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Nicolas Cool | unsplash CIOs went into COVID-19 lockdown thinking it would only last a few weeks â this became clear during many of the conversations I had with CIOs over the last year. These CIOs quickly learned that the crisis would take much longer time to pass. According to CIO David Seidl, We learned that our response plans were for days or weeks rather than a year or longer. Clearly, we are only now potentially seeing our way out of the crisis.
While CIOs did not immediately understand how long the crisis would last, without question, they and their teams did establish the basis for surviving it. And given the experience of the last 18 months, they see further changes coming in terms of continuous improvement and hybrid work. With all this, how will they now consider risk moving forward? In other words, what were their key learnings?
Success in business starts with the realization that competitive advantage is with those that are great with data. Winners create a virtuous cycle and a data supermarket.
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Peggy Anke
In his 1970 book Future Shock, futurist Alvin Toffler argued that society was undergoing an enormous structural change, an evolution from an industrial society to a super industrial society. That change â which economist Klaus Schwab later dubbed the Fourth Industrial Revolution â was and continues to be overwhelming for the people that CIOs lead and the digital workers that CIOs and their teams serve. Toffler claimed that the accelerated rate of technological and social change would leave people disconnected and suffering from shattering stress and disorientation.
Clearly, COVID-19 has only accelerated digital worker stress and disorientation, countering the negative impacts of change requires personal resiliency and the desire and ability to continuously learn. The responsibility weighs heavily on those leaders who deliver business change â CIOs.