2020: The Year of Digital

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Fellow gamers, tech people, humans, aliens or whatever identity you assign yourself, today, we are going to approach our blog post from a slightly different angle. So far we have talked about cool/funny mobile games, charities and social good, but we want to discuss a new subject today to look at things from a slightly different angle.

No matter what else happened across the world in 2020, there is one thing that history will remember. Besides the launch of Robbie’s Piano Music Tiles Brain Trainer, hahaha. Yes, you guessed it right, it’s the c-word. The infamous Covid-19 pandemic with all its worldwide implications, in each and every single sector and in pretty much every single human on Earth.

Have you ever asked yourself if there were any positive outcomes from the pandemic?

Well, we all did and the answer might actually be quite positive. Read along ⤵️

In just a few months, Covid-19 brought years of change in the way companies in all sectors and regions do business. According to a study conducted by McKinsey & Company between July 7 and July 30, 2020, companies accelerated digital transformation by up to seven years, on average, in response to the pandemic. The study was conducted amongst 899 C-level executives (different ‘C’ word but lots of people might disagree).

It is clear by now that one of the factors driving this change was (and still is) a rapid shift in consumer behaviour, especially a growing shift towards online channels. The strict lockdown imposed by many countries worldwide forced the public towards e-commerce for pretty much everything from groceries to financial services, etc.

source – McKinsey & Company

The graph above illustrates the rapid change in our digital interactions, compared with previous years when the changes were happening, but at a slower pace. With this shift in our behaviour, if we talk from an economical and business point of view, the next big question would be if businesses were actually able to adapt on such short notice.

To be honest, they literally had no choice. They either had to adapt or most probably not survive the fierce competition. So, decision-makers and stakeholders had to come up with new and different ways to satisfy this huge trend. As it emerged so fast, we decided to call this a “trend” but bearing in mind that it might be here for the long run, the term might be a bit inappropriate.

The numbers don’t lie ⤵️

source – McKinsey & Company

The survey reveals that businesses have spent more on digital investment than any other business measures during the pandemic including cost-cutting and customer acquisition. And we can see the results of that in the graph above. The growth in digital products and service offerings jumped ahead by an average of 7 years in just a few months.

I think there is one more example, which weirdly, doesn’t need to be backed up by numbers, mostly because its impact is felt daily.

Let’s talk about remote working, as we are all experiencing it and we had to find ways to cope with it, no matter how hard it is or maybe not so hard, for some of us. Prior to the pandemic, there were shy discussions about this type of work, and honestly, most of us raised our eyebrows to this type of approach, just because the basic human “fear of the unknown” was just plugged in.

Just think about its social ramifications, with both parents and children staying home, some with work, some with school, 5 days a week for multiple months in a row. Prior to Covid, this was simply a utopia. But when things got serious, we all packed our big screens and ended up working in our living room, in a matter of weeks or days.

If we think from a company’s point of view, to have this infrastructure in place in such a short amount of time, it is remarkable. Before December 2019, to kick off this type of initiative and actually make it work, companies would need probably at least one year to fully implement any changes, especially the larger ones.

Somehow, they made it work. And although there’s still a debate if remote work is here to stay, we personally think the truth is somewhere in the middle, depending on how companies and employees would be able to reach a middle ground, a place where company’s reach their KPIs but their workers’ physical health and mental wellbeing are no jeopardised.

Remote working aside, I think it is still too early to see if the other measures and changes are here just for the short term or they will play the long term game. For now, Covid is still a reality even with multiple vaccines already being administered and we are slowly getting ready for getting back to normal.

What is the new normal, we just don’t know yet!? What we know though, is that 2020 will be the digital year of our history, a year when progress was forced upon us, some would argue with a way too big price to pay.

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SOURCES ⤵️