The role of the finance team in organisations is changing. The finance team has become ever more responsible for creation of competitive advantage within the organisation; through driving insight and innovation quickly and responsively across the business.

The key concerns of finance have always been the streamlining of processes, the reduction of costs, and achieving rapid ROI and substantial IRR on investments. This has traditionally lead to a focus on efficiency and cost reduction at the expense of innovation and growth.

There is now a shift in focus from just being an efficient operation to a focus on engagement with customers, taking an outside-in view. This shift in focus requires a change in mindset and culture, both inside and outside finance. Further, it requires new ways of working and new technologies.

The CFO needs to get a clear understanding of the business needs and drive a can-do attitude to innovation. New ways of working combined with new technologies such as Serverless Cloud are key facilitators in this change. The business should be designed around what the customer wants, and it is not always the case that the business has a good understanding of what this is, particularly as it changes over time; these changes are becoming more frequent and unpredictable and can often catch the business out.

The drive for customer centric innovation is further hampered by legacy systems and inefficient technology practices that are a cost burden and barrier to innovation. Legacy technology processes are slow and expensive, a recent IDC report identified that 2/3 of delivered solutions are never or rarely used. This high level of waste in IT spend results in a poor ROI and IRR.

The CFO is looking for low risk, low cost outcomes that will deliver a high IRR and rapid ROI. Taking an outcomes based approach to delivering solutions, along with leveraging lean ways of working and Serverless Cloud Technologies driven by the CFO, is the key to successful Digital Transformation.

 

Digitalisation is sweeping every area of modern life, and any business that fails to keep up with this trend will be left behind. Companies need to adapt and utilise digital technology in all areas. But whose responsibility is it to take charge of digital transformation?

Until recently, CDOs (Chief Digital Officers) were primed to take on this new challenge, but change is upon us yet again.

The digital transformation just won’t stand still.

 

The need for a CDO

Long gone are the days when digital technology was an outside-the-box innovation. It’s essential to how modern businesses are run. Those who don’t get on board are essentially sailing against the tide, while competitors sail off into the sunset.

That said, with so many different types of technology and areas of implementation, managing a digital transformation is no mean feat. That’s why, in recent years, the role of CDO became increasingly common among businesses.

In 2017, PwC found that 19% of companies have a CDO or equivalent, up from 6% in 2015. The numbers varied by country, with a digital leader at 62% of French companies, 39% and 35% in Germany and the UK respectively, and an average of 38% across Europe.

 

The problem with a CDO

Much like digital technology itself, modern business is dynamic. Already we’re seeing a new trend on the horizon, with CEOs (Chief Executive Officers) taking on the responsibility of the CDO. Why? In short, digital transformation is quickly becoming the top priority for businesses.

Typically, CDOs report to the CEO of a business, freeing up their time to focus on other aspects of the company. The CDO themselves don’t have the authority to commit resources – financial and staff – where it’s needed. Or at least not with the immediacy that’s required.

 

Shifting responsibilities

That’s exactly why firms are fast realising that the digital transformation is exactly where the CEO’s focus is needed. They have that authority, along with the position and ability to get the board on side. So, when firms are hiring a new CEO, they are typically looking for someone capable of taking on the CDO role themselves – rather than someone who will delegate such a crucial responsibility.

MIT’s Sloan Review found that a massive 41% of digitally mature companies – those who are closer to an ideally transformed organisation – put the responsibility of digital transformation with the CEO. Similar figures are true for digitally developing companies with 31%.

It’s only those early on in their digital transformation where things differ. Most commonly for these companies, it’s the IT department and CDO (23%) who take charge of digital technology. Clearly, there’s something to be said for the pattern on businesses shifting responsibility as the digital transformation moves further down the line.

 

Why the shift?

While an IT-centric approach is useful in the early stages of digital transformation, it isn’t the sole concern. In fact, as organisations mature digitally, the IT department typically has less control over the digitalisation process.

Why? Digital transformation isn’t just about technology. Far from it, people and process are just as, if not more important than the technology being used.

With a CDO focussed solely on technology and its applications, rather than the people and business more broadly, there’s only so far they can take the transformation. The result, in some cases, is a technology-led transformation with sophisticated technology that doesn’t meet the requirements or get the buy in it needs from the business to be a success.

CEOs on the other hand know all about a business. They know the culture, the workforce and the objectives both overall and in various departments. Or at least they should. If this can be combined with digital competence, effective management and the vision to apply the right digital tools where required, we can certainly expect to see more CEOs managing digital transformation moving forward.

 

If you want to find out how far along the digital transformation journey your company is, why not take our Digital Maturity Assessment? 

Even the legal industry isn’t immune to technological disruption.

The legal industry is like banking and insurance. There’s a lot of red tape to wade through as it’s notorious for relying on physical record-keeping and having an eye-watering amount of administration. Practices have remained practically unchanged for centuries. Many startups are keen to disrupt this £26 billion industry in the UK, and beyond.

Far from being replaced by robots, the legal profession is set to be enhanced by the new technologies that have already reshaped much of our world.

