After the last PSD2 topic, I tried to lead my thoughts towards an easier topic. However, I came to the realization that I would like to write about such topics that make me passionate. May it be positive or negative.
Nowadays we hear words such as fintech, innovation, blockchain, insurtech (no worries it’s brand new) a lot. But let’s take a peek behind the curtain and examine what a company needs to do to use such expressions. When it comes to ‘innovation’ (even though this word is such a commonplace today) we still think of positive things such as improvement and uniqueness. For a company to really produce something unique and innovative, many things have to be fulfilled. Nonetheless, joined forces of two different areas make an innovation concrete: one area is IT itself, the other is business.
Technology and business come hand in hand in the 21st century, yet in the field of technology many still consider IT specialists to be the serving maids of the infrastructure. I have been thinking a lot of the reasons why people think IT specialist can solve anything, yet they are being left out of business planning. Based on my personal experience 2 reasons lie behind the surface: First, professionals who are experts of technology do not want to get involved in business. Second, business professionals do not want to have a better understanding of the IT world. Both parties want to create something exceptional only in their own field.
In case an IT specialist does not get involved with business needs and does not have a good understanding of business thinking, it will be really difficult to meet business requirements. May it be a factory or a company providing a blockchain based QR code financial solution and Wallet services. Just to go with the simplest example, if the IT specialist doesn’t know how to calculate loan interest in business, then he/she can develop the system in many different directions any none of them will satisfy business needs. On the other side, when business is not willing to learn and understand technology, then how do we create new business models and introduce new innovations to the market? Actually, we don’t. We won’t be able to provide an innovative, long-lasting solution. What an incompetence.
The key is that IT people need to be open and learn business concepts and processes. Furthermore, business needs to make effort to understand and learn new things. It’s a bad approach to point a finger at IT when it comes to making of process diagrams, plans and data structure diagrams. Innovation can only start when people from the two areas are able to adopt each other’s knowledge.
So, it’s not the blockchain that makes a company innovative (though it is no question that using an appropriate blockchain is a sign of being innovative) but the people who constitute the team. The team behind the company. The team who has understood the importance of understanding their colleague’s field of expertise and does expect the other party to solve everything.
Very deep questions are arising in me. Why don’t companies realize that there is always another way to do things? Why don’t they do anything for their future success? I do know it is a really subjective topic, but we have to keep something in mind: both areas are equally important and they need to be united to make miracles happen.
