Examining the Societal Impact of Digital Transformation

My 16-year-old son is currently studying the Industrial Revolution at school. The conversations with him made me wonder whether in 100 years the present wave of digitization will be studied as the next great leap taken by mankind, and what our legacy will be. Will it be one of harmonious innovation, or rather one of great disruption?

In this day and age, virtually all aspects of our private and public lives are heavily impacted by digital technology. With rapid technological advances being made in a plethora of sectors, the role of technology in our societies, and our dependency on it. will only continue to grow. As one of the leaders of Econocom, a company whose mission is to facilitate digital transformation in the corporate world, I have been able to witness first-hand the positive impact that digitization can have on an organization’s situation. However, I recently chose to broaden my spectrum, and reflect on the impact that the current wave of digital transformation has had, and will have on society as a whole, through the examination of three key sectors.

In terms of science and innovation, the exponential growth in machine learning and artificial intelligence will accelerate breakthroughs in a myriad of fields. In medicine, new technology will significantly facilitate disease analysis and worldwide care, and digital diagnosis vehicles have the potential to expand effective treatment options to remote and neglected areas. From an environmental standpoint, we will be able to use machines to further our understanding of weather patterns, climate trends, oceanic and atmospheric quality changes, and earthquake prediction. Furthermore, the World Economic Forum has projected that by 2025, digital transformation could lead to a substantial reduction in environmental emissions.

In education, the development of the digital world has the potential to break down geographically-based learning in favor of non-locational discourse. Already, Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) enable education in globe-wide classrooms while ‘democratizing’ the pursuit of knowledge and expertise. The increased ease with which one can educate oneself has also shifted the possible beneficiaries of institutional learning, with time-constrained professionals now able to engage in practical training, and if necessary due to the massive redefining of human roles in organisations as a result of digitization, retraining.

Digital Transformation will also have an immense impact on governments and their roles in our everyday lives. In a world that revolves around the sharing of information, it seems evident that the next step for governments in attempting to best represent their constituents is the advancement of transparency regarding their processes. Digital strategies such as crowd-sourcing new policy recommendations and interactive public budget meetings will serve to increase citizen engagement and improve government accountability. On a related note, a present trend that is expected to continue is the privatization of previously “governmental” areas of industry, such as security, education and public data analysis as a result of the professional efficiency assured by sophisticated technological advances.

Obviously, the current wave of digital transformation promises to impact every single area of modern society in numerous ways. While it is easy to fall in love with the notion of advancement, we must proceed with it cautiously, for rapid digitization, if not handled properly, could stand to threaten many of our defining core values. However, I truly believe that if treated as a tool for achieving our goals rather than as our master, technology is the key to a better society, and I am proud to be a catalyzing force behind the current wave of Digital Transformation.