Digital Leadership Report lands in London

The DLR talks about speed and the pace of change being quicker than ever. That speed has already called into question the relevance of the data faster than we could have imagined. 

The data collected in 2022 told us that investment in the Cloud was a priority, but money was being shifted away from data and analytics driven by the perceived difficulty in extracting value from any investment. It was clear from our event debate that this is no longer the case.   

Unsurprisingly, the implications of generative AI on business were high on the agenda, and the questions from the audience reflected the urgency for a guidebook to navigate this new normal. Our initial launch event was on the 8th of November and ChatGPT was released to the public on the 30th of November which showcases the pace of change and what impact this can have on technology trends and agendas.  

David Savage (chairing the discussion) asked Milan Juza, CTO of the Gym Group, what impact generative AI was having on business, and what his feeling was toward its adoption.  

“There is understandably a lot of experimentation happening (with different AI) but we need to understand what these technologies are, how they work and what they can do safely. At the same time, how reliable is this technology?” 

When he flipped the discussion and asked who was using generative AI, the entire room put their hand-up. It only emphasised Milan’s points regarding safety, with guardrails and regulation a must to protect consumers and employees. 

The DLR also reported that progress was (finally) being made in the battle to create a more inclusive and diverse industry. Numbers of women in the industry are up, as are those from wider minority groups, but plenty of challenges remain and gender parity will still take six decades to achieve. Incidentally our data suggests a faster progression than the World Economic Forum, who believe that milestone is still three centuries away from being realised. 

Representation of diverse backgrounds was still noticeably thin around the boardroom, with women holding just 14% of those positions.  

Catherine Wright (Director, Corporate Banking at HSBC Innovation Banking) was on hand to add real substance to the discussion. Having set up the Employee Resource Group within her own business she was keen to stress that technology companies with diverse leadership teams are also the best-performing companies in the sector, and more had to be done to help women get into the boardroom. 

“What you find is that as you go up the ladder, that’s where we see that drop off. The question is how to stop that drop-off. You shouldn’t have to make a choice between family and your career, but family-life balance is still a major stumbling block.”