The rise of legaltech is being treated with the same excitement and anticipation as the growth of fintech a few years ago.

Definition of lawtech

Lawtech is generally defined as the use of technology to provide legal services, with such technologies set to disrupt the legal sector.

While the tech industry is firmly on the pulse of lawtech, the legal industry itself is heavily founded on tradition and custom. Many lawyers are still blissfully unaware of the impending disruption.

Despite some being slow to take up these new technologies, business as usual will no longer be an option in the near future, as has already happened in many other industries including publishing, retail and travel.

There are some sections of society who are currently virtually excluded from obtaining legal services due to the cost barrier. Some company founders therefore have a vision to remove this barrier with technology that can provide basic legal services to customers on a budget.

Lawtech is bringing new challenges and more opportunities. It’s already well-established in the United States, but is gradually spreading to Europe.

Examples of lawtech

Lawtech can involve using Artificial Intelligence to support the role of lawyers, removing the tedium of some aspects of legal work.

For example, AI technology called ROSS has been trialled to sift through data previously handled by people, and can be controlled with natural language queries. This means non-programmers can use the technology by typing commands in the form of questions or search strings.  

An app has been trialled that can draft confidentiality contracts. More software for will creation is also being trialled that helps people overcome the barrier of going through the tedious and unpleasant process of making a will.

Blockchain technology is enabling the exchange of digital legal contracts and avoiding the risk of security breaches like the high profile Distributed Denial of Service attack against Dyn. The Internet of Things refers to connected devices, and in legaltech such technologies are being employed to gather data intelligence for smart contracts.

The world’s largest law firm is trialling software that predicts the trajectory, cost, length and even the outcome of litigation by applying machine learning techniques to case law. It could help prevent some cases from going to court by analysing the most appropriate course of action.

Virtual assistants such as chatbots are growing in popularity in the legal sector. For example, they can provide a neutral and non-judgemental platform that supports people who have been a victim of crime. One app helps users send reports to the police in legal terminology that increases the chance that their crime will be taken seriously.

Advantages of lawtech

Lawtech has the potential to save time and money for law firms. It could possibly automate time-consuming legal processes such as document review.

Computer games can be used to teach employees about compliance and significantly reduce the risk of policy breaches. This will save both money and the reputation of law firms.

At the moment, there is still much less incentive for legal companies to cut costs compared to other industries because all costs are passed on directly to clients. If all lawyers charge similar fees, clients have no choice but to pay the going rate.

In disrupting the industry, lawtech benefits the consumer by forcing companies to innovate and provide a service that is better value. This will drive up customer service levels in the industry overall.

Lawtech can also make the legal sector more transparent by making firms more accessible. If the client has access to a piece of software predicting the cost of their litigation process, law firms will be more compelled to justify the fees they actually charge. This empowers the client to better understand a complex industry.

Hackathons can promote social justice by producing technological solutions that help people to obtain vital legal services. Examples include access to legal help in rural areas, or for people who don’t speak English as their first language.

Final Remarks

Lawtech is an industry ripe for disruption and these changes can benefit both clients and lawyers. Cost predictions can be made more accurate with machine learning software, improving operations within law firms. A vast amount of tedious work can also be eliminated for lawyers themselves.

More clients will be able to access affordable legal help without necessarily needing to turn to a lawyer. Access to legal representation will be vastly improved by potentially removing the need to physically travel to a firm’s location and services can be tailored to better suit the needs of clients.

Data underpins most of the technologies popular today, and big data refers to large datasets that cannot be handled by traditional databases. Big data is high-velocity, high-variety and high-volume, requiring particular methods for managing or processing that differ from traditional data management technologies.

We are collecting more and more data from many different sources in all manner of formats.  It enables us to make better predictions about future patterns but also presents management and analysis challenges.  

Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence is the simulation of human intelligence by machines. Though these technologies are still in their early stages, big data is being used to feed AI programs and make them more viable. Access to more data than ever before means we can develop smarter machines.

At the moment, this is resulting in Virtual Personal Assistants, Smart Homes – including technologies such as Google Home and Amazon Echo, and Google DeepMind, which beat the world Go champion.

Computer game systems can monitor user behaviour by analysing natural language in the in-game chat, and serve a penalty to deter abusive behaviour. Google Translate is approaching the accuracy of human translators by analysing sentence patterns in millions of documents.

User focus in content creation

Leveraging big data for content creation is still set to be a big trend. For example, Netflix produces programmes based on data collected from their users’ viewing preferences.

The Netflix-owned US version of House of Cards was commissioned based on data that showed a large pool of their users liked the British House of Cards, Kevin Spacey films and the film director David Fincher. This played a large role in their commissioning the David Fincher directed House of Cards series starring Kevin Spacey, and it was very popular.

The company has also awarded a $1 million prize to the team who improved their viewing matching system by 10%.

Moving to the cloud

Data processing is moving to the cloud, instead of being conducted on-site. This can be done with Amazon’s data warehouse, Google’s data analytics service or IBM’s cloud platform, for example.

Popular open source data analytics tools like Hadoop were designed to work on clusters of in-house machines but they can also be deployed in the cloud.

