Does IT Need to Shift Gears on Disruptive Technology? Adrian Jones Explains

When Adrian Jones, a sales executive working in automation, talks about robotic process automation (RPA) with businesses around Asia, he has observed that the most enthusiastic audiences are those from lines of business, like HR, finance, and operations. Leaders of these business functions tend to quickly see bots as “digital workers” with jobs that support and take the load off their people. When they see how easy it is to install and deploy these bots, as well as the immediate and quantifiable benefits after doing so, they’re all for adding this new form of employment to their teams.

At the same time, Mr. Jones has noticed that the most resistance to RPA tends to come from IT. That’s not surprising, nor is it unjustified — IT has more experiences, often challenging ones, with the introduction of any new technology into the business. The days of “shadow IT” still loom large in the consciousness of many CIOs. But it does highlight a potential opportunity for IT to shift gears on how it addresses technology in the organisation.

From Gatekeeper to Governor

Most IT teams operate according to the principle that anything technological should be under their control. Adrian Jones’ 20-odd years in enterprise IT would suggest there was ample reason for this principle in the past, given the complexity and scale of traditional IT infrastructure. However, times have changed — both in respect to the technologies being adopted, and the attitudes other lines of business have towards them. In the case of a revolutionary technology like RPA, for example, what’s being adopted is not so much a new technology as it is an entirely different way of sourcing, hiring, and applying talent, which just so happens to be in a digital form.

IT has an opportunity to shift from being technology’s gatekeeper to becoming its governor. Instead of trying to enforce strict controls on technology’s use and application within the organisation, IT can gain much greater leverage by providing strategic counsel, technical assistance, and other forms of support to business-led digital use cases. On a basic level, this seemingly more permissive approach can give CIOs greater visibility over new technologies like RPA or AI — allowing them to spot potential technical risks, while leaving their line-of-business counterparts free to derive as much value from the technology as possible.

However, notes Adrian Jones, there’s a more important opportunity for IT here: to guide the mind-sets and vision that the business applies to technology. Digital advances like RPA don’t just reduce costs or make processes more efficient. They prompt entirely new ways of thinking about talent, collaboration, and even leadership that every leader will have to navigate at some point. IT leaders have experience not only with technology, but with thinking about technology, bridging the gap between ideal expectations and technical constraints. Exchanging strict control for strategic counsel will help them, and their counterparts in leadership, find the most productive way forward with any new technology.

Don’t Get Left Behind!

Adrian Jones’ personal conviction is that there’s no lasting value in marketing technology through fear. “When we talk about RPA with potential customers, we try to stay as focused on the benefits and possibilities that it exposes. However, I have begun to see the enterprise market in Asia Pacific taking on an increasingly “FOMO”-driven mind-set when it comes to automation. Understandably, nobody wants to be left behind by a changing digital ecosystem,” says Adrian Jones. “My advice to CIOs and IT more generally would be: don’t get left behind, but don’t rush in either.”

The IT department’s new role increasingly revolves not around driving digital adoption, but empowering different business functions to do so and helping define how an increasingly digital workplace works. Get the thinking right first, and the rewards of technologies like RPA and AI will follow.

This article does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors or management of EconoTimes