During a time of rapid response to the impacts of COVID-19, leaders implemented new ways of working. These ranged from small daily changes to expansive ones that reached across their enterprises. As the weeks and months pass, changes originally deemed “interim” in response to the pandemic will, in fact, become permanent new ways of working, either replacing or augmenting existing processes.
President & CEO George D. Schindler shares CGI’s perspectives on how clients can navigate through the impacts of the pandemic. Drawing upon the CGI Client Global Insights and the actions we are taking to help clients respond, rebound, and reinvent through the pandemic crisis, this executive briefing shares three key organisational capabilities leaders can use to address the challenges ahead successfully.
Mastering business agility
Organisations will continue to embrace new ways of working to mitigate the impacts of the pandemic. Among commercial executives, business agility is the third most important business priority this year, yet only 18% report their business is highly agile. CGI research indicates that those organisations with high business agility outperform their peers by a factor of 2-3 times in terms of revenue and profitable growth.
Rethinking the technology supply chain
The pandemic highlighted the importance of the technology supply chain to pivot to new realities with agility and elasticity, and to build more resilience into how organisations deliver their products and services. When asked to rank top innovation investments, executives cite modernisation, automation and robotics, and cloud technologies, which are the key elements of modern and resilient technology supply chains.
Enabling the future of work
Digital engagement with customers and citizens has taken on new importance. Executives cite “digital employee tools” as their second most important digitisation initiative. In addition, 88% of executives are not yet seeing results from enterprise digital strategies.
Focusing on the how, rather than worrying about the what and when
Amid the hardship caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the crisis has compelled us to ask many fundamental questions about the ways we live, interact, and work. Clearly many changes will occur, but one thing is certain: technology will continue to be at the heart of future value chains that serve consumers and citizens.
While many are making bold predictions on the what and when of the new normal, this paper outlines that it is more important than ever to be centered on how to create value.