This means that data and analytics operations are more easily scaleable as cloud hosting is more flexible. It means that companies can trial computing their data in their cloud. This also eases pressure on companies to find the technical talent to run their in-house clusters.

However, there are still technical challenges with hosting any kind of data in the cloud, but particularly in big data, such as needing a very high speed internet connection to handle the high velocity of data.

Cybersecurity and data privacy challenges

Storing more data creates even more opportunities for hackers to exploit personal user details. It’s just as well that £1.9 billion has been announced by the government to help protect companies and their customers from cyber attacks.

Many high-profile cyberattacks, such as the LinkedIn data breach that impacted 17 million users, highlights the urgent need for the government and businesses to protect their data. Consumers are becoming more aware of the data that they allow to be collected and demanding better protection.

New European Union regulations in the form of the GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) insist that companies improve the security around the data they are collecting, and, perhaps more importantly, gain explicit consent from users to collect their data.

Data self-service platforms

Our ability to analyse big data is going to develop further with platforms that enable business users to make sense of data. Data self-service platforms are a viable alternative for companies with no in-house data analysts or data scientists, and include platforms such as Trillium and Hunk.

These have arisen partly in response to businesses demanding real-time responses to their data, as well as a skills shortage in data scientists. Gartner predicts that the global business intelligence and analytics software market will grow to £14.7 billion in 2017.

Move to stream processing

Traditionally, companies have tended to batch-process data. Continuous analysis of data is now required as businesses recognise the need to process quickly. Speed is crucial in operations such as fraud detection, trading and system monitoring.

Stream processing handles high volumes of data in real-time as it is being collected by the server. It was first used in the finance industry when the stock exchange moved from floor-based trading to electronic trading and is now commonplace.

For example, fraud detection systems process millions of card transactions in real time, so companies can detect potential fraud through analysis of spending patterns. The electricity generators and distributors monitoring hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses in real time can use stream processing to ensure adequate availability in the right locations.

Collecting more data

It’s just as well that businesses are moving to the cloud, as the amount of data we collect is only going to keep on growing. The world is set to create 180 trillion gigabytes of data annually by 2025, according to International Data Corporation (IDC).  The Internet of Things will generate vast amounts of data in many formats; including sensory data, video, audio and natural speech. Companies will need to leverage this to improve services for their customers.

The smart home market has the ability to amass even more data than we previously imagined. Our devices know what time we get up, how we operate our homes, and which groceries we buy. Our smart cars know exactly where we travel to and our fuel consumption. This data can be used to improve sustainability, for example by turning off lights when we’re not using them, or efficiency by diverting resources to where they are most needed.

Companies will also be making better use of their ‘dark data’, which is data not currently being leveraged for a business purpose, and can be paper-based. This could include analysing expense and travel reports for salespeople to determine productivity, for example.

Data lakes

In the enterprise, there will be an increase in what are known as data lakes, making it easier to draw out business insights. Data lakes are centralized repositories that hold a vast amount of data in its native format.

The advantages of using data lakes include it being a low-cost form of storage for large amounts of data that is easily scalable, and supporting multiple programming languages and frameworks because the data is unstructured.

They have potential to help organisations work in a more coherent manner by storing all organisational data in one place. Users can be issued different security permissions to prevent anyone gaining access to all of the data to ensure security.

Data is going open source

Big data is dominated by open source tools such as Hadoop, and database mining tool RapidMiner. It’s no surprise that the future of big data is open source.

Sharing data is going to be important in developing new technologies. For example, companies like Google and Facebook share their data to progress the field of deep learning.

Google is partnering with the medical field as one London NHS trust has already shared patient details with its AI technology DeepMind to test an alert system for kidney injuries.

Final remarks

Big data has longevity and is much more than just a tech industry buzzword. It must not be seen as an isolated area of tech since it underpins the development of many areas of modern technology.

Big data drives the progress behind breakthrough technologies transforming our environment, such as machine learning and the Internet of Things, or how modern security agencies tackle crime.

The option to move to the cloud enables more companies to take advantage of big data in a way that is scalable. Making use of more data, and open data-sharing, is the future.

Voice search is on its way towards disrupting the search engine industry and how we discover content online. It’s posing challenges for search engine marketers as the nature of search changes from text-based to voice.

What is voice search?

Voice search uses voice recognition technology to enable users to search for content online.

For example, instead of navigating to the default search engine installed on your mobile, and typing in something you want to know, you might say “OK Google. Where is the nearest coffee shop to me with free wifi?” Hopefully, your mobile (or personal assistant) will tell you the answer.

At the moment, voice search is most popular with teenagers. ComScore confidently estimates that, by 2020, 50% of all searches will be made using voice. We are now interacting with machines in a much more human-like way, talking to them as you would a friend, and relying on this technology to accomplish goals.

Voice search appears to herald moving away from screens. Gartner predicts that by 2020, 30% of web browsing will be screenless. This medium is non-visual and poses challenges for businesses that rely heavily on design to communicate their brand, or have a name that is hard to pronounce.

