DA Masterclass, 29th November

1. Digital Business
Workshop Notes
#BEM2007DA3
Lisa Harris

2. Plan for the day
• Introductions
• Review of weeks 1 and 2
• Setting the Scene of Change
• Group Exercise 1
• Presentations
• Group Exercise 2
• Presentations
• Summary and Next Steps

3. My Digital Profile
Lisa Harris, Digital Educator. Connect via
@lisaharris / L.J.Harris@exeter.ac.uk
Finding me online:
Twitter
LinkedIn
Slideshare
Innovation in Education blog
About.me
HaikuDecks

4. Ahead of the curve, or just bonkers? 
• I led teams of staff/students/business partners to develop:
• The first inter-disciplinary BSc in e-Commerce, Brunel University (1999)
• The first UK MSc degree in Digital Marketing, University of Southampton
(2009)
• The first integration of a FutureLearn MOOC and a University module, (2015)
• The first live broadcast via Periscope to an online course (2015)
• “Education-led research” with the Learning in the Network Age MOOC, (2017)

6. In a nutshell…
“a dawning realisation in modern boardrooms that capitalising on new
technology demands a wholesale review of business models and core
value propositions based on what you can achieve with digital
technology and services; and that the new wave of emerging
technologies – AI, virtual reality etc. – will only accelerate the need to
throw off the shackles of old practices.”
(Prof Mark Thompson, INDEX)

7. Expectations
• You are encouraged to
• focus the set tasks in a way that is most useful for you
• collaborate with your fellow learners for mutual benefit
• You have (almost!) total flexibility in where/when you study
• Please read the materials provided and take part in the discussions =
collective resource for all to draw upon
• Take a CRITICAL approach to your work for high marks

8. Key issues in weeks 1 and 2
• Discuss and report back – 5 mins
• “revolutions” take time – both across and within societies (17% of
world no access to electricity, 45% no internet)
• Scope of AI – both “doing” and “thinking”
• AI can solve complex problems which used to be performed by people only.
• What we consider today as AI, is tomorrow’s commodity software
• AI may shed light on how we think and solve problems
• Pix Moving – combines AI and 3D printing to make car parts for USA
• It doesn’t have to be world-changing – small steps are OK (AndySC)

9. What is Digital Business?

10. “Re-skilling, re-location and flexibility” – MGI Report
• 30% of the hours worked globally could be automated by 2030
• Automation does not necessarily mean that jobs will be lost, but it does
require acquisition of new skills
• Where jobs involve managing people or engaging with customers, the
scope for effective automation is lower.
• “Low level” manual jobs are difficult to automate and there is little
economic incentive to do so
• 8-9% of the workforce could be employed in roles that currently don’t
exist.
• What jobs do you think will see INCREASED demand?

11. Jobs where demand is increasing
• To satisfy increasing demand for consumer goods
• Healthcare needs related to ageing populations
• Developing and providing information technology services
• Construction industry and associated services to meet rising demand
for housing
• Development and installation of renewable energies
• Domestic and caring services for the very young and the very old
• What are the key skills you would associate with these jobs?

13. “Third Space Thinkers”
• Ernest Wilson of University of Southern California lists the key skills of third
space thinking as:
• 360 degree thinking (taking a holistic view)
• Empathy (understanding, respect and tolerance)
• Cultural competence (appreciating and respecting differences)
• Adaptability (flexible and willing to change)
• Intellectual curiosity (asking the “why?” questions)
Can any one person have all of these skills? Can they be taught?

14. Sourced from recent lecture by @Intersticia “The age of the social machine” available here

15. Waves of Disruption
“Digital is not technology; it’s empowering people, organisational
culture and new behaviours”
1. The digital “front end” – adding a new layer to existing systems to
engage with customers
2. Digital transformation – changing the whole business in response to
new competitive pressures
3. The third wave – still at a very early stage…think AI, 5G, big data…
Read “Why digital leadership rocks the boat”

16. Sourced from recent lecture by @Intersticia “The age of the social machine” available here

17. Mark Thompson’s Interview by Soldo
“To me, digital transformation conversations come down to one thing: the
arrival of mature services that have been developed around the shared
infrastructure of the internet. Digital transformation is nothing to do with
websites or front ends, although they’re important of course; it’s about the
shared plumbing.”
“I was speaking with a pharmaceuticals executive recently who advocated
“sticking to the knitting”: he said “We make drugs, and the minute we take
our eye of that, we’re dead in the water”. But we now live in a health data
economy which focuses on keeping people well rather than curing them
when they are ill. Businesses like Amazon are outspending pharma in the
healthcare sector exponentially.”

18. Pipes to platforms – by Professor Mark Thompson (INDEX)

19. Example: Property conveyancing
More details here

20. “Throw off the shackles…”
…but how?
• Reconfigure everything around the customer via
“SMAC”: Social, Mobile, Analytics and Cloud.
• Outsource digital platforms (AWS, Salesforce etc) for the infrastructure of
corporate service delivery.
• Most importantly, it requires a dramatic transformation of culture.
We will be addressing these issues in future weeks of the module…

21. The big picture: Analysing the macro
environment factors (PEST/PESTLE)
• Political
• Economic
• Social
• Technological
• Legal
• Environmental
• Evaluation of the broader
environment encourages strategic
thinking
• Provides an overview of all external
organisational influences
• Supports informed decision making
• Assists organisational change
initiatives

22. Getting started
• PEST analysis is about the “big picture” – you are categorising and
ranking the issues that affect us all
• Brainstorm some top level ideas in each category
• Get googling for more detail – keep the links to your evidence base
• Great sources are We Are Social's comprehensive 'Digital in 2019'
report or Mary Meeker's extensive 'Internet Trends' report
• Organise your ideas within the PESTLE headings and give some
thought to their ranking/prioritisation
• Present back your ideas to the class

23. Stage 2
• Choose one of the PESTLE categories
• Review the ideas put forward by each group in this category to agree a
consolidated list
• Present to the class
• Choose one of the remaining categories
• Review the ideas put forward by each group in this category to agree a
consolidated list
• Present to the class
• I will upload photos of your output which becomes a resource base
for you all to draw upon in your assignments

24. Summary exercise
Brian Solis, Futurologist – “Now hiring: Robots, apply within”
A great critical review of many of today’s key themes
1. Read the article
2. In your groups, identify and agree a ranking of the 3 key themes
covered that you will take forward in your studies/working lives
3. Present back to the class

25. Next steps
• Preparation for assignment 1 (due 16th December)
• Taking forward the PESTLE as a collective resource
• Tips on critical writing
• Plan for Webinar 6th December
• Getting started with Week 4 – towards a “Contract for the Web”

26. Descriptive writing

27. Critical writing

28. More Resources
• Our free MOOC, Building your Career in Tomorrow’s Workplace, runs
again on 27th January 2020 for 2 weeks. You are welcome to join us!
• Future-proofing the Workforce, (2019) by Adecco and Boston
Consulting Group
• Harris, L. and Rae, A. (2011) “Building a personal brand through social
networking”, Journal of Business Strategy
• “Making an Impact” from the “In Business” series on BBC Radio 4,
August 2019

29. Free tools you may like to try
• Appear.in for webinars
• Googledocs for collaborative writing
• Haiku Deck for cool image-based presentations
• Piktochart for infographics
• Biteable and Powtoon for cartoon videos
• PixaBay and Pexels and Unsplash for copyright-free images