far in advance to
think about!
So the biggest thing from from my
perspective
is that for a long long time
as individual psychologists working in
neurodiversity we've been trying to
convince managers that they could really benefit
from letting some of their neurodiverse
workforce work from home. Sometimes
we've really battled against
this idea that they might be
shirking and what COVID
did was that it has launched
this international social
experiment and it would seem that we
were right all along - people can work
from home and it
it's just fine. So I think for me it's
about dropping the idea
of the office as such.
I think it was really
important for us all to be in the office
when clerks needed to refer to ledgers.
But going forward what it means
is if if you need
quiet time then you can work at home. 
If are someone who
likes the zing and needs the quick
fire
stimulation in order to think then you
can you can work on the move now.
I think, like Brian,says, it was all
happening anyway but
we've kind of had a concentration of
this because we've had to think outside
of the box in terms of
finding new ways of working and COVID
just just making that more urgent.
it's important for me that we just
don't go back to these old ways because
it's what we used to do.
You know the digital
transformation means that
things that we're teaching in schools
are already obsolete.
My first career was in education so it
pains me to say this but
you know we're not going to need to know
how to spell it's just not going to be
relevant.
So we're still teaching skills that
just won't be useful and arguably 
spelling isn't necessary now with
the voice recognition software
that we've got and
text-to-speech. So
there's something about equipping our
young people as well with the
flexibility for the future.
Charlie that's bringing back a
subject to me that
I'm personally passionate about. Do you
think that we're ready for the
education transformation then when
you say we're accelerating and
Brian reckons we're already at 2025 and
it's only 2020? So
what's the gap and how do we call
out to to our governments, to our
education centers ...
Well far be it for me to advise on the
national curriculum!
So i think that we're still very
subject and topic based in education
and actually what we need to be doing is
equipping young people with
the skills and the flexibility and
to be ready to
adopt things quicker and to change
rather than
quizzing them on history and
geography
which are lovely subjects - I'm not
against history and geography but
our kids are learning algebra but
not about pensions! That's really
weird I think
Jackie have you any final
thoughts before we move on?
I certainly share what Brian and Charlie
have stated and also when it comes to
education and learning and the
'half life' of skills
There is the suggestion that an
engineering degree is only valid
for 18 months now such is the pace
of acceleration. I think in the
wake of COVID it is coming
more into focus that
there's certainly  more of a 
requirement or an obligation
on side of the employer to look at 
how they're tooling and skilling up
their workforce and
and ensuring that the cycle of
learning continues over time. So
what I certainly would say is that
there's an opportunity to look at
ensuring that there's greater levels
of experiential learning in an
organization
combined with mentoring, reverse
mentoring and then also
on-the-job learning through
the accountabilities of
their own job profile as well. It's
the
combination of those three and
also leveraging some of the 
e-learning tools
which will hopefully ensure that
individuals will remain relevant
and continue to build on their
knowledge and their skill sets
and can contribute to the organizations
Jackie thank you. And Brian?
Without repeating some of those really
good comments ... I think it's really
about behaviors now
and it's about fostering the
skills that help people 
adapt to new situations so they
apply themselves in different
ways and bring unique talents and
new unique perspectives
into play and to develop
a culture where people
actually can speak up so
that ideas can come from
anywhere genuinely.
You know the idea of failing fast it's
almost a little bit cliche at this
stage but
it's important that you're
trying things and experimenting
and that you're breaking things down 
and iterating
and continuously learning and getting
that feedback loop going
and then only pushing ahead when 
the conditions are right and then
scaling really fast and being able to
hit the market and so
these are different sets of skills
for people. Ideally for people who
are coming from
a technical engineering background
if we can fuse some of those
skills together and get the questioning
and critical thinking mindset into people
it's going to be powerful when
applied on top of some
technical skills.
Brian, thank you.
What will be long-term impact of COVID
on employees, workplaces, and workforces
and what was the most unusual insight or
lesson you have learned
over the past few months about digital
transformation?
Who would like to take that ... maybe Jackie?
I think we're still learning in 
terms of the long-term
impact on employees
because as you know
we're still in an evolving
situation and we don't know
as to what extent there will be a
resurgence and
the extent to which they will have an
impact
on individuals in the long term
However there are a couple of things
that you know that we have seen
on a sector agnostic basis
and have come more and more into the
fore in the last couple of 
months. I suppose one is
that we've seen that we are
adaptable you know. So
in the space of a week the amount of
people who've moved over
to different platforms - be it
Zoom, Teams, Webex or other -
so we have been able to adapt very
quickly
to new technologies and work
effectively and
productively in that remote
environment.