Benefits of search

Voice search integrates more naturally with the demands of the physical world.

Using voice search is much easier than typing when a user’s hands or vision is occupied. For example, when driving, or walking down the street, and it’s important to be looking ahead.

It’s more accessible for users who have a physical disability, and typing on a screen would be too difficult for them, or even impossible.

Using natural speech is easier than trying to search in the language of search engines. In many situations, voice search also generates faster results.

How businesses can adapt to voice search

With no visual cues due to the absence of a screen, businesses have to optimise separately for voice search to stay ahead of the curve and ensure they can be successfully found. Natural language, and a question and answer format, is the key to optimising for voice search.

A company’s website navigation and structure has to make sense with users jumping around using voice commands, perhaps disrupting the typical task flow expected when designing a site.

Viewing users as action-oriented rather than search-oriented will transform the nature of connective technologies. This means developing a greater sensitivity to the context in which technology is being used. Instead of imagining a user sat at a desk typing queries into the search box, imagine them walking down the street or driving a car.

It requires knowing the needs and mindset of customers inside out, understanding how they are moving through their environment, and the kind of tasks they might use voice search for. For example, finding their nearest vegan restaurant, or ordering a taxi.

Voice search is also disrupting current advertising opportunities and organic search results. Instead of being able to serve an advert in the search results, businesses will have to find alternative ways to reach their customers.

The future of search

Accuracy is key to the future of voice search. In order to increase the rate of adoption, it has to be easier and more successful than the traditional way of searching online by typing keywords.

Voice search technologies are fuelled behind the scenes by ‘skills’ (like apps) that provide the relevant information or data to answer user queries. The number of these available skills is growing to accommodate more diverse and complex queries.

The online world is going to become increasingly defined by what delivery agents like Google or Amazon define as legitimate or expected activity. There is a huge question mark over the potential that this technology has to shape the way we interact with the world.

If we already had privacy concerns about our identities and data online, then the potential for one of these companies to be recording our speech or even whole conversations has serious implications.

Relationship to Smart Homes

It’s less about killing traditional search and more about mobile technologies permeating even more areas of our lives. Instead of there being a hard line between the virtual and the physical world, personal assistant products help us control our environment digitally.  

The personal assistant market is one way of capitalising on voice search technology, and currently includes products like Amazon Echo and Google Home devices. Users can talk to their devices and use them in the same way they would a traditional browser.

As more products become ‘smart’, including televisions, thermostats and fridges, they can be linked to your personal assistant, and the possibilities for using voice to manage the home are increasing rapidly.

By developing a smart home ecosystem, businesses are increasing their revenue potential in a new market.

Final remarks

Voice search underlines how digital technologies are evolving towards being increasingly user-focused. Understanding your customer is truly key to succeeding in the future of search.

Recordings of natural speech are becoming a more common data format that platforms will need to make sense of. At the moment, Google Analytics does not make voice search queries available, but Google has hinted that this functionality is coming soon.

As with any new technological development, the industry may panic about “the death existing technology”. The reality is, change is much slower than that, and voice search will grow to complement existing search technologies.

Businesses should embrace the change that is coming, and anticipate that, while creating content is still important, the ultimate consumer of that content might eventually be a virtual assistant mining for data.

Both Civic Tech and Smart Cities are technologies used en masse for the greater good. They are driven by government initiatives, used by the general public, and the latter is supported by the private sector.

Civic Tech aims to increase citizen participation in government. Civic Tech is non-profit and enhances the public good.

For example, Civic Tech might be a tool that improves voting turnout, or enables someone to easily write to their local MP online. Civic Tech is not that well-known among the general public, but there are a number of useful platforms available.

If you’re an active internet user, you’ve probably used Civic Tech without even realising it. For example, you’ve probably signed a petition on change.org to campaign for a certain policy change.

Civic Tech naturally works in partnership with (and sometimes by challenging) government to:

• Further the public good
• Allow the government to deliver a better service to citizens
• Help people participate in government decision-making
• To reduce economic inequality
• Make government more accountable to the public

Civic Tech is related to the concept of Smart Cities, which we’ll go into next.

Smart cities

Technology can be used to address some of the problems associated with living in an urban area. Many governments are trying to utilise the benefits of technology to improve their city planning and reduce costs.

Smart City technology can help citizens to:

• Navigate their way through a city
• Tackle overcrowding
• Reduce long-term carbon emissions
• Improve traffic flow
• Improve health (eg by encouraging people to cycle)
• Support ageing populations

The result of smart use of technology in cities is increased economic productivity, lower healthcare costs, and better well-being for urban inhabitants. A key goal of Smart Cities is to ensure a greener future by using technology to reduce waste and increase efficiency.

Manchester Digital Development agency (a former department of Manchester City Council) says:

“a ‘smart city’ means ‘smart citizens’ – where citizens have all the information they need to make informed choices about their lifestyle, work and travel options.”

Many cities in the UK are becoming Smart Cities. The government launched Future Cities Catapult to help cities advance urban innovation.

For example, Manchester’s Smart City Programme aims to understand and optimise their existing city systems using technology. Bristol is Open is developing an ‘open programmable city’.

