I think it’s fair to say that no one will mourn the passing of 2021.

It’s been an intensely difficult year for individuals and businesses as the pandemic increasingly swept across the world. Now we have the Omicron variant to contend with, which threatens the start of another challenging year.

The hope, of course, is that 2022 will be a year of rebirth and new beginnings as businesses put in place digital transformation strategies for greater resilience in the face of current and future shocks.

Indeed, 2022 will be the year of the tiger, which traditionally represents strength, determination, removing evils, and, fingers crossed, reconnecting with networks and people. These are all ideals we collectively must aspire to build back better (as the politicians like to say).

The question, of course, is whether businesses big and small will be able to fulfil this zodiacal promise and put in place strategies across the organisation to rise from the ashes like a phoenix and with the strength and determination of a tiger.

One of COVID-19’s unintended benefits has been a dramatic acceleration in the onboarding of digital solutions that have to date been collectively thought of as part of the ‘future of work’.

McKinsey found that investments in digital and automation transformations that were viewed as optional just 18 months ago are now very much necessary to not only remain competitive but thrive in the after-COVID environment.

Given this backdrop and the challenging year we’ve all just lived through, I now see three notable trends on the horizon that will likely touch every business in Singapore and beyond as we move into the new year: the future of work (which is already here), a unique physical-digital mix, and environmental, social, and governance (ESG) considerations.

The future of work is already here

Remote and hybrid work, which have been with us in one form or another for decades, is now going mainstream and becoming an inevitable part of tomorrow’s post-pandemic office.

These work styles’ shift to the forefront may pose challenges for some businesses that resist change. Still, for most companies, they are already a necessity rather than a nice-to-have.

Enabling this future of work at scale and organisation-wide does require new cloud platforms and solutions to ensure both internal and external stakeholders are properly connected without suffering from any major communications or process breakdowns.

While decentralisation is a theme we’re hearing more about every day in the world of finance (DeFi), it is also a big theme in the workplace as we spread workers out over more locations and geographies – rates of people coming back to the office will likely increase for a while but are unlikely to reach pre-COVID levels.

Also Read: How to build a strong remote workforce for startups

While not without challenges of their own, these new arrangements do have a range of perks: better work-life balance, greater flexibility and autonomy, and more quality time between parents and their children.

For businesses, this cloud-enabled future of work structure is an asset to business continuity planning and resilience in the face of future shocks – and may even reduce costs associated with large, fixed offices.

Physical will remain, but digital will dominate

We yearn for in-person human interaction and camaraderie; that’s how we’ve evolved as a social species.

Despite that, the reality is that more –not less– of our teamwork and collaboration will move to digital channels, even as entertainment venues, trade conferences, restaurants, and offices reopen to larger groups in the year ahead.

While physical events and tradeshows, which we all love and miss, will return, they will do so with more implementation of digital platforms and solutions that coexist alongside the physical. For instance, paper business cards may continue to be exchanged, but QR codes may be scanned to exchange contact details alongside them.

At the office, even as more employees do return, we will not see the last of cloud platforms like Zoom, which came to prominence as a solution to remote work but are now even being used for group meetings when everyone is in the same building – simply owing to preferences around social distancing and convenience. 

This is just one example, but there are dozens of popular cloud platforms and solutions being used internally at organisations worldwide for work and collaboration. These will continue to be relied on and onboarded even after the pandemics’ worst is behind us.

My advice to businesses looking to start in earnest with their digital transformation (DX) in the year of the tiger is twofold: first, start with a small manageable pilot project in an area like digitising invoice management in the finance function; second, hire or designate a DX champion to champion and oversee these projects and push the cause internally with leadership and with staff at all levels. Buy-in is imperative for success.

Greening business by tackling our corporate paper addiction

ESG has taken the world by storm in 2021, and this trend will only continue as nations attempt to live up to their net-zero pledges made at COP26 in Glasgow.

This brings me to the third major trend I want to highlight for next year: the mainstreaming of ESG strategies at every private sector organisation and government department.

Also Read: A wave of change: What sets impact investing apart from traditional investing

Specifically, I’m calling out our collective corporate paper addiction and suggesting that business leaders recognise that reducing paper reliance within their business is a good starting point for ultimately reducing their carbon footprint.

This is no longer about just looking good: institutional investors, consumers, and governments are increasingly looking through an ESG lens as they choose capital allocation, tax breaks, and purchasing decisions based on the appeal of a company’s products and services.

Moreover, less paper and more digital in every organisation’s finance function may help reduce rates of some types of fraud, especially in emerging markets such as Southeast Asia, where it remains stubbornly high.

This leads to not only more sustainable business but also better governance.

I wish every company, big and small that’s grappling with these three themes – the future of work, the new physical-digital mix, and ESG factors – the best of luck in the year ahead. I’m confident that those who take these seriously (perhaps in the form of a corporate New Year’s resolution) will thank me this time next year.

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Image credit: Elnur

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