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Digital is the new normal, says UnionBank Chairman

Businesses should think long-term and realize that digital is the new normal, says UnionBank of the Philippines Chairman Justo A. Ortiz.
Businesses should think long-term and realize that digital is the new normal, says UnionBank of the Philippines Chairman Justo A. Ortiz.

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced companies to embrace digital transformation. It would wrong, however, for businesses to think that digital is just a means for survival, or part of their business continuity plan. Instead, they should accept that digital is the new normal.

“Clearly the pandemic has given us a use case for digital. Many corporations — large, small-, and medium-scale — have realized that investing in resiliency is going to be a lot more important going forward. But having said that, we don’t want the idea of digital and digital transformation to be just BCP,” said UnionBank of the Philippines Chairman Justo A. Ortiz.

Digital is a journey

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“I think that clearly there’s a lot of opportunity for digital to be mainstream as our new normal. So it’s not about social distancing and face masks, because there could be other black swans that come down the road. Other pandemics, other natural disasters, and, God forbid, even wars. But it’s important that we basically focus on digital and mainstream it,” he said.

Ortiz was one of the speakers at the “Digitize and Survive” webinar. This was organized by the Distributed Ledger Technology Association of the Philippines (DLTAP), UnionBank, and UB GlobalLinker. Ortiz is also the chairman of DLTAP.

Today, companies are forced to embrace digital to survive. But their mindset should go beyond short-term survival if they want their businesses to thrive in the post-pandemic world.

“Now, it could start as a resiliency goal and a BCP goal, and that would be a good start for everyone. Or there could be pieces of it, like ordering and delivery and that sort of thing, as we’ve experienced with a lot of food services and grocery services that we have today, or farm-to-market services,” Ortiz said.

These, however, are merely ad hoc reactions to the present situation. The payback for making digital mainstream is much bigger, he said.

Data is the new air

According to Ortiz, he has been advocating for the mainstreaming of digital because the payback is data.

“Data, they say, is going to be the new oil. But I say it’s going to be the new air. It’s what we’re going to breathe. And that data gives us now the opportunity to be insightful. To contextually and cognitively be insightful with regards to our customers. So it’s more targeted, it’s more personalized, it will give us even better pricing optimization possibilities. It gives us a minimum digital hygiene of a customer experience, which is anytime, anywhere, 24/7, Six Sigma reliability, real-time, safe, secure, and, hopefully, a lower cost. All these advantages only come when you have an end-to-end digital business model.

“And so I look forward that even though this is a great start, that this is a lot more than just survival. It’s about prosperity, it’s about progress, it’s about embracing the Fourth Industrial Age and being fully engaged in that Fourth Industrial Age,” he said.

Ortiz said the most difficult thing about digital transformation has never been the justifications for doing it, such as cost savings. It is actually customer behavior — their willingness to adapt to digital. The COVID-19 pandemic, however, has changed customer behavior almost overnight. Filipinos have embraced the digital lifestyle.

Customers already know that digital is the new normal. Now, it’s up to companies to fully embrace digital, and become more relevant to their customers.

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