We would have some insight to suggest that
60 percent of individuals working remotely
at home feel they're as productive as they
would have been
f they were working in the office.
We're seeing some kind of
really interesting decisions
being taken by other organizations
like Tata Consulting Services in India
who've mandated that all their
employees will work remotely from
home because it delivers (and here's
another buzzword Grainne)
a productivity velocity quotient
of 25 percent. So they
are saying that there's a
sustained uplift in productivity.
and we're seeing that very much
in our evidence and then also
there's a greater level of focus
on employee well-being and work-life
balance.
So prior to COVID coming into
effect when we look at the future
structure of the organization
in terms of the the organizational
design and spans of layers
the impact of technology would have
reduced
the requirement for say finance teams,
administration teams, and  customer
service teams
but conversely it would have seen an
increase or an expansion
of the c-suite and also
well-being.
So that's now been amplified even
further and it's also posing
some really important questions
for leaders in their organizations around
what is the long-term value
that they are going to hold
themselves to account for beyond the
key financial levers of the P&Land how
will they realize that
throughout the organization
and in the market.
So they would be some of
early insights on the impact employees.
Do you think Jackie that many companies
are ready for this and that they
have the training and the
intelligence in-house
to deliver this up speed in
transformation or do you think
that's a new form that we'll have to
move to in getting them ready or getting them
them digitally enabled ...
I think most of the organizations and
those large-scale blue chip organizations
would have learning management
systems in place and
it's a it's a
case of evolving or building on them
but we're also talking about the
development of soft skills and
that becoming more important and those
soft skills now being the hard skills
now as we go forward
and quite often we see
middle management layers who
I refer to as the forgotten middle
because they don't necessarily
benefit from a full suite or
glide path of learning
development or leadership development
programs
and now as a result of COVID more
than ever
it's really important
for organizations and their
leaders to have those soft skills
to
invest in in their in their management
and then
so as they can have very candid
conversations on a one-to-one basis
with employees who might be coming back
to work
and to understand their intrinsic
motivations and how best to respond to
them
and create the conditions that are
successful to enable them to
work productively and feel safe and
secure.
Thanks for that Jackie. Brian?
The location of work has 
become a question now, We
were all suspicious about working
from home and
I think that we've slayed that dragon. 
Charlie already mentioned that.
But i think it's probably worth thinking
for the future where we are
really has to be dictated by what we're
trying to achieve
and again Charlie did mention about wherever
that right space is. 
I'd contend that home is part
of a hybrid model.
Home suits obviously suits a
work-life balance and there
are other benefits to it. But
it's probably very very good for
concentrated work, it's probably very
good for productivity
as we are probably going to discover.
But then
let's not forget the benefit of
what the the office brings. So it's
about understanding
where we get benefit in different ways
and the office is about
sharing knowledge, about passing
knowledge to younger colleagues, about
 creating some level of
community and social interaction,
and about forming those connections
i'd add something else to the mix here
and I'd call it a third space
and what's your creative space. It might
be one of those
two things because i think in a in a
world where we're becoming
more connected to ecosystems and
where we are collaborating more
there's potentially a third space - it
doesn't necessarily need to be a
particular place but it may be
a customer location or a partner
location or
a satellite office or a coffee shop or
whatever it happens to be but
I think people need to think about
where that in the mix - where do i
where do i create best, where am 
I at my best and
and allocate a certain amount
of time to being there.
In terms of the longer
term I've got some research here
HSBC has issued something
yesterday - it's on the website and
you can download. It's "Resilience
Building Back Better" and it's
feedback from the March-April
period of this year from 2600 customers
about how they're feeling on COVID
and it reads very interestingly
in terms of the long-term impacts that
tech and sustainability
need to be ingrained more into how
companies operate ... resilience ... 
but something that's coming to the top
which is very interesting is
that customers of HSBC
in turn feel more connected to their customers (82 percent)
to their employees (83 percent) and to
strategic partners (80 percent)
So this has bonded ecosystems,
supply chains
call it what you will. I had an anecdote
yesterday from
somebody i was working with in another
company and i said business
must be
difficult or constrained  (they are a major
services provider) ...  He said it's
incredible the empathy
that has been developed with 
their customers.
it's because everybody's
in this together.
So in terms of the long term maybe
as well as the structural things around
sustainability and resilience
... there's an empathy factor here
maybe there's a closeness here and
a re-imagining about the way we need
to go forward.