London’s Smart London Plan is a collaboration between business, academia and government which aims to bring people, technology and data together to solve London’s challenges.

The world’s smartest city is arguably Singapore, which monitors almost every aspect of its city with its large number of sensors. This generates a huge amount of data that can be analysed, collected by a program called Virtual Singapore, and used to improve city management.

Open data

Open data is crucial to achieving the objectives of civic tech and Smart Cities. Uber releasing their traffic flow data to the public in early 2017 on their website Movement means that city planners and researchers can gain more insight into urban traffic flows.

The London Datastore is an open data platform containing 700 datasets that has enabled the creation of 450 transport apps.

Crossover between Civic Tech and Smart Cities

Both areas of technology are naturally directed by government policies and local council participation. Civic Tech generally addresses the priorities of government, whereas Smart Cities are focused on the needs of individuals living in urban areas.

Smart Cities are driven by the private sector, whereas Civic Tech is exclusively the domain of government, nonprofit and citizens.

Barriers to Civic Tech and Smart Cities

The use of high technology demands familiarity with computers and in many cases requires the use of a tablet or smartphone. This could exclude people from low-income backgrounds without access to these kinds of technologies. Worries of rising social inequality hold back some initiatives.

Issues of data privacy and security also come into play as citizens worry about who has access to their data, or councils must guard against data breaches.

The UK is behind other countries in Europe when it comes to Smart Cities and the adoption of new technologies can only grow if there is the ecosystem to support it. It also requires cross-departmental collaboration within government, to share knowledge and data, and work towards shared objectives, something that has historically been hard to achieve.

Budget cuts are a barrier to pioneering new technologies and focus falls on maintaining essential services, even if innovation is badly needed. Many services, such as rail and bus, are privatised, meaning the implementation of new technologies requires the buy-in of private companies.

In Greater Manchester alone, there are 66 private bus companies, all of which had to agree to using the new smart ticketing system.

Final remarks

There are many technologies that have already revolutionised the way we live, work and play. Travel has been completed disrupted by ride-hailing mega company Uber. Travelling and navigating is easier than ever with Google Maps, City Mapper, and many other travel apps.

This demonstrates the enormous potential for Smart Cities if different stakeholders can align towards a common goal. A coordinated vision will be key to the growth of both Smart City and Civic Tech.

Both of these industries require the collaboration and participation of the many, and will benefit from more people truly understanding their potential and impact.

“We have to move towards automated testing really, really quick!”

In the early days of our adoption of automated testing, this was the clarion call that rang within Arrk that got us starting a program in earnest. This story explains how we went about making a success of it.

Some time ago, as with many organisations, Arrk Group’s main testing focus was on manual activities. However, we quickly realised the benefits of automating areas where automated functional testing would provide significant advantages.

To break down the wall between manual and automated testers, we set-off with a transformation programme called ‘Manual2Auto’ which covered structured training, self-learning, collaborating and climaxing towards teams delivering mini-projects. At Arrk, experiential learning forms the core of any programme which is catalysed by challenging goals to extract the best from the individuals and teams.

The big mission upfront for all testers was to “learn to code” or even “don’t fear to code”. We were aware that not all testers like to code or they became testers in the first place because they did not want to code. This mindset needed to be both understood and corrected if Manual2Auto had to succeed. When the program was rolled out, we carefully reasoned that given the demands of the time, the aversion to programming/scripting or being misfits would not only impact Arrk but also hurt the tester cause. We allegorically urged them to discard the saw in favour of a chainsaw. The testers saw it and understood that learning to be friendly with Java was way better than being a relic in the testing museum.

We started the program by reviewing the composition of the team, mindset, and technical competence levels, to ensure the transition to automation competent test engineers. We customised the Dreyfus Model to create our own categorisation levels for test automation. We set Manual2Auto goals for the team to move up the chain. We used gamification to get the competitive juices flowing along with the lure of rewards for the high-achievers.

We had the team divided into focus groups for two languages which are commonly used across projects at Arrk; Java and Ruby. We formed a dedicated trainer group comprising champion testers (having sound technical knowledge) and the Guruji Group (comprising passionate senior development personnel willing to impart technical skills within testers). The Champions and the Guruji’s conducted several sessions on pseudo-code programming, OOPs concepts and language specific aspects. These sessions required the team to invest in self-study, assignments and presentations.

Formal in-depth training was also conducted on Java and Ruby by external expert trainers. The Guruji Group played a pivotal role in customising the training content and in the selection of the trainers. Both the internal and external training were followed by tests to evaluate the progress in the respective learning groups. These tests amply communicated to the testers where each one stood individually and vis-à-vis the automation objectives. The scores were never intended nor used to beat up anyone. We had a periodic catch-up and pep-talk sessions to inform and focus the team. We made use of the gamification points ranks to highlight the stand-out performers from the rest.

