The Myths You Can Bust to Embrace Automation
[Music]
i’m sure everyone here has an old
grandfather’s tail
you know one of those stories you used
to hear when you were young
that you were never sure whether it was
true or not it might have included that
little bit of exaggeration
changed slightly every time you heard it
and sometimes even left you with a
sprinkle of fear
but right now in a world that is
changing at a pace never seen before
organizations and their employees are at
a crossroads
they’ve heard about this for several
years now it’s mentioned in parliament
on the news and even their competitors
have been whispering about gently
starting to get involved
but unfortunately the topic is often
surrounded by fear
and misunderstood by us humans and today
i want to bust four myths i often hear
around the topic
of automation and whilst this wasn’t
something me and my grandfather would
sit down and discuss
as a society now more than ever we have
the opportunity to break down those
barriers
and allow ourselves to leap forward
every one of us use some sort of
automation in our everyday lives
whether that’s with our bank booking a
taxi or the end-to-end process of taking
a flight from an airport
we try it we test it we have a right
good morning about it
but in the end we often embrace it as it
makes our lives
that little bit easier it allows us to
spend less time on the admin and more in
what we enjoy doing
but to get involved in designing it and
embracing it in the workplace
no chance that’s for the techies they
say i don’t have any experience in that
sort of thing
and our financial services from one in
five of our automation team
are apprentices who’ve come straight
from school and i remember one of them
telling me
ally i originally thought about doing a
four year university course on
technology
but i was worried the skills i gained at
the end of it were then irrelevant
i thought it was better to learn as i go
our youngest team member 21
or eldest 50 less than 15 percent have
an i.t qualification
of any sort the remainder
they’ve been re-skilled and upskilled
from traditional roles of the past
highly experienced individuals with
years of knowledge of our customers and
our markets
employees in the latter years of their
career having the realization that
something needs to change
if they’re still to work for another two
decades
never did they expect to have to do much
different from what they did today
but with the right mindset change is
possible
with the technology also advancing at
such a pace low code platforms have
meant it’s easier than ever before
for employees to get involved in the
basics and get a foot in the automation
door
this coupled with the ever increasing
amount of data that businesses have at
their disposal
there is a real opportunity for us to
improve our business decisions
customer outcomes and start to develop
these future employees
people having this personal resilience
and then the curiosity to explore is key
but when s statistics show that
employees with a degree
or equivalent higher qualification are
four times more likely
to have received training at work than
employees with no qualification at all
and as leaders we must change this we
must provide the learning to allow
people to embrace this new way of
working
and not something that is leveraged by a
select few
and by doing so we will really enable
ourselves to build teams
not only diverse in their experience and
background
but also in their thinking
change can often be difficult for people
most of us prefer the status quo
we prefer that things were left how they
are now
and that’s a natural reaction for all of
us to have i want to stay in my comfort
zone
and when it comes to automation there is
a real myth that looms over society in
general that the robots are coming
they’re here to take all of their jobs
and us humans will be left out of the
equation
the media seem to have whipped everyone
into such a frenzy
that people often find it easier to
avoid the conversations
or put up barriers thinking they need to
protect what they have
but the fact is roles are changing
reports suggest over 80 percent of the
roles that will exist by 2030
haven’t yet been invented having led the
change team myself
i’ve seen firsthand how we’ve had to
adapt in recent years
to stay relevant and on top of the
latest trends in technology
for us this has meant a significant
shift towards
upskilling and reskilling as well as
coaching and feedback
building centers of excellence is one
thing but then federating this skill set
out to others
is just as important why is it important
because we need the behaviors as much as
the experience
because believe it or not the real story
here is a human one
building and developing automated
solutions may result in tasks or
processes
being removed from traditional roles of
the past
but these solutions need monitored they
need maintained
health checked they often need
redesigned and sometimes even
switched off humans are front and center
of this
and so in turn we begin to create these
roles of the future
automation is a real asset which is
changing almost every part of our
society
whether that’s scanning or shopping or
ordering a drink at the bar
but it’s not the answer to every problem
