TECHNOLOGY & HUMANITY

The empowerment of the individual has radically changed through how we access and utilise technology. Consider, for instance, just the way and how we now watch television. The broader picture of technological development is no longer a take-it-or-leave-it template, but a bespoke service tailored to the individual.

Earlier television broadcasts were carefully scripted and delivered to present a highly curated programme, forcing us not to only share the same worldview, but also to watch on the terms being offered by the programme makers’.

The evolution of video fundamentally changed both our view of the world and how we interact with it. In less than a century, we’ve moved to an online and digital world with billions of viewpoints, coming from governments and businesses and more importantly from people. Everyone offers a unique perspective; and, we now have a truly live culture where technologies like Periscope and Facebook Live mean that anyone can broadcast what they want and tune in when they want – on their own terms.

This illustrates that the way we use technology today is to bend it to our own needs. Change may be endemic, but the key point is that the individual is now in control. It’s no longer the case that people are adapting to technology – rather, the technology is continuing to evolve and adapt to us.

The situation now is that every time an experience is personalised, or where technology anticipates our needs and wants, we are being thrusted forefront to realise or satisfy those needs. In terms of digital evolution, this is the age of human empowerment and it matters to business. With technology that truly responds to people, based on what they want, firms can evolve from being a supplier to one of being their customers’ partner.

IntelligentX, a London-based Brewing Company, has developed an Artificial Intelligence (AI) system to continuously collect and incorporate customer feedback. It utilises this information by incorporating it into its thinking to brew new versions of the company’s beers. The firm provides feedback into its algorithms: with people’s tastes changing faster than ever before, AI seems a logical and perfect way to respond.

This is how businesses will grow their role in people’s lives, and by establishing a place in the future of society. They need to become more than just a provider of products and services.

We might like to refer to it as the hyper-personalisation of technology. It is likely to drive commercial success at the scale of entire industries, not just at the individual or micro level. The digital leaders of the world, proactive as always, are making big calls in response.

Consider Electronics giant Philips. It is looking to transform healthcare into one that becomes connected, with a comprehensive experience that’s both intertwined and accessible throughout people’s lives. Through the development of new apps and connected devices that integrate into our lives, it will become possible for health professionals to live alongside each patient. This will allow them to build a closer, more personal relationship, and an opportunity to provide comprehensive – not just reactive – care packages.

Paradoxically, for patients, connected healthcare isn’t an improvement because of the technology itself. The draw is the empowerment it gives individuals over their own health – you only need to consider how wearable technologies are driving a tailored approach to personal fitness programmes.

Company conglomerates like Philips have the leading edge because their technological strategies focuses on the needs of the individual patient, and on their terms.

If any business is to become a true partner to people that process must start with technology. No doubt, the path ahead will have its challenges. But the foundations are built on matters of trust.

Yet, barely one in two members of the public say they trust businesses to do what’s right. Even fewer look on business leaders as credible sources of information. If people are to value these new partnerships, companies must work hard to gain and by keeping that trust.

One of the best ways of doing this is by putting the power in the hands of the customers. That can be achieved by designing technology that works for them. This will mean an end to technology tools whose power is only unleashed when customers adapt to or in learning how to use them.

Technology’s great new strength lies in its growing humanity. Tools that interact with people – structured in such a way that they learn from those exchanges – should be able to adapt for any future interaction that makes the experience of using them all the more human.

To put these new adaptive technologies to use, businesses must adopt people’s goals as their own. Technology is now crucially the agent of change and it should be enabled to empower people in an interactive and collaborative way.

When companies are aligned to people’s individual goals and aspirations, only then will they be contributing to the growth of society and the economy.

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