{"id":45059,"date":"2021-08-24T15:47:17","date_gmt":"2021-08-24T07:47:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/?p=45059"},"modified":"2021-08-24T15:47:23","modified_gmt":"2021-08-24T07:47:23","slug":"pldt-urges-businesses-to-rethink-strategies-to-survive-in-now-normal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/2021\/08\/24\/pldt-urges-businesses-to-rethink-strategies-to-survive-in-now-normal\/","title":{"rendered":"PLDT urges businesses to rethink strategies to survive in ‘now normal’"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

PLDT urged businesses to rethink their strategies and re-examine their approaches to cope with the long-drawn-out pandemic.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the online broadcast of the Asia\u00a0Tech\u00a0Forum\u00a02021, PLDT Vice President and Head of ICT Business Nico Alcoseba cited key factors, helping companies thrive.\u00a0He\u00a0cited\u00a0a study released by McKinsey on \u201cthrough-cycle outperformers,\u201d where\u00a0thriving\u00a0companies that invested in critical capabilities enabled them to shift to\u00a0digital operations.\u00a0 Alcoseba emphasized three key aspects for a business outcome-led and technology-enabled strategy to better survive the economic environment:

Contactless is the Now Normal<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAs we put our customers at the center of how we transform our businesses, building customer experience with a \u201ccontactless\u201d mindset takes into consideration consumer personas that have emerged from this past year,\u201d he shared.
\u00a0
Citing a Deloitte study, he listed four varying\u00a0personas\u00a0of the new kind of customer\u00a0emerging\u00a0from this crisis.

The\u00a0\u2018Shut-In Shoppers\u2019\u00a0do their transactions online expecting fast delivery of goods and remote activation of services with a great value for their money mind-set, while\u00a0\u2018Touchless Store Experiencers\u2019\u00a0will still want an immersive in-store experience,\u00a0but devoid of human interaction.

Then there are the\u00a0\u2018Drive-through Customers\u2019\u00a0who value speed and simplicity and prefer short purchase journeys, while\u00a0\u2018Virtual Patrons\u2019\u00a0are the most sophisticated\u00a0as they are willing to pay for\u00a0brands that help them live virtual experiences without having to leave their homes.

\u201cThe key is choosing which personas we would like to target and then creating new unique value propositions for these customers,\u201d he added.

Businesses need to get \u2018Phygital\u2019<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alcoseba pointed out how “contactless” has gone beyond digital payments, delving into hybrid operations. He said\u00a0businesses are migrating\u00a0from \u201cbrick-and-mortar\u201d to \u201cbricks-and-clicks\u201d, a combination of Physical and Digital, or \u201cPhy-gital.\u201d \u00a0

First, businesses\u00a0have to\u00a0understand customer personas and tailor experiences for them.\u00a0 In looking at new business strategies, operational processes, and technology investments, customer behavior shifts are the main drivers of transformation.\u00a0

Second, businesses need to tie all ends\u00a0from\u00a0front-end,\u00a0back-end, and far-end for a seamless experience. One of the results of the digital shift\u00a0is\u00a0that customers now expect experiences that are immediate.

Therefore, the importance of tying-in the front-end customer touchpoints, back-end operations infrastructure, and far-end partner ecosystem is key to make this experience\u00a0a\u00a0positive one \u2013 especially as business scales.

Lastly,\u00a0businesses must\u00a0invest in core capability and divest of periphery activities.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAs the economy re-opens and our customers begin to feel safer going out of their homes, they will be looking for experiences that combine the efficiency, immediacy and safety of digital with the certainty, immersiveness, and connectedness of physical,\u201d shares Alcoseba.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Imperatives to thriving in this new business environment<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

New ways of thinking, new ways of working, and new ways of operating\u00a0are all\u00a0underpinned by strong digital technology enablement.\u00a0 This also means digital systems become central to operations, and\u00a0resilience emerges front-and-center in\u00a0the strategic agenda.

Alcoseba cites\u00a0four\u00a0principles that constitute best-practice in resilience:

For peace of mind that your business will continue to run, put mission-critical applications in mission-critical infrastructure.

To keep up and adapt to changes, build-in agility into operations.

To better serve customers with improving manual processes in the value chain, automate processes for scale.\u00a0

And most\u00a0important\u00a0is to protect the perimeter-less environment.

This new-found virtual ground also equates to a larger surface area of vulnerability, and if inadequately protected, the risk of a cyberattack and data breach becomes more apparent. Attackers constantly evolve their tactics to compromise systems, and they exploit\u00a0the\u00a0weakest link – the human element.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0

\u201cIn order to effectively protect this perimeter-less environment, a company must execute a multi-layered approach to cybersecurity which is enabled by a holistic framework that covers prediction, prevention, detection, and response,\u201d he added.

Alcoseba stresses\u00a0how important companies should invest in cybersecurity knowing that\u00a0\u201cevery company has one employee that will click on anything.\u201d

This initiative to help enable businesses to thrive in the \u201cnew normal\u201d falls under PLDT’s group-wide commitment to Awesome Customer Experience and Quality of Service, one of the seven pillars that comprise the company’s sustainability framework. PLDT and Smart\u2019s relentless push to enable and empower businesses with technology and connectivity is also aligned with the group\u2019s long-standing commitment to help the Philippines attain the UN\u2019s Sustainable Development Goals, particularly SDG #9: Industry, Innovation, and Infrastructure.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

PLDT urged businesses to rethink their strategies and re-examine their approaches to cope with the long-drawn-out pandemic.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":45060,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[379,96,2727,1656],"class_list":["post-45059","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","tag-pldt","tag-technology","tag-technology-adaption","tag-technology-investment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45059","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45059"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45059\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45060"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45059"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45059"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45059"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}