With great upheaval come great challenges, and if 2018 can be summed up in a word, upheaval must be near the front of the queue. Politically, sociologically, technologically – the world feels like it’s built on fast-moving sands.

 

In cyber security, business IT and digital transformation, things are no less secure: recent high-profile hacks have made worldwide headlines, and the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), aimed at protecting the use and storage of personal data, has caused tremors across all industries – particularly in IT where the challenges are technical. And finally Brexit, with all its uncertainty, looks set to define a generation.

 

This Holy (or Unholy, whichever way you look at it) Trinity makes up the three biggest challenges facing the IT industry right now, and the bottom line is that they are all inextricably linked. Let’s assess each in detail.

 

Yes, still.

 

A lot of consultants made a lot of money out of GDPR. The threat of fines of €20 million or 4% of global turnover was enough to get businesses panicking, and throwing money at so-called specialists to get their house in order. Never mind the fact that in August 2017, a post by Elizabeth Denham, Information Commissioner for the ICO, explained the rational side of GDPR.

 

“This law is not about fines. It’s about putting the consumer and citizen first. We can’t lose sight of that,” she said. Adding: “It’s true we’ll have the power to impose fines much bigger than the £500,000 limit the DPA allows us. It’s also true that companies are fearful of the maximum £17 million or 4% of turnover allowed under the new law.

 

“But it’s scaremongering to suggest that we’ll be making early examples of organisations for minor infringements or that maximum fines will become the norm.”

 

The message was clear, carrot > stick.

 

However, GDPR remains one of our 5 biggest challenges on account of the fact that so many businesses are still lagging way behind. The carrot may be preferable, but you can expect some high-profile stick action in the coming months.

 

The stats are staggering. Despite the May 25th deadline – a date that must be now forever etched into the minds of CISOs and business leaders – 37% of UK businesses are still not fully GDPR compliant.

 

Then there’s the problem of enforcement for The European Data Protection Board (EDPB) — the body in charge of GDPR’s application. Following the Facebook/Cambridge Analytica stories, data breach notifications have increased fivefold: this is a lot of work in anyone’s book, particularly for a fairly small enforcement team.

 

The ICO has some work to do, and don’t be surprised to see some businesses made an example of in the next few months, if only to startle business leaders into action. Watch this space.

 

As Danny Dyer so eloquently put it, “no-one’s got a bloody clue what Brexit is.” Over the last 12 months we’ve gone through ‘Brexit means Brexit’, ‘Hard Brexit’, ‘Soft Brexit’ to a ‘No-Deal Brexit.’ We, and seemingly most people in government, are still none the wiser as to what it actually entails.

 

One thing most experts agree on, however, is that a no-deal Brexit could be calamitous, at least in the short term, for the talent in the UK’s tech sector and for cybersecurity as a whole.

 

According to Antony Walker, deputy CEO of industry body TechUK, about 8% of talent working in the UK tech sector comes from the EU – highly skilled and talented people, with most earning between £45,000 and £80,000 a year.

 

He told a commons committee, “it is quite hard to think through a no-deal scenario because it would be so disruptive, I think many take the view that it would be such a negative outcome for the UK economy that it won’t happen. The scale and complexity of no-deal is so great that it is genuinely difficult for companies to think through and mitigate.”

 

The government recognises the value of foreign talent to the sector – Theresa May recently doubled the number of “exceptional talent” visas in areas like digital technology and science to 2,000 to help retain an edge after Brexit. That, however, doesn’t mean people want to come. As the Telegraph recently reported, there has been a drop in UK visas for tech workers between 2017-2018.

 

Economic analysis from Cambridge Econometrics revealed that a no-deal Brexit would have a severe impact on the UK economy as a whole, with science and technology sectors likely to suffer most. The report claimed that even in the case of a two-year transition deal, after which the UK stayed in the European single market and customs union, there would be 36,000 fewer science and technology jobs in the UK, over 5,000 of which would be in London.

 

The analysis found that the harder the Brexit, the more severe the consequences for the economy. In the worst-case scenario of a no-deal Brexit, the study predicted there’d be 92,000 fewer new jobs in science and technology, more than 11,000 of which would be in the capital.

 

And cyber security itself could cause a headache. It’s not clear what the UK’s relationship with Europol will be after Brexit. Europol helps foster cooperation between law enforcement agencies across Europe in the fight against crime, including cybercrime.

 

The UK currently leads Europol’s cybercrime initiatives and the agency’s outgoing chief Rob Wainwright said that post-Brexit the UK’s influence is likely to be “less direct, less pronounced and probably less successful than they are now,” in an interview with the BBC.

 

Over and above all these questions lies the greatest problem: uncertainty. Without knowing what’s happening or what the plan is, it’s tough to mitigate any potential problems.

 

As Simon Hansford, CEO at UK cloud hosting supplier UKCloud, said to a Lords committee in February 2018, “It is the uncertainty that will kill us. We have multiple multimillion-pound investment decisions that need to be made, but it depends on capital, certainty and access to people.”

 

May 29 2019 looms large, and clarity is sadly lacking.

 

While digital transformation has been on the radar for what feels like decades, businesses are still not very good at it.

