Mapping Tomorrow’s Technology Operating Model

The technology operating model is a vast network that must be deftly managed by leaders if their businesses are to thrive.

With the changes brought forth by the coronavirus pandemic, leaders are compelled to rethink and reimagine their technology operating models. C-suite executives debate the future of business practices in the industrial “new normal”. 

The COVID-19 pandemic became the epicenter of a paradigm shift that has revolutionised the state of operations. The realm of technology and business functions have become intertwined, customer expectations changed and the state of work altered beyond recognition—in a matter of months. 

With Peter Stojanovic moderating this roundtable debate, the participants include:

• Adrian Samareanu, CDO & Group SVP, Digital & IT, Volvo Financial Services
• Ian Cohen, Chief Product Officer & CIO, Acacium Group
• Supriya Rao Patwardhan, Executive VP, Global Head of IT Services, Deutsche Post DHL

Moderator Peter Stojanovic opened the discourse, asking the C-suite executives to trace the journey of the operating model transformation in their organisations over the last two years. 

Technology operating model evolution

Ian Cohen delved into an account of his experience at Acacium—a Broxbourne-based healthcare staffing service. 

"In terms of business, and in terms of technology," commented the CIO, "what has been really clear is that structurally we’ve changed. We’ve had to learn to organise differently and work in different ways.” 

Cohen revealed that the focus, the approach and the pace of the production of goods and services underwent a dramatic change. 

“Every part of the [technology] operating model has changed,” he added. 

“From the clerical settings that we support all the way to the patients at the other end, and everything in between”.  

Supriya Patwardhan offered the outlook of a global logistics giant apropos to the operating model shift. 

“[The last two years] have revolutionised how we work and how we operate”, described the DHL Executive Vice President. 

While the operating model of the German logistics giant was no stranger to teleworking and the occasional video conference, Patwardhan conceded that the COVID-19 pandemic altered the way the workforce connected, interacted and collaborated on a fundamental scale. 

“I think on a human level [the operating model] has changed, on a tech level it has changed, and with that has come the change to the expectations of people, the choices they have and how they operate.”

But there’s much more change to come in the sphere, Patwardhan maintains.  

Changing Expectations, Changing Demands

Amid changing customer and employee expectations, the question of how to stay on top of the rapid influx of changes beckons itself. 

Patwardhan explains the response of DHL's tech team in the face of the changing landscape of business post-pandemic. 

“We are actively exploring different collaboration tools and looking at things that are fit for purpose”, she remarked. 

The EVP characterised the onset of the change as a consequence of the shift in the mindset—of consumers and employees alike. She also attributed the confluence of IT and business operations as organisational arms as one of the foremost drivers of this perceived change. 

“There was a period of time when, for many years, when IT was IT and business was business, and there was this segregation of duties and responsibilities”, said Patwardhan. 

Patwardhan argued that the mantle lies on IT professionals to step out of their zones and take on more diversified roles to aid business practices. 

This roundtable was created in partnership with HPE.