70% firms see half of their workforce going digital post pandemic

As organisations move away from physical locations and remote workforce is the new normal, more than 70 per cent organizations feel at least half of their workforce will be digital workers post Covid-19, according to a new survey.

One in four organisations expect that more than 80 per cent of their workforce to be a digital workforce in the world after Covid-19, said the survey by Automation Anywhere, a global leader in Robotic Process Automation (RPA).

“The pandemic has encouraged a new wave of digitisation that will revolutionise our life as we know it. The organisations are transforming their engagements with customers, employees, suppliers and other stakeholders and will leverage the current crisis as an opportunity to drive innovative digital models to gain increased efficiencies,” explained Milan Sheth, Executive Vice President of IMEA, Automation Anywhere.

The research surveyed more than 5,000 senior executives from mid-sized to large organizations in over 20 countries across India, the Middle East and emerging markets in Africa and Southeast Asia.

It found that more than 80 per cent plan to invest in digital technologies to build resilience in their future business plans. The survey indicated that 57 per cent of respondents aim to acquire skills in RPA and AI in the post COVID-19 world, followed by 28 per cent being reskilled in analytics and 15 per cent in machine learning.

These trends are seen across key industries, such as banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI), global capability centers (GCCs) and pharma, healthcare and life sciences.

“While certain sectors like manufacturing, travel and retail have been hardest hit by the pandemic, they remain optimistic and are seeking new, digital technologies to understand customer behavior and drive new models for engaging them as the crisis ends,” the findings showed.