 

Forrester’s report The Sorry State Of Digital Transformation In 2018 – a survey of 1,600 business and IT decision-makers in North American and European enterprises – shows that 45% of companies haven’t made any investments in SaaS, while 56% of firms are transforming but their level of investment and scope of transformation are still mostly small.

 

That’s not to say businesses don’t have plans in place. The International Data Corporation (IDC) found that global digital transformation investments will increase to $1.7tn by the end of 2019, up 42% from 2017. But we know that investment doesn’t mean success, and the challenges of digital transformation go far beyond simply throwing money at the problem.

 

You may like: AI transformation: Is it the new digital transformation?

Following the report, Shawn Fitzgerald, IDC research director for Worldwide Digital Transformation Strategies, said: “While we are seeing more companies becoming more digitally capable, there is a widening gap between leaders and laggards, with significant implications for those organisations that cannot make the transition to a digital-native organisation.”

 

So what are the challenges for digital transformation in 2018 and beyond? Top of the pile is culture. Change can’t be dictated from the top down, it has to be ingrained in the soul of the business. Legacy businesses with legacy systems often have a legacy mindset to go with it. Employees are naturally resistant to change (in fact, humans are in general), so to roll out new large scale changes takes more than diktats from on high.

 

Added to legacy mindsets are legacy business models. When people approach digital transformation, they often look at existing processes and make them digitised. This works in some respects, but this isn’t transformational. Another challenge is innovation, and often that comes from working with third parties, as Rolls-Royce has done with its data innovation hub, R2 Data Labs.

 

To be honest, you could write a book on the challenges of digital transformation for businesses, but there’s little doubt that, while there has been progress, we’re a long way off where we need to be. Particularly with some of the revolutionary tech about to shake up the way we all work…

 

Is AI transformation simply part of digital transformation? Perhaps. But as Artificial Intelligence promises to be the single biggest disruptor to the job market since the industrial revolution, it deserves its own spot on this list.

 

According to Adobe Today, just 15% of enterprises are using AI currently, but 31% said it is on the agenda for the next 12 months. Of the most digitally mature businesses, or those that have advanced digital practices, 47% said they have a defined AI strategy.

 

Businesses in your industry are already moving, are you?

 

 

Of course, AI presents far more complex challenges than simply digitising processes. It’s a skill set of its own, and it’s not necessarily something you can palm off to IT.

 

We’ve written a whole piece on the challenges of AI transformation here so we won’t get too deep into the range of challenges facing businesses looking to get to grips with AI, but the key takeaway should be, ‘start with why’.

 

Putting AI at the heart of the business is a noble aim, but you need to lead with the problems you want to solve, the processes you want to improve or your desired impact on the customer before you even think about the tech.

 

Leading with the tech solution without an end goal in mind is pointless. For businesses that combine the ‘why’ with the ‘how’, the impact on the business can be phenomenal. Much like digital transformation, AI transformation isn’t an overnight thing, it’s a culture, a mindset and an evolutionary process.

 

Yes, Brexit is going to take a lot of high skilled workers away, yes the skills shortage in the UK is an issue, but the challenge of talent is more than a just shortage of skills.

 

In an article for Inc., author and speaker Brian Gleeson said: “I’d argue that culture fit is the most important aspect of retaining great employees above anything else. But employee retention starts with first being able to clearly articulate what the organizational culture is. What are the aligned values, beliefs, behaviors and experiences that make up the organization’s environment?”

 

This alignment between cultures and beliefs is crucial to attract new workers. Take Millennials, for instance. You might think that means ‘kids’ but these 80s and 90s babies are grown up – they are now the world’s most powerful consumers. What do they want?

 

In work, they’re often disillusioned. According to Deloitte’s Millennial Survey 2018, only a minority of them believe businesses behave ethically (48 percent vs 65 percent in 2017) and that business leaders are committed to helping improve society (47 percent vs 62 percent in 2017).

 

But, despite a reputation for job hopping, a Capital Group Survey found that 67% of Millennials say being loyal to their employer is important to them, which is on par with previous generations. The same report found that they want flexibility and would prefer to work for a business that has a social conscience. According to Forbes, they want autonomy, agility and limited formalities.

 

The point is, they’re looking for a business with a certain culture. This can differ from person to person, of course – not everyone can fit into the same pot. But, it’s crucial that a business has a firm handle on, and can articulate, its culture, AND find out if new applicants suit that way of working and thinking.

 

Personality testing is just one way of doing that, and we see the demand for this kind of ‘soft skill’ alignment becoming just as crucial as someone with all the right ‘hard skills’ – the certs and qualifications – over the next couple of years.

 

 

We’re in a period of uncertainty which hasn’t been seen for at least a decade. Technology is moving faster than ever before, and the only thing predictable in the political landscape is unpredictability. The changes in legislation will have a huge impact on everything from data to employment.

 

For candidates (and employers), it’s essential to look holistically at the challenges facing the industry, understand your place in the ecosystem and tool up/skill up to future-proof your employability.

 

In a time of uncertainty, it pays to be prepared. And we’re committed to putting our candidates first. Take a look at our candidate charter.