Technology in 2020

The past decade has seen technology radically change almost every aspect of business management and development strategy. So it is crucial for companies looking to progress in 2020 aim to be just as dynamic and adaptable as the technology they utilise. Making progress in the three key areas below will support you and your team in reaching your goals for 2020.

1. Accelerated Communication

Communication within an organisation is imperative for cohesive and clear strategic development. The ability to streamline your company’s communication processes will help improve organisational alignment and agility.

Companies are increasingly turning to social technology such as Teams in the Office 365 suite, which has enhanced their ability to communicate information across the organisation. This has helped develop a sense of transparency and accountability which was previously lost to closed door meetings and confidential PowerPoints. This collaborative hub and sharing of information speeds up information flow and feedback loops. We adopted Teams in 2018 and have not looked back. No internal emails, easy collaboration and shared data sources for our teams spread across Australia.

2. Data Analytics & Visualisations

Organisations are accumulating data at a rate beyond anything we have seen in the past. There are valuable insights to be gained from this data but the key is in interpreting the data correctly, extracting meaningful information and presenting that data visually.

Power BI, was built by Microsoft to put power in the hands of business people or "end-users". Business users can connect with various data sources and pull them into a single report and build interactive, live dashboards. These dashboards can easily be shared, published to the web and viewed on mobile. So all key metrics can be monitored easily and continuously.

Data Analytics is a key skill, growing in importance. Learning the basics of data analysis, how to programme in R or Python and using these languages to analyse your client base and what drives them will be important for all businesses. These programming languages are stand alone but can be run in Power BI. Get familiar with the tools available.

There will be continued growth and development in this area. Understand what is available and start making the tools work for your team.

3. Automations

Increasing automation of tasks within the workplace is nothing new, but the emergence of the Power Platform from Microsoft is something all users should be aware of. By combining Power Apps, Power Automate (Flow) and Power BI, end users can create customisable solutions to real workplace roadblocks without the need to engage the IT department. As a simple example; scientists in the field can collect data on their mobile devices using Power Apps. Power Automate and automatically take that data and load it into a shared SharePoint list which in turn is pushed into Power BI. Power BI then displays the findings from all scientists and helps to identify trends and outliers.

The possibilities are endless with this technology, you are limited only by your imagination. You may already have access to these apps as part of your Microsoft subscription, so start exploring them.

Organisations that wish to experience significant growth in 2020 should embrace new tools and technologies. The communication, automation and dashboard tools available mean that mere reliance on spreadsheets or the old way of doing things will render a company too slow to remain competitive in the next decade.