Business transformation needs keen leadership

GP CEO tells ICAB webinar

FE REPORT | Published: October 24, 2020 23:30:44

Business transformation requires dynamic leadership, emotional bonding among team members, trust and readiness to accept innovation and fresh ideas, said a top CEO of the country on Saturday.
Grameenphone CEO Yasir Azman said technology is just a tool for business transformation, but real transformation depends on transparency between leadership and members of any organisation.
He was speaking as the chief guest during a virtual discussion styled 'Business Transformation - Recipe for Survival and Success' hosted by the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Bangladesh (ICAB).
Mr Azman said no leadership can change an organisation if leadership in the different ladders do not collaborate and cooperate.
Business change is a must, he said, as learning from the ongoing pandemic will help businesses alter their operation quicker than it was thought earlier.
The chief executive officer of the largest local telecom carrier said, "We will ultimately understand that everything we had before Covid-19 was not good."
ICAB president Muhammad Farooq said a lot of discussions have already been held on the implications of technology for the future of work.
"However, future has arrived sooner than anticipated as companies and workers shifted to remote working in order to contain the transmission of COVID-19, dramatically changing how we work."
Mr Farooq said remote virtual meetings are now commonplace and economic activity has increased on a range of digital platforms.
"In fact, our world has already entered a new era-the 4th Industrial Revolution-characterised by not just a key technological breakthrough but a fusion of technologies in multiple physical, digital and biological areas."
The ICAB chief said, "The potential and possibilities of our world to change are endless." Dimension and methodology of business are changed now, supply chain and consumer demand have contracted, investors have lost confidence. On the other hand, new consumer needs have evolved, he observed.
Mr Farooq said the most obvious changes of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic are the infusion of data-enabled services into the ever more aspects of life.
"We must embrace this change or we will be overwhelmed by it," he mentioned, saying that digital revolution does not respect boundaries or nation states.
"The revolution is global. It's relentless and it's accelerating, but digital transformation is less about technology and more about people."
"We can buy any technology, but our ability to adapt depends on developing the next generation of skills. This is a big adversity; we have to face."
As restrictions are lifted, Mr Farooq said, a question in everybody's mind is whether this 'business as unusual' will become the 'new normal'.
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