May 2020
Hasn't the world changed this year? An article discussing trends for 2020, published five months into the new year may seem like a stretch; but this article's message needed an adjustment to align with the current market.
So, without further delay; our second trend for 2020 is the Adoption of Technology. As technology continues to relentlessly drive change, organisations that already have innovation entrenched within their culture can be nimble and adapt easily to change. These organisations will flourish in 2020 and leave a lasting legacy. Considering recent events, this could not be more relevant.
To define why the AEC industry needs to adopt new technologies, let's start with what technologies our industry has adopted in the past.
Society has progressed through an industrial revolution with three key periods until now. The first period saw the invention of the steam engine and this started the urbanisation of our world, with manufacturing factories, railroads and steamships in the 18th and 19th centuries. Things started to speed up by the late 19th century with advancements in science, such as gasoline engines, air planes, chemical fertiliser, electric lighting, radio, and telephones. All these inventions helped us to ‘go faster’ and produce more. Beginning in the 1950s, the third industrial revolution brought semiconductors, mainframe computing, personal computing and the Internet — the digital revolution.
Analogue moved to digital technologies. Engineering plans which were produced by hand with pencils, ink and tracing paper on an easel transitioned to being produced by Computer Aided Design (CAD). This enabled technicians to produce a digital replica of an engineering plan prior to publishing on paper.
When drawing by hand, a mistake needed to be 'scraped' off the paper using a scalpel. If the mistake was beyond a scrape, then it was a complete re-draw. Are you starting to see the benefit of the digital revolution? How much time is wasted when you m, when all you need to do is 'hit the undo button'? The CAD transition for our industry was not instant, the first version of AutoCAD was published in 1982. But once adopted, organisations realised this had time saving benefit, thus leading to an increase in their production capacity.
Each of these revolutions represented profound changes to society. Most recently, the digital revolution altered nearly every industry, including AEC; transforming how people live, work, and communicate. Technologies are emerging and affecting our lives in ways that indicate we are at the beginning of the fourth industrial revolution. A new era that builds upon and extends the impact of the digital revolution in new and unanticipated ways. This revolution will see the rise of entirely new ways in which technology becomes embedded within society.
Think artificial intelligence, machine learning, miniaturised sensors, digital twin, 3D printing, autonomy, 5G, Starlink, edge computing, robotics and blockchain. The complexity of these technologies and their emergent nature makes many aspects of the fourth industrial revolution feel unfamiliar and, to many, threatening.
But, is our industry ready to take advantage of these quantum leaps in technological advancement? The graph below represents previous trends in technology adoption during the digital revolution in the AEC industry. It compares awareness and usage across multiple technology trends. Building Information Modelling (BIM) is a common term in our industry that has been around for two decades. BIM promised increased productivity and reduced life-cycle costs. It highlighted the need for sharing digital information in a common data environment to provide insights and tools to more efficiently plan, design, construct, operate and maintain infrastructure. Have we seen the benefits of this technology yet? Maybe more so in some sectors and less in others. What is worrying, since the creation of BIM, productivity growth in the AEC industry has averaged only 1 percent a year compared with growth of 3.6 percent in manufacturing.
The last few months has seen unprecedented change in how the world operates and we have all seen changes across all aspects of life. Regardless of what stage of adoption businesses are at, there has been a significant spike in companies adopting new technologies. Isn't it amazing what you can achieve with a survival instinct? Looking at an example, Optus experienced an increased use of collaboration apps on their network between February and March this year, with Zoom experiencing a 1,125% spike, Webex 560%, and Microsoft Teams 108%.
Microsoft Australia national technology officer Lee Hickin identified that 57% of meetings in Teams in Australia now include video content, while the usage of Windows Virtual Desktop has grown three-fold worldwide. "At the same time as we are helping our customers get their employees set up to work remotely, we are working with many of them to rapidly build and develop completely new applications for their customers – helping businesses pivot to find fresh ways to create revenue and keep afloat," Hickin said.
Similarly, ServiceNow ANZ Vice President and managing director David Oakley reports that, as a result of the crisis, there has been a dramatic shift in how organisations prioritise technology to help maintain the continuity of existing business functions. "Businesses that have established technology foundations are looking to innovate faster to meet demand. Digital workflows are already being used to manage resources, action customer service requests, and support employee work processes. Across more traditional industries, organisations are looking at digital workflows in two ways: to digitally reinvent the way consumers access products and services; and to help make work better for employees who are adjusting to new ways of working," (Oakley. D, 2020. (ZDnet)).
Although most AEC companies understand the importance of technology adoption, many are overwhelmed by the idea of having to revamp their entire digital approach and flounder without knowing how to implement a transformation. But they also realise that if they do not do anything, they run the risk of being disrupted or replaced.
The goal of a digital transformation is to use technology to solve traditional problems. Our 'traditional problem' is our poor productivity growth. The need to adopt technology has not been greater. Successful digital transformations prior to the global pandemic of 2020 could differentiate companies from one another. However, considering the current market climate, the adoption of technology will now be a matter of survival.
After reading this article, I’m sure you will now agree that as technology continues to relentlessly drive change, organisations that already have innovation entrenched within their culture can be nimble and adapt easily to change. These organisations will flourish in 2020 and leave a lasting legacy. Only if early adoption of technological advancements is embraced quickly and efficiently.
A true digital transformation is a state of mind. For a company to continually evolve and adopt new digital solutions internally and externally is an exciting challenge. Adoption of new technologies doesn’t have to be overwhelming. It’s not something to check off a list, but instead a mindset that becomes part of the organization’s culture and experience. AEC companies that have this culture will flourish in 2020 to leave a lasting legacy.
How is your company positioned to respond to the new challenges facing our industry?
