subject: The Real Competitive Advantage [print this page] Sabas Global People Summit was a few weeks agofrom the video clips released, the event looked to be full of innovative and informative sessions. Most interesting to me was the engaging integration of technology, industry, and organization with a component that seems to have been missing lately: people.
Sabas founder and CEO, Bobby Yazdani,spoke on the first day of the Summit about redefining the workplace. In years past, the world was in the age of information. No more, said Yazdani; we are now in the age of people and ideas. Information is now readily accessible to everyone worldwide. With innumerable search engines, anyone can find anything with just a click of the mouse. Today, it is people who offer the real competitive advantage and it is people who create the organizational brand that enables you to stand out from the crowd.
Yazdani was teeing up a detailed presentation of Sabas newly launched social networking tool, Saba People Cloud. Before he got into the demonstration, he explained how this new platform would aid organizations in utilizing and connecting their greatest resourcespeople. There is a huge difference between siloed workplaces and those that understand the advantage of cross-functional networks which bring the best and brightest onto the right team. But how do you know who those people are and how you can connect with them?
In addition, Yazdani asserts that todays workforce requires more integration for all that they do and all that they need to doand they need things to be more personalized. Its hard to keep employees engaged when the training they need isnt available when they need it, they dont know how well they are doing on a project because they wont get their next performance review for another eight months, or they are stuck with a stagnant, ineffective team because they dont have the ability to tap more qualified resources.
With the technology that exists today, there is no excuse for not getting the most out of our greatest assets in the workplace (that would be people, in case you hadnt caught on yet). And while integration and acclimation may take time, organizations need to start moving towards a more collaborative environment because future generationsand even those brand new to the workforcewill not tolerate archaic technology and methods.
Do you agreewill technology-enabled work environments take over? Or, do you believe that the traditional workspace will ultimately prevail?
