Originally published on Medium.
Fast Company recently hosted the Agenda 2022: Rethink, Reimagine, Reinvent conference, offering a glimpse into the way technology will continue to transform business, society, and the ways we work.
As part of its Innovation Festival 360 series, the virtual summit featured a mix of panels, insightful case studies, and informed predictions from some of the tech and business world’s most creative thinkers. They explored topics around organizational digital transformation and building business around digital means, the future of the (virtual) workplace, and evolving rules for business leaders.
As the Senior Digital Media Strategist at Bixal, it’s my goal to stay apprised of emerging trends in digital and to craft strategies for implementing innovative ideas at scale. This conference provided an opportunity to engage with thought leaders in the digital innovation space and to hear from top executives about where they experienced challenges in their businesses during the past year, as well as their vision for potential growth.
Here, I have compiled the three most impactful sessions, sharing some key takeaways and thoughts from the conference and how Bixal’s digital strategy ties in with these insights. It’s encouraging to see that Bixal, a woman-owned small business, has already invested in many of these strategies, driving innovations in the federal space.
Driving Digital for 2022 and Beyond
In the session, Driving Digital for 2022 and Beyond, CEOs from multiple industries — including healthcare and tax welfare — explain how digital transformation not only is changing every aspect of business, it also is informing strategy, goal setting, and corporate ambitions.
We live in a digital world. It’s time we work in a digital world, too.
These thought leaders spoke about the importance of embracing digital transformation in your business. To better adapt to a physically-distanced world, businesses should be supporting hybrid work models by digitizing business operations to seamlessly allow employees to do their work from wherever they are.
And if your business isn’t already digitally optimized, you likely have a lot of catching up to do. As the digital experience changes, customers and employees are relying more on technology to meet their needs. This shift will be a major priority for a lot of companies that want to achieve significant growth in 2022.
Bixal understands that using technology to maintain a positive employee experience is critical to success and has been ahead of the curve — that is, even pre-pandemic — adopting virtual work solutions, and has now fully transitioned into a hybrid work model.
Additionally, Bixal continues to help its clients navigate the digital transformation landscape by providing strategic support in areas such as human-centered design (HCD) and customer experience (CX).
This is the perfect time to reevaluate your “why.”
Why do you do what you do? In other words, what’s the purpose of your organization? What are the things you need to invest in that are not part of the essentials of running your business? Simon Sinek has made a career of teaching that the “why” (or purpose) of your business is how leaders inspire action in their teams. Maybe this is a good time to evaluate if your why is truly inspiring?
Bixal is a people-absolutely-first company. Its culture of inclusivity and support can be felt throughout. Preserving that culture in a completely digital environment, however, can be challenging. Where before you could physically feel the energy and buzz when walking into the Bixal office, teams are now focusing their efforts on replicating that connection and vibrancy through computer screens while interacting with coworkers on Teams calls.
That said, we must remember, people are the priority. “Going virtual” should complement face-to-face, in-person interactions, not replace them.
Something worth considering is how you’re connecting at the human level with people in a virtual setting, as this is imperative to healthy growth in the virtual work environment. Keep in mind that a company’s culture extends beyond the four walls of an office building and discovering new ways of celebrating, sharing, and learning should be encouraged wherever possible.
One way I think of preserving this culture is to find simple ways to help the people I work with daily, which is perhaps the simplest way I can personally contribute to a culture that puts its people first.
The Future of Tech Will Be Responsible
As the pace of digital advancement accelerates, leaders increasingly are embracing innovations that better incorporate sustainability, inclusion, equity, and ethics into their businesses. Two prominent thought leaders in the technology space from the Yale School of Management and Twitter, respectively, offered a roadmap for responsible innovation and development in their panel The Future of Tech Will Be Responsible.
Data privacy and security were useful yesterday. They’re important today. Tomorrow, they will be critical.
How can we ensure ethical innovation in tech is not just a marketing effort or a simple box to check that eventually takes a back seat to revenue? How does it become a measurable investment? And who is accountable? These are questions we should be asking as the reliance on digital transactions and online information comes with a heightened awareness of security and privacy.