now more than ever human behaviors are
key
what we say how we act and how we leave
people feeling after an interaction are
priceless
and not something a robot has yet
mastered the art of
in a time when we’re telling each other
to be more kind
embracing automation and your
organization can support you to do just
that
automation done properly can do the
stuff that customers would not be
willing to care for
nor do they care about and free up us
humans to do
what we are good at empathy support
care who better to understand the needs
of the customer
and the customer themselves
now anyone who works for a company
hundreds of years old
with thousands of employees isn’t
without its challenges
often we are naturally a little
risk-averse
many of our employees are long-standing
ones who’ve experienced change
many times throughout their career
they’ve seen mergers
acquisitions and new i.t systems come
and go
they have great technical expertise
which is often invaluable
but one thing that hasn’t changed in
these hundred years
we are here to serve our customers and
their needs are changing
fast 2020 was a great example of this
for all of us
how we communicated and interacted with
customers changed significantly
important business meetings were held in
our kitchens sending posts to the office
was pointless
and every staff member had to overnight
learn to become
a home worker communication seemed a lot
more instant a lot faster
but at the same time somehow with a
closer degree of human touch
and increased emotional intelligence
this coupling of technology and people
has the potential to catapult many
industries forward
and as a result we’ve seen automation
opportunities double in those 12 months
of 2020
and in the last five years the number of
processes we have
supporting our customers has increased
fivefold
and here’s the thing this isn’t just
about the technology
when the burning platform is there and
we’re forced to make that leap of faith
into a new way of working and shining
new tools
us humans can achieve remarkable things
automation technology will continue to
change like it has for the last hundred
years
but businesses succeed or fail on the
decisions
the training the leadership of us the
employees
a recent two-year commission led by a
vet cooper mp
on the impact of technology on workers
was recently released
and in 2018 i had the pleasure of
meeting them
in this report it describes the real
fear employees have
around the topic of automation and one
of the reforms proposed
is a major overhaul of adult training
and skills
to better help workers adapt these are
our colleagues our team members
this is each one of us the fact is
organizations must change and to do this
we must provide our employees with the
opportunities before the gap widens and
avoid anyone from being left behind
in the summer of 2018 i personally was
at a career crossroads
having been involved in change for
several years i’d built up a reasonable
bank of knowledge and had a team of
hungry staff wanting to change the world
but up until then i’d avoided stepping
too much into the automation world
stay clear of technology i’d say this is
way out your comfort zone
my mom even bought me my first
smartphone
but then an opportunity was presented to
me and i have a decision to make
do i jump into the unknown or do i
shuffle to the left and avoid it till
next year
maybe i could avoid it until someone
forces me to
it would have probably just been easier
to stay in my sweet spot
but i decided to take the leap of faith
and since then i’ve been on my own
personal change curve
robotics artificial intelligence data
science
topics i’m sure you’ve heard many times
on this channel before
become the conversation and a normal
working day for me
overnight i had a team of people looking
to me for the answers
i didn’t have them all they did the
technical capabilities and automation
tools
were already there waiting to be
utilized i just needed to help them grab
a hold of them
discussing the fears with the business
teams and customers became a lot easier
because
i’d experienced those fears firsthand
myself
and slowly as the myths are dispelled
you begin to turn around what can often
seem
like a pretty large cruise liner staff
become more
at ease as they start to see the
benefits and they have a little more
time on their hands
to do the things that’s important for
the customers
good news stories of a robot acting as
their virtual assistant
start to spread on internal social media
and with that comes momentum
belief acceptance customers start to
notice the difference they want to be
looked after and cared for
they often want that human touch
and the fact is this partnership of
humans and technology
forms a strong allegiance but as the
technology accelerates forward at such a
pace
we must also take our open mind with it
far from limiting what we as people can
achieve automation can truly make us
limitless within the workplace
but only if we allow ourselves to open
our mind and embrace its potential
for business leaders they have a duty to
inspire
motivate and help our people dispel some
of these myths and fears that surround
it
and in doing so only then will we build
a culture
that we really are all in it together
you