After the success of Phase-1, we started Phase-2 with gusto intended to consolidate and implement the learning and skills acquired. We formed multiple work-streams for the purpose. All the work streams had reasonably steep testing-come-technical objectives, to assuage project demands/problems and serve future needs. For example, we formed work streams focused on:

• Designing automation approach for a multilingual website
• Optimising a very large but bloated automation suite
• Developing a mobile automation framework
• Presenting Groovy’s capabilities
• Demonstrating capabilities on security testing e.g. OWASP, tools
• Development of a mobile app to track happiness quotient of Arrkitects

The mini-projects symbolised a rallying conscience call for the tester-teams to achieve what they had never thought they will be involved with, leave alone achieve given that these were technical work-streams and most were resigned to think they will be manual testers for the rest of their lives. But the initiative took root and spread, quite rapidly. The testers conferred with the technical experts about database design, technical nuances, got them to review code and so on. The techies were only keen to help since the testers were, for a change, interacting on a level playing field. The blossoming interactions indirectly helped the relationships as well and mutual respect got strengthened along the way.

The work-streams were demonstrated to an audience comprising the testers, senior management and the Guruji Groups. The show-and-tell sessions were well-received and applauses filled the room at times. The mood was infectious, the feeling upbeat. Many testers were now well and truly on their way to being technical, quietly confident how to use a tool or a script to produce results faster and better.

Two Significant take-away’s from the Manual2Auto program

Khushi Mobile App – Testers turn developers

Khushi literally means happiness. Khushi Android app (iOS app in the works) is designed to pulse-check the happiness quotient of Arrk employees. Easy-to-use and administer, the app determines overall happiness and that in itself represents a significant input for Arrk. The mobile app may have been built by a few testers but is really a shining beacon to all Arrk testers of what can be achieved if you put your mind to it.

JavaScript Testing Framework

The work-stream was aimed towards study and analysis of open-source Javascript-based testing tools and frameworks. After detailed analysis, a framework was created based on Protractor (AngularJS framework) and Jasmine. The framework enabled quick functional and UI testing of Angular and non-Angular applications. The proof-of-concept done on an existing project established the fact that the framework indeed enabled quick automation.

Manual2Auto represented a breakthrough journey for testers befriending the machine more than they were used to. It provided an impetus for testers’ first-hand realisation of the benefits of technical learning and the outcomes they can help generate. At another level, many testers also demolished a few demons in their minds to transform themselves into more confident, superior, efficient beings. We would call Manual2Auto a successful initiative but the joy of learning will carry on.

Open APIs have been increasing in popularity as the nature of the web changes. Web-based applications have become more integrated with one another, as users expect an increasingly connected experience.

As the software market becomes more crowded, applications have become increasingly specialised in order to compete with one another.

What are APIs?

APIs are the keys that allow your apps to talk to each other. To understand what an API is, you have to bear in mind that all web apps can be made by any number of different companies, all with their own way of doing things.

On top of that, most companies keep their source code a secret, ostensibly as a way of protecting their intellectual property. APIs are a way of allowing other developers to work with your software without opening up your source code.

Fewer and fewer vendors are providing all the technologies needed for the operations in a single business, as in the heyday of Microsoft. Companies are increasingly using cloud-based microservices for their core IT.

APIs allow apps to integrate with one another for increased power. Compounded with the rise in SaaS (Software as a Service), there is a growing market for developers who can create third-party applications that integrate with existing platforms.

Sometimes also called ‘public’ APIs, open APIs contrast private APIs in that they are somewhat freely available to anyone who wants to use them.

When are APIs open?

APIs are considered open when they have these characteristics:

• They are freely available for any developer to use (although they may be vetted to prevent fraud or keep out direct competitors)
• They might be supported by open data (access to customer data)
• They are based on an open standard (documentation containing guidelines on how a particular piece of software is to be used or distributed)

In contrast to private APIs, which are only for the use of internal developers inside a company, open APIs encourage rapid development and data sharing.

Open APIs are created in the spirit of collaboration and sharing, under the belief that open software business models are the future.

Companies using open APIs

Many companies have found success using the power of open APIs to integrate with other platforms.

Facebook has its own API, just like many other social media sites. When you see users commenting on a blog using their Facebook accounts, this is Facebook’s API in use on that site.

Google’s APIs enable widespread use of its products across other sites and applications. For example, when you see a Google map embedded on a company website, they are making use of the Google Maps API.

The rise of Software as a Service (SaaS) has led to entire companies emerging that depend on developers using their SaaS.

For example, Stripe is a payment processing platform that performs it’s one function extraordinarily well and is monetized using a freemium model. This means that lightweight users can use the platform for free, but larger organisations must pay for their subscription. It successfully uses an API to integrate with other apps and platforms.

Benefits of open APIs

Before, when building an application, developers usually had to build everything from scratch.

Now, it’s much quicker to integrate your product with a third-party application to vastly reduce the time to it takes to get it to market.

Open APIs enable companies to increase their revenue without investing in additional resources. Small companies can vastly boost their software’s functionality by using the power of larger companies’ software.

APIs are especially useful for a company’s core IT infrastructure since no one wants to use their technology in silos. If you’re using a customer database provided by one vendor, you want it to integrate seamlessly and effortless with your email marketing platform sold by another. No one should have to manually move the data over in a spreadsheet.

