Anette Bronder: European Companies Need Rapid Digital Transformation
Covid-19 and the Ukraine conflict are still ravaging Europe. These issues bring to mind the future and, more importantly, rebuilding economies in the wake of disasters. Annette Bronder, a digital transformation specialist, sees digital transformation as the way to overcome many modern-day issues — both political and otherwise. Consistent, quick implementation isn’t a want. It’s a need.
“Europe has slept through the first half of digitization. We have discussed this a lot in recent years. But we didn’t make the necessary leap a few years ago,” Bronder said during a keynote speech at the Huawei ( News — Alert) Connect conference in 2017.
Anette Bronder has worked as a digital transformation specialist for more than two decades. The heft of her experience comes from the European telecommunications and technology industry. In 2021, she was voted among the top 100 in Manager Magazin’s list of the 100 most influential German women in the German economy.
The advocate of holistic digital solutions has recently addressed several challenges that European companies must face regarding digitization and solutions that allow companies to remain globally competitive.
“We Overslept The First Half Of Digitization”
European companies are still deeply rooted in what Bronder calls the “old economy.” She compares them to large cross-ocean tankers due to their reliability and resilience. However, strength and stability aren’t everything. These tankers lack the agility and disruptive attitudes common in the digital economy, such as Silicon Valley startups and startups in China, which she compares to speedboats.
Agile ( News — Alert) companies of the modern digital economy have a completely different approach to technology and risk. They see technology as an opportunity. They build projects from scratch and are not afraid of failure. As a result, they are almost always compatible with other modern technology, while European companies still struggle to preserve their existence amongst a sea of bureaucracy.
“If you see technology not as a threat rather than an opportunity, you’re standing in your way,” Bronder said during her keynote.
Unfortunately, even companies with viable technological concepts are often too slow or come to market too late. As a result, they are at a constant disadvantage to places like China and Silicon Valley. According to Bronder, perfection isn’t always preferable to quick implementation.
“It took the [European] automotive industry a long time to understand that a Tesla would be so popular. The Germans had the electric car concept first, but it got filed away while other companies went ahead with implementation.”
However, Bronder remains optimistic and believes Europe is catching up in the digital race. But for their leadership in the industry to come to fruition, companies would have to update their business processes and introduce a modern, digital model to remain competitive.
Digital Transformation Challenges Among European Companies
There are several challenges facing European companies opting for digital transformation. Not all have to overcome the same obstacles. However, Anette Bronder thinks that there is an acute need for action in the following areas:
Anette Bronder explained throughout the pandemic, medical professionals were able to track the spread of the virus across platforms using health, economic, and social data from apps and social platforms. In the past, it would have taken weeks to gather this information. But by using datasets and automated applications, researchers received updated data several times per hour.
Many companies in Europe do not have clear access to consumer data. Governmental regulations are only one hurdle. There are also hierarchical organizational structures, intercultural challenges, and a severe lack of technologies available to companies. Companies need to invest in compliant data governance to unlock the potential of their data and ensure the protection of customer data.
“IT is no longer the sole responsibility of the IT department,” she explains. “And technology is no longer part of the business. It’s the business, whether you like it or not. This means we need to stop looking at employees in their ‘key role’.’
Bronder’s rethinking of organizational hierarchy may seem radical, but Silicon Valley companies have long rejected the classic structure of separate departments and assembly line-like task delegation. In other words, it is past time for European companies to abandon their rigid hierarchies in favor of agile processes and committed organizational structures.
Bronder describes an ideal working environment as follows:
“Companies need to rethink employee interactions based on how to be productive in the digital world. Self-organized teams and joint decision-making should replace traditional hierarchies. This creates an environment that encourages constant learning because employees feel safe and empowered to advance their mission.”
“Tomorrow’s competitor can be my cooperation partner today,” explains Bronder. “Nobody does digitization alone.”
To effectively share data, companies should partner in the public cloud. Only cloud solutions enable the rapid collection and synthesis of data between partners worldwide. Companies should build digital infrastructure and a well-managed cloud ecosystem to make this possible.
Given the limitations and bureaucratic hurdles of dozens of member states, despite current regulations and control systems prior to implementation, companies often have their hands tied when trying to offer technical solutions to their customers.
Legislators need to make it easier for public and private organizations to join the digital revolution at the political level. Investments are also needed in the appropriate infrastructure for cloud computing, the Internet of Things (IoT), and big data.
Monetizing and processing data requires a human component: from software development to data governance. The problem, however, is insufficient digitization in the public sector, especially in classrooms.
“We still think that anyone who can sign up for Microsoft ( News — Alert) Teams is now digital. That is incomprehensible to me. When it comes to training, education, and even teaching the basics, we are far behind,” says Bronder.
Perhaps the world of technology is moving faster than educational systems can keep up with. Ironically, one solution to this lack of agility is digitalization.
Anette Bronder On How To Win The “Second Half Of Digitization”
Bronder claims that Europe has slept through the first half of digitization — the internet. Now, top management colleagues are working together to win the second half.
“Europe is well-positioned in some aspects of the digital race. We have the industrial know-how and more local engineering and computer science graduates than the United States.”
The focus of Europe’s public and private sectors must be on making digitization easier to accomplish and data more accessible. Next, the software would have to be the most critical factor for development. Companies with the best data processing software would be able to use data more efficiently and offer customers the fastest and most beneficial solutions.
There is good news from the EU Commission: there is a proposal for the Data Governance Act. It creates a framework for exchanging data across businesses, educational institutions, and humanitarian organizations by creating a common European data space. However, the law will not enter into force until the end of 2023 at the earliest. This means European companies must act now to ensure they are ahead of their competition. The challenges that European companies must face in coping with the digital transformation are enormous. But Anette Bronder believes that Europe’s values and ingenuity will lead it to a competitive digital future.
“We have to look at digitization in our culture and our value system and then find appropriate regulation. But we have to be brave and not afraid to take a step beyond our imagination.”
Originally published at https://www.tmcnet.com.