One way companies are addressing these questions is through environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investments, which take into account a company’s impact on those factors when deciding whether to invest. ESG investors increasingly are considering these non-financial factors as part of their analysis process to identify material risks and growth opportunities.
Bixal has been a leader in this data and cybersecurity space, advocating for digital security measures and smart identity management practices. The Bixal security team also shares updates and ethics resources to promote digital health among its clients and within the company, all of which promote the priority of responsible tech.
The biggest advantage of transparency is understandability.
My favorite takeaway from this session was the concept of “constructive dissent” or “articulated dissent.” This approach posits that employees should express their dissent to an appropriate audience within an organization — such as executive leadership — so that the ongoing discourse — to be perceived as constructive — can potentially affect positive change.
I am a firm believer that open communication and transparency is the perfect place to start when trying to understand a problem. Creating opportunities to openly engage, or developing a “safe space” for dialogue, should be a priority for any team or business.
Bixal supports a company culture of openness and transparency, holding monthly All Hands meetings that invite employees to an open forum where updates and corporate news is shared. They also recently implemented an anonymous employee suggestion box, where team members can submit feedback on anything from project challenges to benefits suggestions. In addition, Bixal will soon kick off a program where team members can ask questions and share ideas with leadership in semi-regular, open forum luncheons.
Fostering a culture of transparency with opportunities for team members to better understand business decisions should be a major consideration for any company looking to create an environment where employees feel safe and supported with an opportunity to voice their concerns in a constructive and positive way.
Leading with Purpose: How to Create a Mission-Driven Culture of Innovation
Brand affinity and customer loyalty are driven by a company’s mission and values, along with how its actions help foster positive change in the world. By committing to being positive influential actors in society, companies can build meaningful relationships with consumers and communities.
Here are my top insights from Leading with Purpose: How to Create a Mission-Driven Culture of Innovation, a session in which executives at Capital One and Peloton discussed how their companies are building innovative corporate cultures that make a meaningful impact.
Authenticity. Values. Purpose. These are what drive value for customers interacting with your brand.
The most successful brands are the ones that want to authentically do something for the customer. And authenticity is achieved by delivering value consistently, over time, to foster trust and respect.
At the heart of a mission-driven brand is a cohort of like-minded people who want to express their values through the products and services they deliver. Impacting people’s lives in positive ways, in conjunction with clients and partners, lies at the core of the Bixal value proposition.
Bixal pursues opportunities in the federal space, using its energies and talents to do work that improves the lives of people both domestically and abroad. This work, while incremental and iterative, is forward-facing and focused on creating a strong future for everyone. Ultimately, I believe that helps drive teams toward their goals, both personally and professionally.
Allow data to inform, so that people can drive.
“Data-driven” is a commonplace descriptor for many in the tech industry. Data is great. However, using data shouldn’t negate the importance of human judgment. This is arguably the most important measure to acknowledge as technology becomes more pertinent in doing business. Even with robust access to analytics and the best data modeling, human-centered decision processes shouldn’t be discarded.
Bixal acquired Clear Outcomes just over a year ago to expand its capabilities in data and measurement, specifically its deep expertise with monitoring, evaluation, and learning (MEL) services. This move signaled Bixal’s forward-thinking aspirations and growing competitiveness in the international development space and its broadening capabilities as a full-spectrum digital services provider.
Equally as important, Bixal welcomed a host of new team members who have made a significant impact on the company’s growth, culturally and technically, integrating their skills and experience with the broader team to ensure clients receive the best solutions, based on data-informed analyses and guidance from a talented team of experts.
Takeaways such as these are important to keep in mind as we continue to adopt new ways of working together and move toward greater innovation and adaptability in business practices. Leveraging digital innovations and transformative technologies as tools to support collaboration, being responsible in the development of products, and staying true to the core purpose of the business should steer us toward positive progress in 2022 and beyond!