Tom Peters famously said “if you’re not confused, you’re not paying attention.” Nothing could be closer to the truth when considering one’s options in the modern technological era. The rate of change has gathered such momentum that disruption hardly feels like a fitting term anymore. Wave after wave of new technology is washing over us like a tsunami of opportunity with many of us baffled by the options. Moving to the cloud seems like the easiest choice; what to do when you get there and how to architect your technology landscape to be future proof and primed for competitiveness is the hard part.
To remain relevant you have to move forward. For every enterprise that hesitates to embrace change there are a dozen more that are grasping the opportunity and eating your lunch while they do it. Transforming your business, however large or small, into a digitally intelligent enterprise is the only way you can flourish. Your competitors are implementing smart finance to improve accuracy and educe meaningful insights; they are streamlining production and delivering goods and services faster than you can; they are utilising automation to reduce costs and free-up human capacity, and they are harvesting experiential data to cultivate customer relationships you can only dream of.
Whether you are a butcher, baker or candlestick maker the time to engage with digital transformation is now. You only have to look at the Global 500 from 20 years ago to see how few of those businesses are still relevant to realise that the pervasive nature of digital technology has already had a permanent impact on commerce, society, and the human condition – and its reach and influence has barely started.
However, taking steps towards becoming an intelligent business does not have to be as daunting as it may seem at first. The days of pumping millions into monolithic ERP systems that took years to implement and rarely delivered the predicated benefits are long gone. Today it’s all about agility and time-to-value; small projects that deliver rapid results utilising creative technologies like RPA, blockchain and elastic infrastructure. Those enterprises that harness the technology and culture required will prosper while those that do not won’t just be left behind – they will soon cease to exist.
It’s an honour to introduce WRAP as our patron charity for the inaugural ERP Today Awards and to welcome Automation Anywhere as our headline partner. The event is almost a sell-out already and we cannot wait to bring a fresh and innovative social spectacle to the ERP community. The awards website has launched and the nomination process is open so don’t delay in telling us why you should be recognised as a leader in your field.
Finally, I would like to say a very warm welcome and a massive thank you to our new extended team. We have assembled some of the sharpest minds in the industry to bring you the news, views and opinions that will help you make sense of the opportunities with thought provoking editorials on the topics that most affect ERP, enterprise applications and digital transformation.