So I'd like to think that there's a very
strong byproduct coming
but this is all to be seen i suppose over time.
All very positive Brian. Thanks for that.
And Charlie your thoughts?
It's quite a specific thing for me so 
as i mentioned my
area of specialism is neurodiversity and
I guess the easiest way of explaining
that is that
some people have greater strengths and
weaknesses across their cognitive
profile
and i personally go in diagnose and
make recommendations to help with weaker
areas and then we make sure that people
and with specific strengths are in the
right jobs.
These can be lifelong conditions but
we also talk about
acquired neurodiversity. So let's say
for argument's sake that
someone is undergoing chemotherapy we
might find that
whilst they're on treatment that their
working memory isn't as strong as it
would be normally or they might not
process as quickly.
And what we're finding with COVID is that
people are having longer-term problems
with working memory and processing speed
and we just don't know what the
implication is of that yet.
So we don't know of all of the people
who have had
COVID it would seem that some
people keep getting recurring symptoms
they're very tired, they feel better, and
then they get worse again.
I actually have a colleague who tested
positive for the first
test and the second test then
tested negative and then tested positive
again on the fourth test.
It's really concerning because
obviously we don't know what
implications there are going forward
but what we do know is that some
colleagues will need
extra support. Of course that's going to
have an impact on teams.
And the most important thing is that we
talk about it and it doesn't become
one of those things that we just make
quiet and and go away because it's going
to put disproportionate amount of stress
on certain people.
So a very specific answer to your question
but it's quite an important
thing i think.
Absolutely Charlie and
thanks for that. I suppose
often these things are not really spoken about and are a layer
underneath the carpet that seems to be
pushed away ...
not consciously maybe
subconsciously ... we are dealing with
it but it's over here and we have
support mechanisms.
So in forums like this it's
great to have you on board
today to address that
and and to make it a very key point for
going forward.
There's lots of employees and
employers out there
that are in such new territory with
something that is
not just the winter flu, that this is
something that
may have recurring effects and
that is going to impact
the progression of employees etc in work
not to mention their their mental state
should they return to the office or not.
So indeed lots of food for thought
and
a very great area where lots more
support
needs to come i'd imagine both 
in the UK and Ireland so hopefully we
can learn from your intelligence in that
space.
I've just received two questions and
the first one is a little
lengthy so bear with me and I'd
appreciate if
there's hands up from whoever wants to 
tackle it. Alan thanks for sharing it.
Facebook announced in May that up to
half its workforce
is likely to be working from home within
the next
five to ten years ... There is one caveat
- staff salaries could be adjusted to
align with the cost of living in their
chosen location
... meaning potential pay cuts for those
considering moving away
from its expensive Palo Alto and other
global hubs
like dublin. Does this mean there
potentially
will be a job drain
out of Ireland to lower cost economies?
I might let that sink in for a couple of
seconds.
I think it definitely could. I would
say that
makes a lot of sense to me in terms if we
continue on the track (as we spoke earlier)
about employee
engagement and really engaged employees
and
people being at their best and in their
most comfortable environment.
Incorporating your home, wherever your
home is, into the whole equation
seems to be a logical next step. So you
see
where people are flocking to the city
and to the jobs.
I mean cities are under threat
as well in this.
There's a lot of anecdotal evidence at this point that
cities
could suffer ... we didn't think that
was going to happen. Nobody would
have forecast that.
So needing to be in the city at the
hub
doesn't seem like it's as important
as it was 12
months ago. So I could see why people
would look to reduce their salary
and have
a better way of life and a cheaper way
of life and a
home-working environment. So i think
we'd have to take that as a
threat in terms of our workforce for the
future
and particularly with particular types
of skill sets that lend themselves to
being
remote anyway, which are a lot of key
skills that we're going to need. And
in my own area we're looking at that
very intensively where our skills are
going to come from.
Okay. Thanks for that Brian. Jackie have
you any thoughts?
I'd share Brian's perspective on that
question. I probably also would say
that i think that this is much
bigger - it's one of the big hairy kind of
challenges that are coming from a
socio-political perspective as well. So
to what extent does the
employer (if we consider that we've
got a number of US multinationals
in ireland) ...
so if we take one of the the top
three where over 80 percent of their
workforce are non-nationals
many of whom have returned to their home
jurisdiction and they are 
now working from
home ... there is a question around
employers liability and where that
starts and stops and at what point will
that
over take the current benevolence of
those organizations.
