Key corporate leaders deliberate on digitalisation and automation at EFC Symposium

The 2018 edition of the annual symposium of the Employers’ Federation of Ceylon (EFC) will unfold on 2 November at Hotel Galadari under the banner ‘Shaping the Future of Work’. The symposium will have a discourse on ‘Impact of Digitalisation and Automation’, ‘Challenges of Transition’, ‘Future of Work We Want’ and ‘Managing Diversity and Inclusion’.

From fostering strong customer relationships and product development processes to interacting with partners and suppliers, in the digital world, entire business models need to be revisited, said Hatton National Bank (HNB) PLC Managing Director and CEO Jonathan Alles. A panellist of the session on ‘Impact of Digitalisation and Automation’, Alles warned that, by ignoring this inevitable phenomenon due to past practices and assumptions, businesses will be at the risk of failure and therefore on the path to the ‘corporate graveyard’.

Besides Sri Lanka’s strategic location with close proximity to the largest Asian economies, the country’s ever expanding internet coverage, high level of mobile penetration, and growing social media engagement were cited by the HNB Chief as strengths in transforming the local business world to that of an automated and a digitalised one. The financial sector of the country, as Alles noted, had responded to changing dynamics in this regard by establishing critical infrastructures which had enabled the sector to embark on e-commerce, mobile commerce, and other creative value propositions to engage with customers. 

The challenges which entail in this digital journey, however, cannot be underpinned, said the senior banker, who cited cyber security as notable among them. Along with challenges come new opportunities, for which operational efficiencies and new business models are imperative, he said. “This mandates us to have our people’s skills and competencies aligned with doing things right and intelligently by developing our business architecture, strengthening our digital core by establishing the appropriate technology layers, being creative, decisive, holistic, and agile to introduce products and services, and having cognitive flexibility and critical thinking.”

Automation and digitalisation, as Alles pointed out, further impacts talent management significantly. With old principles and practices once followed for talent management becoming obsolete, the HR arm needs to play a key role in aligning itself to the organisation strategy in terms of recruitment, selection, training, development, rewarding, and evaluating, he says. 

The financial sector, as the HNB Chief observed, could play a key role in enabling new initiatives which provide solutions such as smart acquisition, merchant mobile integration with intelligent supply chains, and banking infrastructure. “From a supply chain management point of view, Blockchain solutions are providing the financial industry to relook at how trade finance is conducted, by enabling the ability to monitor logistics and track and verify transactions, through the establishment of smart contracts. These smart contracts become the foundation for reducing time to market, reduce fraud, and bring trust to the transaction. Blockchain technology also enables digital identity for the e-KYC process, which would facilitate onboarding of merchants as well as customers faster into the financial process.”

In a process-driven environment, automation and digitalisation will create opportunities to improve efficiency, productivity and consistency of quality of output generated, reflected the, Finlays Colombo Limited Deputy Chairman and Hapugastenne Plantations PLC and Udapussellawa Plantations PLC Managing Director Gihan Jayasinghe, a panellist of the symposium’s session on ‘Impact of Digitalisation and Automation.’ Digitalisation, as Jayasinghe further explained, provides data which enables more analytics in the form of desktop-based analysis of scenarios. “Such analysis can further be evolved by the use of analytic tools in the form of management information systems (MIS) to help stakeholders in the decision-making process,” noted Jayasinghe, who went on to note that another key aspect of this process is the ability for companies to innovate by using digitalisation as a platform to create, define, and develop value propositions for the market.

Among the notable challenges faced in the sector of logistics and manufacturing/agri business, as Jayasinghe pointed out, are the shortages in human capital, and the migration of human capital to other lucrative sectors. Therefore, the balance is creating a platform where a job role becomes more attractive, and where tasks entailing high input of labour are managed through a process of automation. “Organisations don’t have much of a choice, due to the shortage of human capital, and the competitive environment that they operate in. Therefore, automation and digitalisation is a transition that needs to take place in order to survive. The approach is typically understanding of what level of automation and digitalisation is required. A gap analysis should be conducted to identify the type of training and up-skilling that is needed. This training and up-skilling will actually help industries in redefining job roles, thus making those roles more attractive,” observed the senior professional.