Alan Alper, VP and Editorial Director, has his fingerprints on most Cognizant marketing publications and events. He has been involved in the planning of Cognizant's presence and pitches at the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum for the last several years. For a variety of reasons, he did not have a chance to personally attend. He did this year and I caught up with him about his "rookie" impressions of Davos.
This was my first year onsite in Davos. I was really struck by the fact that there really are two Davoses. There is annual meeting, where the elites of the world in business, government, policy, and academia get together to try to take on the world's grandest challenges. Then there is the outside the Congress Center, what we call the alt-dot-Davos experience in which there are popup presences and storefronts up and down the Promenade hosted by big technology companies; banks and brokerages and the economic development authorities of developing countries; and also, not-for-profit and NGO organizations all trying to get heard above the din.
It was fascinating to me to see what I thought was both a divergence and convergence inside and outside the Congress Center. Inside the Congress Center, clearly the conversation was all about the 4th Industrial Revolution and the impact that globalization is having across our ecology, economies and social systems. There is the hope and the dream that technology - AI, automation, blockchain - applied correctly, can help to alleviate some of the bigger challenges --which is WEF's mission to make the world better.
There was the continuing conversation inside the Congress Center of keeping up with the demand for talent, primarily in the digital world, how we make sure that folks are well versed in technology, trained, equipped to help society progress and to leave no one behind. There were murmurs of the tech backlash, how big-tech is grappling with issues of trust and data stewardship. And questions about whether we are heading for a global recession.
On the ecological front, I think the talk that took people by storm, really grabbed at its heartstrings was that of Sweden's Greta Thunberg who did a presentation titled “Our House is On Fire.” I think she stole the show. I mean it was just so authentic and genuine, this 16-year-old girl who basically is telling the world leaders that if we don't fix the ecological issues of our world, we are sunk - and time's a wastin.
Inside the Congress Center, there was a lot of conversation about making the world inclusive. Yet, when I looked at some of the data coming from WEF, only 23% of the delegates are women. That's only up 1% from last year. I would draw a comparison to what's going on outside the Congress Center where, at least in my travels, I encountered many, many women who are involved and passionate about addressing the issues of the day. They led conversation on the caring economy and how to make FinTech work so that there is more democratized access to information services not just in the developed world, but also in developing economies.
There were a number of really interesting women events, one that was sponsored by an organization called Female Quotient that I dipped in and out of a couple of times. I could barely get in. It was standing room only. Again, they were tackling all the big issues of the day. It was great to see that, at least outside the Congress Center, women are playing a huge role trying to create a dialog around issues that seem to be vexing to most business leaders and to everyone else.
Tech Talk
Reskilling, upskilling, humans to thrive in the future of work, that was a big topic everywhere you went. The conversation about job losses was a little more subdued this year. I think people are now finally coming to realize that the whole notion of fearing the bot may be overplayed and that it's going to be some time before AI and intelligent process automation will take lots of jobs from people.
I think there are places where clearly the rote and routine jobs are going to start to disappear. But the prevailing wisdom is that, to make businesses work, we need to make technology more appreciative of the human condition. The future of work is not "no jobs". There are going to be new jobs that open up as a result of AI and automation. They're just different jobs than we've seen today.
Most of the people that I spoke to reject the notion put forth in the infamous Oxford study that 40+% of all jobs are at risk of being automated away. There may be tasks that go away, but not full jobs.
We did an event on blockchain, that was quite well received. I think, down the road, we're going to see places many places where blockchain will boost underserved communities by providing data and services, what some people call micro-moment applications. For example, we're working with MetLife on a pilot project in Singapore that enables women with gestational diabetes, once they take a test to see whether they are susceptible to it, and if they do contract it, are able to be compensated for treatment directly on their cell phones without having to file a claim.
The other thing that got attention was just the humanizing impact of AI, the more we can put an empathetic veneer on AI and how it can enable more genuine, authentic, and meaningful interactions and how we can guard against bias, be it intentional or unintentional. These are things, with proper governance and structural changes -- such as AI offices that enable organizations to create and follow policies and procedures -- that will ensure that AI is used for good purposes and that deliver great experiences, while weeding out bias that can affect black box algorithms.
I stopped by the Facebook pavilion. Unlike a lot of the big tech companies, they allowed you to come in and browse like you would in a gallery or a museum. On the walls they displayed this wonderful narrative about the impact of social networks. You know, obviously it was a very positive spin, but I was very happy to see that they did treat the whole question of the unforeseen consequences from social networking, particularly the misuse of Facebook as a purveyor of fake news, and how data privacy needs to be better protected. They could have buried it, but it was there. They didn't hide from it.