So what does that mean then effectively
from a cost and also from a 
taxation perspective for
those organizations operating here in
ireland?
That's a hot topic and it's one for
government.
So that that person hit the nail on
the head.
Thanks for that Jackie absolutely
so maybe not just a job drain but a
whole bunch of economic factors and
legal factors and for employees
to look out for that ...
and seek good advice out before
they go forward.
Charlie will you have that
effect in the UK?
or are more people coming home to Ireland?
Good grief! The idea of being paid less
depending on
geographical location - i'm not sure i can
get on with that.
You know what also comes up
for me is where do you
draw the line there. Do you know one
of the things that concerns me 
most about the
digital transformation is
this obsession over seeing when people
are logged on.
So i shall not name and shame any large
companies but it would seem that as a
matter of
just general process it states how
long people are logged on for when
they've logged in, when they've
logged off, and what that doesn't tell
you is whether they've actually done any
real work
So for me it's actually about
judging people by their output
and not on their input ... and
geographic location
oh that's a hot topic isn't it 
so london is waiting
and we don't really want people to
be in the city so we're going to
penalize them financially
for getting out of the cities - that
seems odd to me .
But maybe i don't know enough about life
in Dublin to say any more about that.
We look forward to welcoming you there
or better still to Cork.
Okay guys i have another question
from Eric.  The substantial increase in virtual
remote working
has accelerated quickly but what was
withholding
companies earlier to experiment and
accelerate it.
Brian you've talked a lot about
accelerating, will you deal with that one?
Fine. Well I think technology
was definitely a constraint.
It probably has surprised us all 
how technology was just ready
for this. I'm not sure that 12 months ago
even we would have been
able to flex to do what we've done.
I do think and echoing Charlie's
last comment there about
are you online presenteeism and
old-fashioned
mentalities. There has definitely been
a huge suspicion
to home working  that you
couldn't actually
contribute and be productive.
And maybe we just haven't advanced
our whole discussion about what work is.
It has changed ... it's dramatically
changed
Digital transformation and the Digital Lab
will
tell us this but the way we are
now looking at the future of our
businesses. We are assembling
them
in very small parts. We're using 
micro-services and APIs and we're
breaking it down ... we're building it up
... and
it's more organic. So it's a different
type of work
so i just don't think we had
brought our thinking forward enough.
We were still in that ritual
of getting in our cars and going to the
office and then figuring out what we're
going to do.
So it probably needed that bigger debate
and this is the catalyst perhaps
for that.
Jackie you're nodding there graciously.
Yeah when i look at it I actually
think that a lot of it is down
to kind of behaviors. When I
look at why change programs
in large-scale
transformation programs change over.
A significant percentage
of that is down to corporate
disobedience
and also maybe a lack of change
management and behavioral change
to support that.
So i think in this instance what
we are seeing is a unifying common
goal and there's a burning
platform there globally
that nobody could challenge for
the want of keeping economies,
people and life going during this
period and so therefore I
think that kind of did
away with that corporate
disobedience and you
could see that very much in practice at a
local Irish level and because i suppose
once the pandemic ensued we
were still
at a point where our own government
was in formation talks
and who would have thought that we would
have seen this
very different government that we have now
six months ago. So i think all of
that has all helped the burning
platform, it's done away with the
corporate disobedience and it's also
encouraged organizations, where they
may not have trusted their employees
to work remotely in the past, and be
productive and doing all the
right things, it has
forced that and and then in doing
so they've kind of seen that
people can be productive and it's
built up a
psychological trust as well.
Thanks Jackie. Absolutely and I
think the trust factor
is something that was there but did it need to be tested?
And was it then driven into
existential
testing overnight when one has no choice.
Then you've got to go with it and
lots of learnings from that space.
Charlie have you anything to add?
Just if anybody on this webinar is
interested in how to get around that
system apparently you can download an
app called 'jiggle my mouse'
so that it looks like you're constantly on.
Love it Charlie. Thanks for that.
We might post it indeed ...
I'll move on to our third
question ...
How can digital transformation
play a positive role in promoting
diversity, inclusivity, and equitability?
Charlie. There's the big smile of the day.
You couldn't wait to get in on this.
My area. Let's go. So I guess I've 
already said the big losers will be
the people that aren't given that
flexibility
so the people who still need to commute
into work ... the people who
have to be in the open plan
offices in particular ...
so difficult to work in that kind of
environment.
And i think there's also something about
the power with the little p and the
obligation of certain people who will
have to go on public transport and they
might not want to but in order to stay
in employment they will.
