How Will Digital Transformation Impact Your Career?

How Will Digital Transformation Impact Your Career?

Don’t get left behind as your industry moves into the future.

What Is Digital Transformation?

Digital transformation is the process of using technologies to create or adapt business practices to keep up with changing market requirements – and it’s occurring in every single industry.

With the rapid advancement of digital adoption, companies have changed their business models. IT isn’t just a support department now; it makes doing business possible.

Whether you consider yourself an IT worker or not, digital transformation certainly touches some aspect of your career. Understanding digital transformation processes is significant not just to job seekers, but to all workers, regardless of industry, experience, or specialization.

Why Is Digital Transformation So Important?

When the Covid-19 pandemic hit in 2020, digital adoption projected to take place over the next decade suddenly came to fruition over a six-month period. As a society we’ve changed the way we operate and how we interact, and all of these changes have been made possible due to technology.

Reliance on these technologies has not waned as we start to come out of the pandemic, but now rather than replacing services with digital technologies, businesses are focused on increasing capacity and maintaining greater access. For example, during the pandemic the healthcare industry moved towards a telehealth model which increased the rate of technology adoption from approx. 2-3% to over 50%. Now that in-person healthcare consultations have mostly resumed, interest in telehealth appointments continues to grow.

As companies hire, they are increasingly looking for new skillsets that can help them operate in this innovative environment of rapidly advancing digital transformation.

What’s the Impact to the Market?

Global spending on digital transformation of business practices is forecast to reach $1.8 trillion in 2022 (an increase of 17.6% over 2021). This pace of growth is expected to be sustained over the 2022-2026 forecast period with a 5-year compound annual growth rate of 16.6% (source: IDC.com).

The spend is of course high, but pace of growth is the most significant. There is a huge opportunity in the job market to be involved in operationalizing digital transformation; it’s something all businesses will be spending money on. We’ve experienced a major disruption and there is endless room for creativity and innovation in digital progress.

How Can Job Seekers Differentiate Themselves?

While having hard skills in math, programming, data analysis, etc. is important, you don’t need a computer science degree or a computing background to take your career in a more technical direction. As technology progresses, it’s equally important to organizations to secure employees with the business knowledge and creativity to drive innovation. Every job, every career, every business, every industry is affected by digital transformation. The duality of understanding both technology and your particular business is the best way to stand out as an invaluable hire.

If you can speak about technology in layman’s terms to a business audience, and also articulate the needs of the business to a tech audience, you’ll be able to bridge the gap between business and technology. The pairing of your particular expertise with technology skills will make you exceptional.

This is why it’s strongly recommended that all workers (whether or not you’re currently seeking a new job) begin building a technical element to their skillset either informally or by obtaining continuing education certification in the technologies making it possible for organizations to achieve digital transformation such as data privacy/security, Cloud technologies, AI/machine learning, and mobility.

Interested in Learning More?

Millenilink is an IT recruitment and professional services agency specializing in digital transformation, founded by Sabe Mpofu in 2018 in response to the growing need in the marketplace for recruitment services that understood specific customer specializations and requirements in the IT field.

If you’d like to learn more about the importance of digital transformation, Sabe recently gave a 25-minute presentation (skip ahead to 9:18 for Sabe’s portion) during a job workshop facilitated by MACA (Madras Arts & Cultural Association).

Are you curious about the impact of technology in your industry? Looking for strategies to broaden the options for your long-term career trajectory? We’d love to hear from you.