A new look at our 2020 Technology Vision trends
When we published Inanstech’s 2020 Technology Vision report, COVID-19 was not yet a global pandemic. Now, it’s the greatest challenge the world has faced in decades. In just a few short months, it’s transformed people’s lives on an unprecedented scale, impacted every industry, and altered the course of companies’ growth. But the pandemic has not slowed innovation—it’s amplifying it to historic levels.
Our technology trends explore how people’s values are shifting, and digital-age technology models are increasingly out of sync with them. This imbalance—when business value is misaligned with people’s values—is what we call "tech-clash." It’s a very different crisis, but COVID-19 does not overshadow the issue. It exacerbates it. Now more than ever, it’s critical that businesses think about outmaneuvering today’s uncertainty.
How to manage now
At this time, the full extent of COVID-19’s impact on human life, the global economy, and enterprises is not yet known. But already, it has become an extraordinary catalyst for change. The need for innovation is greater than ever, driven by new challenges that are more disruptive than most have ever faced. The question for enterprises is: How fast can you act? In light of this new reality and new imperative, we are revisiting our 2020 Technology Vision trends and exploring how they will impact people and business in the post-COVID world.
The I in experience
In The I in Experience, we explore the evolution of digital experiences: black-box personalization, now common, leaves customers feeling out of the loop and out of control. Instead, organizations will need a new model for personalization—one that emphasizes customer agency. Now, there is a significant caveat: COVID-19 has transformed the role and importance of digital experiences in people’s lives. Businesses will need more agile engagement strategies, now and in the future, if they want to thrive.
In the short-term, people are changing, and enterprises should update their personalization strategies to keep up. Businesses need a way to quickly update their understanding of individuals’ wants and needs, and quickly retire information that is no longer valid. The enterprises that give people the agency to steer their own digital experiences will be the first to understand what their new wants and needs are.
Long-term, the purpose of a digital experience will be transformed. Demand is soaring for truly shared digital experiences and digital communities, and leaders are rising to the occasion. The need for digital platforms and experiences will continue to accelerate in the future, as businesses and consumers seek alternatives to in-person gatherings in a post-COVID world. The enterprises that start building personalized, interactive, and shared virtual communities today can carry that success far into the future.
AI and me
Our AI and Me trend explores how leading enterprises are fostering human-AI collaboration—bringing AI’s near limitless capabilities together with people’s ability to direct and refine ideas. Before the pandemic, this was already top of mind in many industries. Now, AI should be an even higher priority and the benefits have never looked more promising.
Short-term use cases are clear: workforces desperately need augmentation. Already, human-AI collaboration is playing a role in the race to find a COVID-19 vaccine. Outside the medical field, the pandemic is introducing new constraints and challenges that AI systems can help overcome. AI can help people dream up new solutions and ideas to build a more flexible organization.
Long-term, COVID-19 will enable us to see human-AI collaboration at its best, potentially easing people’s concerns about the technology. A 2019 global Accenture study on AI found that one of the top roadblocks to scaling the technology is lack of employee adoption. But the pandemic could push us past this. If enterprises invest in explainable AI and other tools that support and enable true human-AI partnership—people will experience the technology at its best. Success today could open new possibilities for businesses to reimagine their enterprise and workforce in the future.
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