As companies make more use of open APIs, developers are able to search lists like the ones provided by ProgrammableWeb to find APIs they want to integrate. There is a booming API industry with many supporting products and services available.

Downsides of using open APIs

There are potential security risks involved in opening your code and data to external parties. You also have no control over the user experience of third party clients using your application.

If you’re a developer, it’s important to remember that APIs will be released under certain licences which you will need to comply with, and it can get complicated.

Even more importantly, if you’re using open APIs that come packaged with open data, you’ll also need to comply with these licences.

Do your homework before committing to using an API. If a company decides to change the terms under which their API can be used, developers who have already built software and want to continue using these APIs will have no choice but to comply.

Closing remarks

Open APIs enable developers to build complex software solutions without reinventing the wheel every time. They allow some startup software companies to achieve explosive growth without having to invest all of their own resources in developing their products.

They are in keeping with the free and open web, making companies more collaborative rather than competitive.

The usage of open APIs is here to stay, but developers and founders should think twice before basing their whole business model on using other companies’ APIs. The privilege to do so could be revoked at any time.

Many businesses will be affected by PSD2 (Revised Payment Service Directive) coming into force in 2018. It has huge potential to impact the banking sector and signals new growth for payment services.

Despite uncertainty due to the UK’s decision to leave the European Union, companies should still comply with the upcoming changes to regulations.

What is PSD2?

It’s the second iteration of the Payment Services Directive (PSD) implemented by the European Union. It affects both individual consumers and businesses, and is set to revolutionise the way we make payments online.

The PSD was adopted in 2007 to create a single market for payments. The idea was to create a more unified payment market in Europe. Adoption of digital payments has advanced steadily since then and is outside the scope of PSD.

Hence, PSD2 was born. It was implemented in 2015 and will come into force in January 2018. Businesses must comply by then.

Introduction to the PSD2 framework

PSD2  is a wide-ranging directive, covering 117 Articles including mandatory encryption and strict controls on merchant charges for transactions, but a significant part is Article 29 – Access to Accounts (XS2A). This opens up consumers’ account information to third parties. These third parties can offer payment services but they won’t have to be banks.

PSD2 opens up consumers’ account information to third parties. These third parties can offer payment services but they won’t have to be banks.

Merchants (such as Amazon) will be able to take payments from your bank account without using an intermediary like Visa or PayPal. They will access your bank account directly from your bank using an API (Application Programming Interface).

Here is a list of players who have been defined in the PSD and PSD2:

Credit Institutions – Banks

Payment Institutions – They can offer several payment services.

Third Party Payment Service Providers (TPP) – Don’t hold bank accounts so offer limited range of services.

Account Servicing Payment Service Providers (ASPSP) – Provide and maintain payment accounts for consumers.

Account Information Service Providers (AISP) – Bring together multiple payment accounts.

Payment Information Service Providers (PISP) – Enable the use of online banking to make payments.

XS2A Impact on banking

For a long time, incumbent banks have had the monopoly on payment services. Before PSD2, banks have had to authorise payments for account holders.

Now, free-market competition will be introduced to the payment services market. This creates new opportunities for third party services to create online payment products.

Also, banks and brokers can currently profit from offering poor exchange rates for consumers. PSD2 aims to prohibit non-transparent pricing methods in transferring money abroad.

Potential of XS2A for consumers

Right now, consumers plump for outdated online payment technology that seems better adapted to the needs of traditional institutions than users.

Banks will be obliged to open up their IT systems to third parties making payments on behalf of account holders. They must also be prepared to provide a consolidated real-time view of a user’s account statements.

For example, if you have bank accounts with more than one bank, you will be able to see your account information in one place.

With PSD2, consumers can become the focus of financial services. We’ll see improvements to the piecemeal way consumers currently manage their finances.

How banks could reposition themselves

The intense popularity of fintech is one indication that the industry is ripe for disruption. Many banks have slowly started to respond to the fact that consumers are dissatisfied with their services.

Companies such as the UK’s first mobile bank Atom Bank, and competitor Monzo, are digital financial services that have gained great popularity. With PSD2, true disruption is becoming more of a real possibility.

Banks have to comply with very strict regulations, which is one barrier that prohibits their innovation. To overcome this, some banks have already been scrambling to invest in fintech startups, and three of the largest fintech investors are international banks.

Advantages

Businesses need to get ready for the changes coming into force with PSD2, and the huge opportunities for breaking into the payment services market. PSD2 should help to level the playing field and present more opportunities for innovation.

Startups have the advantage of being able to adopt disruptive new business models and move very quickly. Forward-thinking entrepreneurs will jump on this chance to make a profit.

Existing businesses can modify their service offering and take advantage of their brand name to quickly gain the trust of consumers looking for new payment services.

Consumers can get ready for a slew of new products and services that make managing their finances and buying online much easier.

Disadvantages

New financial technologies often suffer from a slow uptake due to fears about security. Security is a valid concern.

Online transactions will require more security checks than we generally have now. Payment authentication is likely to require a combination of password or PIN, bank card, and/or fingerprint or voice recognition.