How well are organization's dealing
with it and i think
it depends ... it depends on the
organization  ... and it depends on
openness. But the digital
transformation
is the big leveler here. So
i think that the most important thing is
that employers need to ensure that their
employees have
the tools to actually learn how to use
some of these digital
approaches because it's
all very well equipping people with
things but if they're not showing
properly how to use it ... it's a bit like
being given the Ferrari when
you've never driven before.
We can't assume that everybody's
just gonna plug and go.
Thanks Charlie. Jackie?
I'd agree with Charlie. I think
that those organizations who
are going to lose out are those who don't
adapt
and adapt quickly and that's for sure.
And even if we consider all of the
various kinds of research that's out there
on how many kind of jobs
will be lost and replaced with
machines. 
There's a lot of conjecture out there.
But based on our research we know
let's say in EY New Zealand and Australia that 11 percent of
the jobs that would be 
retired or jettisoned would be
replaced by 13 percent more
roles or more jobs but they would be
in very different areas and i think it's
incumbent
on organizations to really look
at
the diversity of skills and diversity
of capabilities
to zone in on
some key competencies that may not have
been given the same attention
a number of years ago
such as the appreciation of
intercultural appreciation,
data visualization, active learning,
team working,
critical thinking, statistical
reasoning - all of those types of areas.
So i think that organisations
who embrace that and really
interweave and stitch that into
into their functions in their
businesses will do well
in terms of how
digital transformation
will play a positive role.
I think if anything it's shown that
it's allowed increasing flexibility and
no one size
fits all.  That's something that we know
for sure. So
the flexibility wins hands down
and that
will encourage
any type of invisible barriers
around engaging different 
talent in the workforce to be overcome.
So those individuals who might have
caring needs themselves at home or
those individuals who
can't pay rent in certain capitals in
Europe and
that therefore have ruled
themselves out of the running
for a role
are all of a sudden back in
the frame for that. So
i think that's also a contributing
factor.
Absolutely and interesting i've recently
worked with some
graduates from both UCC and CIT here in
Cork
and the idea of working from home 
in 2020
... i'm sure when they started out four
years ago this was never an intention ...
their intention was to get out of home
and do their college ...
During COVID they were fortunate
to stay at home for those that could stay at home ...
and now you know when i'm sitting 
with them or are zooming with
them they're thinking the only place
is
remaining at home ...
Maybe just just one or two points i'd
add to that in terms of the losers
... companies and individuals I
suppose who don't work at enough pace.
I think what we've proven
here in the last period of time
is that it would
have taken enormous change
programs to get everybody working on new
technology platforms but it just
happened
through osmosis over the last couple of
months
which proves the point that
it's a mindset thing. So much
so i think pace is now a huge
factor in
everything we do.
The second thing i'd say is
disrupting ourselves and
automation was mentioned there.
It's very important for the
efficiency and the sustainability of our
business to get them as lean and mean. 
Disrupt yourself and disrupt ourselves
and get out of your silos ... I mean there 
are still silos in organizations ...
and looking at the politics ...
then the right thing is the right thing ...
we need to get above our silos
and make good sound decisions
based upon design and architecture.
And the last point i'd say is companies
that don't embrace an
ecosystem ... you know there's so much
power outside your own door ...
you need people who
are engaged in orchestrating
an ecosystem so that you know how
to tap into it, you know how to
use it, you know to partner with it, and
so you find effective ways of partnering
in all different
modes as there's many many
different ways you can do this.
But I think that it will be a limiting
factor if people stay within their own
four walls
and don't embrace the opportunity that's
out there.
Great Brian. Absolutely. So it's all about
embracing and moving forward
and stop slowing down to what 
we did in the past. It's all about
creativity, critical thinking and
design thinking.
You know get this into the boardroom.
Get them out into spaces. I loved that
creative space you mentioned earlier.
A lot of emphasis is being placed
on the transition to digital
in the workplace and how changes which
are being made
now will probably endure long term.
What about the third level education
space and what would you say that the
benefits being felt in the corporate
world would be
transferable to third level?
Don't be shy guys!
I think ... you mentioned earlier there
Grainne around the kind of
graduates and the graduate
program. From EY's perspective the
graduate program is really important 
to us. For the first year in many
we've been challenged with 
our summer internship
program, which has just taken
place over the last two weeks
to really make that meaningful
within a virtual environment.
