Technology is all around us these days, and it’s hard to ignore its impact on various areas of our lives. Business is, without doubt, one of the fields that have benefited the most from recent technological advancements, and in fact, many areas of business have seen significant growth in the last few decades primarily due to this reason. The traditional professional services such as business consulting, training and recruiting will likely be radically different in ten years. Changing clients demands, employee expectations, rapid technology developments, and other external factors will change the nature of doing business in the future. Ultimately, these factors, with technology in the lead, may even challenge the very nature of the “practical expertise” that professionals usually deliver.
Many industries and business models are at risk of being disrupted due to rapid technological developments, enabling new business models, replacing old distribution channels and changing the way people and businesses interact with each other. Professional services especially consulting have so far not been highly impacted by these technology developments, but all signs are there that real change is coming and that the industry is at the gates of a digital transformation process. My idea to create an online platform emerged as a result of these changes that businesses environment is going through. Along with these changes, my research agenda was changed several times during this process. In the beginning, I thought that this could be impossible and I did not make any sense but after a few discussions with my colleagues I realized that only through technology this idea can be a reality. The goal is to help international entrepreneurs to test their ideas and guide them on how to do business in foreign countries. moreover, the online platform will offer consulting services and information based on the criteria that are chosen by the customer. Every customer has the option to choose the country, product, and market in order to test its product or service at a very affordable price. Online consulting is a new way of offering business consulting services and it is growing rapidly. However, some parts of the consulting industry may also benefit from this disruption age. As a result of the disruption, clients are rethinking their own purpose and business models. Therefore, there will be an increased demand for technology-based strategy consulting and this will likely go hand-in-hand with new parties entering into strategy consulting.
Historically, the business consulting industry itself has shown a slow pace of implementing and adapting to technology changes while their clients and the rest of the world have shown to be less restrained. So, at some point, the industry needs to catch up on these developments. Technology and artificial intelligence will both be a substitute and complement for certain professional services and the impact will likely be more dramatic than anticipated. Highly complex tasks and processes will be simplified through technology; analyzing and research processes will be impacted; the use of all types of knowledge platforms, crowdsourcing models and knowledge sharing models will be common practice. The needs of clients will also change and combined with the technology revolution it could be one of the main drivers that affect the way in which professional services will be delivered in the future. Clients will increasingly use technology and automation for obtaining services and knowledge. This can be in the form of marketplaces for services, via knowledge sharing and crowdsourcing models or via virtual advisors backed by technology and artificial intelligence.
Cascio, Wayne & Montealegre, Ramiro. (2016). How Technology Is Changing Work and Organizations. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior. 3. 349-375. 10.1146/annurev-orgpsych-041015-062352.
Cavalcante, Sergio. (2013). Understanding the impact of technology on firms' business models. European Journal of Innovation Management. 16. 285-300. 10.1108/EJIM-10-2011-0085.
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