The reality is that most consumers are probably using services outside their normal bank without realising, such as PayPal. Consumers will need to switch on to the reality of online payment services, since those who don’t may get left behind.

Takeaways

All the new terms can be a little overwhelming. The core message to take away from PSD2 is that the online payments market is becoming more unified.

Some of the power is being wrested away from banks and placed back into the hands of the consumer. This spells good news for individuals and businesses.

It’s an exciting time for fintech. Startups and other businesses will compete to offer a new breed of financial services and products, following on from first movers like Monzo, and Mint in the US. Incumbents will be looking to invest these new businesses.

Bringing the omnichannel into the supply chain

The first rule of retail has always been that “the customer comes first” – however, that statement has rarely been truer than it is now. With so many retail options available, the customer has truly gained power – if they don’t like your service they can not only find other options quickly and easily, but voice their dissatisfaction loud and clear on the internet. Personalisation has become increasingly important as retailers look to appeal to consumers individually because they know there are so many choices out there that the “one size fits all” approach rarely works any more.

In an effort to stay relevant to consumers, therefore, businesses are increasingly turning to the so-called omnichannel – a cross-channel business model that can be used to enhance customer experience. In this guide we take a look at how the omnichannel works, and why it’s become increasingly important to integrate it into the supply chain, as well as other aspects of the business.

Where does the omnichannel idea originate from?

The origins of the omnichannel in retail date back to 2003 when Best Buy used customer centricity in an effort to compete with Walmart’s electronics department. Its approach centred on the customer both online and in-store, with the firm also offering post-sales support.

Effectively, Best Buy was integrating its physical and digital channels to offer a better customer experience – and it is this concept that is the heart of the omnichannel theory. The customer has started to dictate how transactions occur, and so to keep up, businesses must create integrated services that will facilitate the customer journey and make it easier for them to transact.

So the basis of omnichannel is that there should be a consistent shopping experience across all sectors with complete visibility and a unified path towards purchase.  To make the most of it, companies have to ensure there is clear visibility between how products are sold from manufacturer through to retailer.

How the omnichannel theory is being implemented

The concept of the omnichannel has already found its way into many different forms of business, including:

Finance

With the explosion of digital banking, omnichannel banking developed to include individualising channels and marketing for customers.

Government

Believe it or not, the US Government is actually using omnichannel as an approach with customer-centric shared platforms. Through the omnichannel, citizens are able to communicate using the platform they choose, when they want.

Retail

Perhaps there is no other area making better use of the omnichannel than retail, which utilises a variety of channels to research consumers even before they buy. Companies are integrating digital, mobile, telephone sales and more to transact and interact with consumers. According to EY research, omnichannel is making a significant impact on retail: omnichannel initiatives are increasingly important with bricks-and-mortar revenues likely to fall down from 93% to 81% of revenues in the next five years.

The area that businesses are overlooking…the supply chain

According to the same EY research, omnichannel represents the most significant growth opportunity available for the retail industry. Its survey found that 88% believe that consumer goods firms cannot rely solely on traditional channels for growth – and the supply chain is one key area that needs to be addressed.

Traditionally, supply chains were designed to bring goods to stores, but in an omnichannel world they have become increasingly customer-facing. Today the supply chain is a front office and plays a vital role in determining whether or not the consumer enjoys their experience.

So what can be done to improve the supply chain?

Any successful omnichannel strategy starts with knowing what consumers want and how these needs are changing. Think about what they really value in the supply chain – such as accurate delivery times – and delivering them. It’s no longer just about being efficient, it’s about being responsive too.

Balance efficiency with agility

While many consumers want next day delivery, most just want their order fulfilled accurately. Speed of delivery requires cost and you must always be aware of changes in consumer behaviour, such as cyclical shrinking in demand, or volatile purchase peaks. As such, it becomes vital to know your customer to know how to serve them and balance efficiency with agility.

Supply chain mix

EY suggests there are two broad models in fulfilling online orders. One is to leverage a store network and fulfil orders from the store, which requires less capital and can lead to greater efficiency; and the second is to establish a warehouse, which can be more expensive but also give you the chance to offer consumers a greater range and better customer service. It suggests that choosing the right mix for your business is key – and that it is quite possible a combination of the two will be preferable, with long tail items in centralised warehouses, while products that typically move quickly would be housed locally.

 What inventory to stock

Another key consideration is what you should stock and where – think about the level of stock kept in store compared to that held back to be available online. Getting it wrong can disappoint customers so think strategically, assess growth opportunities and the potential to expand profit margin and adjust your strategy accordingly.

Think about tomorrow

When assessing the omnichannel supply chain, think about tomorrow and not just today. New services like “click and collect” are emerging all the time, while some companies are focusing on same day delivery rather than next day – so you will need to have the agility to adapt to new market requirements.

Make sure you stay one step ahead by exploring emerging concepts as early as possible – and assessing which ones are likely to impact your business. As with all aspects of the omnichannel, you will need a structured and strategic approach supported by all aspects of the business to thrive and prosper.