One of the things that
we're speaking to
third level institutions on is
around
a focus on digital transformation
on emerging
technologies - on data analytics,
intelligent automation, and kind of going
up that spectrum to cognitive
and beyond ...  that's there a 
real opportunity for us to
partner and work with
universities on their particular
business programs
and to bring that to life. So
by that I mean by
way of looking at say a
proof of concept or by way
of looking at what our
co-creation innovation hubs
look like and how we can
showcase and demonstrate
some of the technology,
tooling, ideation and
methodologies around getting
to a point where you can come up
with a really really fantastic
solution either a
technology solution or
otherwise. And to
that end there's EY
co-creation labs called
a wave space
and I think that's a real opportunity
to take those tooling approaches, 
methods and plug them in
or certainly share them to share 
that knowledge. And to bring
some of the EY technology leaders
or others into the third level 
institutions
and so that students can 
get a bird's eye view
of what that looks like in practice and
what they can expect.
Just finally we have a question
from Natalie ...
My question was what about the other
side of the spectrum -
employees that are happy and in fact
are looking forward to returning
back to the office
for the social aspect of work and team
building.Do you feel that these voices
are a minority?
I don't mind taking that briefly.
Thanks i don't know that
they're a minority because i can't give
you the data to back that up but what i
would say is
a lot of people actually need the
stimulation
purely on dopamine levels and for some
people it's essential so if you have
ADHD then it's
quite often accompanied by a lack of
dopamine
Yes absolutely there'll be people
who
are dismayed that they will not be
returning back to the office.
And there's got to be something
about meeting everybody's needs in
this. So yeah zoom 
fatigue is quite a big problem I think.
But it's making sure that we get the
balance so that people who do need that
interaction
can have that in various formats but it
doesn't exclude people who need to be
home based as well.
What would your
three messages be?
From this morning's chat and
interaction. We we've brought you
together, you've met and shared
quite a lot of content in the short time,
what would you be saying to
to all our viewers and those indeed who
will be listening to our recording?
Brian?
I think the the digital transformation
journey that we've been on for
a number of years i think
we just need to stay the course on that ...
This doesn't change it, it just
brings it into sharper and
sharper focus ...
probably changes it to a degree ... but 
it's still the same. We still have the
same imperative
to really look hard at our
businesses and to make sure they are
sustainable and make the changes that we
need to make.
That's one. Two is ... that
the people who work in
our businesses
and the people are connected - whether
they don't work for us directly
but work with us
in a partnership - we need to
create the environment
for everybody to be successful and
that's really about empowerment
and so i really like the idea of 
moving to a
a sort of meritocracy where we're
looking at the
the work coming
towards us, we're applying a critical
lens to it and then we're
giving it a level of autonomy that
that's moving away from the hierarchical
systems of
businesses to move ahead and improve
yourself and deliver value and be
accountable to value
as articulated by our
business and allow a bit of 
failure as part of that and so
i think empowerment. I think we
really need to focus hard on how
we're setting ourselves up.
Brian not to cut you there but ...
Jackie i'm probably down to one tip at
this stage and
you
might shoot up your contact details
if attendees want to contact you
directly
and we're getting loads of great vibe
there from chat and Q&A.
Thanks Grainne. I'd say just
be aware of the changing nature of
the workforce ecosystem
and how the
gig economy is now kind of amplified
- freelancers, contractors,
full-time workers and otherwise - 
and kind of role
that technology
will play um going forward and
how we can kind of leverage that for the
greater good longer term i.e
telemedicine for example.
I'd also say culture
and so connecting through purpose and
engagement. So maintaining
engagement
connecting through purpose and
maintaining culture
over the long term
Super Jackie. Thanks.
Charlie? Last but not least. Go for it.
Just briefly - don't assume that your
colleague's
experience is the same as your own 
and also don't assume that just because
you give somebody access
to digital tools that they know how to
use them
Fantastic guys thanks so much and
the contact details are going up.
The conversation will hopefully flow on
on Twitter
The DT-LAB@UCC can be found on
Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin
Join the conversation. Don't stop.
Watch out for our
August event. Thank you so much Brian,
Jackie and Charlie for taking your time
out and
sharing your insights today and we
look forward to
future collaboration and we won't say
goodbye as the story isn't ended but will
continue.
Indeed thanks to all my team at DT-LAB@UCC
To Paidi our chairman, the lads for
answering the questions
and indeed the Cork University
Business School
for supporting us in our events.
We look forward to seeing you soon
thanks and stay safe and look forward to
keeping the conversation going.
DT-LAB@UCC
