Trends that will impact the Future of Work by the CIOs

Automation of routine work with artificial intelligence (AI), digital dexterity, and hybrid work with distributed workforce will be three key trends impacting the future of work that CIOs should focus on, as per Gartner. Analysts discussed the future of work in India and how technological, generational and cultural shifts will play a major role in shaping work culture. In 2020, organizations across the world experienced a sudden surge in remote workers. During this shift, workforce automation, digital dexterity and hybrid working delivered significant business value, revenue growth and helped organizations maintain business continuity. Going forward, the dependence on technology to promote collaboration with a sense of belonging with the remote workers to stay connected and engaged in the ‘new normal’ became more important than it has ever been before.

Gartner recommends that CIOs and IT leaders should focus on three future work trends to ensure their organizations are well-positioned. AI is already automating large parts of routine work to direct employee focus towards higher value non-routine work. AI and robotic process automation (RPA) technologies in the enterprise are expected to accelerate and have the potential to automate large swaths of routine work when the duties are fast, known and repeatable. Gartner forecasts that global RPA software revenue will increase 19.5% in 2021, and continue to grow at double-digit rates through 2024.

Secondly, alI will make inroads into many aspects of non-routine and cognitive tasks performed by knowledge workers. Few jobs will be replaced by AI, but almost all jobs will experience some automation or augmentation. Organizations that embrace a combination of humans and machines complementing each other's capabilities will enable their employees to perform their jobs more effectively than either human experts or AI-enabled machines working alone.

Digital dexterity will become critical as organizations can build competitive advantage by enabling the digital dexterity of the next-generation workforce. As organizations accelerate their digital transformation initiatives, a strong digitally dexterous workforce will become critical. CIOs and IT leaders should focus on expanding the IT charter and work closely with HR leaders to include helping employees rapidly embrace new technology and invest in algorithms and well-structured training programs that identify worker skills and competencies to improve digital dexterity.

A report states that 48% of employees will likely work remotely post-pandemic, as compared to 30% in a pre-pandemic world. “The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated this trend, forcing many organizations to move a large proportion, if not all, of their workforce to remote work. Post-COVID-19, many employees will want to work remotely more than they did prior to the pandemic. There have been serious issues related to cyber forensics that raise biggest concern as the cyberthreat landscape has changed dramatically during the past few years, and in the last six months in particular. Traditional stand-alone antivirus and backup solutions are unable to protect against modern cyberthreats. “Organizations that modernize their stack with integrated data protection and cybersecurity not only gain greater security, they lower their costs and improve efficiencies. 39% of global companies experienced a videoconferencing attack in the past three months as workers rely on apps like Zoom, Cisco Webex, and Microsoft Teams where India demonstrates the highest rates, with 66% of local companies reporting having encountered videoconferencing attacks.