People gazing and networking
For me, personally, it was really enlightening. We ran into so many interesting people. We were walking down the promenade the first morning, and I ran into Tim Cook. We exchanged glances, and I decided not to say hello to him because he looked like he wanted to be left alone. Even though Apple didn't have a pavilion in Davos, they had a presence there, so that was interesting.
We saw Prince William. He walked across the street from our pavilion, the Hub Culture Pavilion. We saw the Queen of the Netherlands, who had a meeting in the Hub Culture pavilion.
There weren't as many big name political leaders. I think Merkel from Germany was the biggest name. Macron from France didn't come. Modi from India didn't come. Trump wasn't there. As I said, I think Greta Thunberg was the lightning rod. I think a lot of folks were very intrigued by her presentation.
I met a former WEF heavyweight, Dr. Frank Jurgen Richter. He runs an organization called Horasis. It's The Global Vision Community. He's offered us a speaking opportunity at his upcoming event in Portugal.
The alt-dot-Davos
The general press tends to cover the pronouncements that come out of the Annual Meeting, and disparagingly comments on "Oh, it's all these elites and they all fly in on private jets and fly in and out." That may be true, but the ultimate Davos experience is really all about the activity outside the Congress Center, that’s occurring up and down the promenade -- the people who are trying to collaborate, and work together to solve big challenges that we all face.
We ran into this young woman, Christine Moseley, founder of a company called Full Harvest, which is focused on creating a more sustainable food supply chain. She had been brought to Davos by Bloomberg. She had just received her Series A funding, and she's out hiring people. A great opportunity for her to evangelize what she's doing.
Again, it's all these young, bright people who descend on Davos and really try to make a difference. I don't want to say it's just a millennial thing, but it's a lot of people with high aspiration and interest in giving back to society and making the world better. I know that all sounds very Pollyanna, but it was true.
In my conversations with our WEF partners, I have to tell you they are very encouraging and supportive of this alt-dot-Davos experience. In fact, we had a number of them at our Future Workforce event. Eric White, who oversees the IT and electronics industry community that our Vice Chairman & CEO Francisco D’Souza leads, came to our event. We had a number of WEF shapers both at that event as well as our blockchain event. In discussions with them, they're glad to see the experience that is blossoming outside of the Congress Center.
I think WEF has done a good job of making sure that you get this cross-section of people in Davos who can have influence, have input, and shape conversations and strategies that can at least theoretically start to address what needs to be done. Then it's for everybody else to kind of pick up and run with it and take the theory and turn it into action.
They could say, "This is a security risk that we don't want to deal with." We're all better for it because they allow this new experience to kind of layer on top of what they're doing in the Congress Center.
The New York Times still does not get it
In 2006, I asked the question "Is the media biased?" I wrote "No this is not about being liberal or conservative. This is about how little MSM covers business technology as against consumer oriented technology. New York City is home to the largest number of Fortune 500 headquarters. The NY Times has a strong business readership..... Maybe NY Times journalists ought to step away from their Macs and Google searches and go visit some of the CIOs at the numerous headquarters in Manhattan."
In 2007, someone far more influential, Bill Gates pointed out
"The business computing market, which is way bigger than the consumer computing market, no one pays attention to it. Even in the Wall Street Journal, and you think, oh, this is the paper they're going to tell me about business computing; no, it's all about consumer computing."
Gates singled out the WSJ but the same applied to the Times.
So, over a decade later, the Times now runs a story about how the city has "become a tech town". Clearly, with Amazon's recent interest (and then loss of interest) in Long Island City, and the growth of Silicon Alley, the tech intensity in the area has increased significantly. But those same CIOs I had talked about in 2006 have continued to spend tens of billions a year on tech. Wall Street has spent hundreds of billions since the deep recession in 2009 on building next-gen fintech. Agencies, another major NYC focus, have seen the swing to programmatic advertising and watched digital advertising become a $ 200 billion a year market.
It sounds almost like Rip Van Winkle waking up from his 20 year slumber amazed how things have changed. No, New York has long been a flourishing tech town which the Times did not find that interesting. Consumer tech companies and sexier startups have made it bigger and more interesting to the Times but the underlying foundation has not disappeared and still does not get much attention.
February 25, 2019 in Industry Commentary | Permalink | Comments (0)