The current dynamic economy is bringing forward new economic opportunities. New sectors, new channels of communication and a vast ecosystem of e-commerce and digital solutions are available. For almost every business, the digital economy represents a challenge to change: and that means adopting new technologies, retraining existing employees – and tapping into a new digital workforce.
This is good news for the UAE’s digitally literate population, especially women. In the UAE, females represent 56 percent of graduates from science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) subjects – and 77 percent of all graduate studies.
Yet when it comes to women in senior roles globally, studies have found that 60 percent of firms have no female board members, just over half have no female C-suite executives, and fewer than 5 percent had a female CEO. This is surprising, because according to many different reports and studies, companies with higher numbers of women in leadership positions perform better. Indeed, research shows that companies with women in 30 percent of leadership roles witness a 15 percent increase in profitability.
Now, with new opportunities to innovate in digital solutions, women with STEM qualifications and those with experience outside of the industry, have an opportunity to re-orient their bearings: to re-think their careers and what matters to them the most in life.
With the technology revolution brewing, newer job opportunities have opened up – especially in the revolutionary areas of artificial intelligence, robotics, automation, analytics, biometrics and more.
For women equipped with digital skills – or even those without – this is the time to take advantage of career opportunities within the digital economy. There has never been a better time to step out of your comfort zone, learn something new and take a risk. I should know – as it’s a path I have embraced myself.
My best career moves happened when I ventured into a sector in which I had no expertise and sometimes very little knowledge. I knew that IT was a male-dominated world – but I also knew that if I threw myself into it there was no reason why I couldn’t build an incredible career. I know from experience that for those women who want to enter the digital economy, there are many rewarding moments where being a woman does make a difference, especially in areas that require particular skills and competencies.
Helping companies to reinvent
As companies seek to reinvent or reorient themselves towards the digital landscape, the competencies women bring are of fundamental value; in finding new ways to serve customers, or creating new ways of getting the best out of employees with digital remote working technologies.
For women who want to take advantage of the digital revolution, build new skills, or enter a new line of work, these are some key areas where there is significant potential for skills development and personal growth:
- Design thinking: This field allows organisations to review and reinvent their current ways of working in light of the new business models they are looking to build. They usually necessitate a combination of skills such as graphical design, user interface design and development, user journey maps and roadmaps, storyboarding and even a touch of psychology or social studies.
- Process optimisation and assessment: Whether front, middle or back office, organisations are transforming how they operate in the digital age. For women in specific domains such as supply chain, manufacturing, research and development, HR, finance, legal or hospitality, there are vast opportunities to leverage your skills to drive organisation-wide initiatives. These kinds of jobs offer a unique opportunity for client intimacy and process reconciliation with a sense of orchestration, while leveraging methods such as Lean or Six Sigma, a key certification to have in one’s resume.
- Development: The next logical step post-process optimisation is usually automation, where intelligent automation and AI solutions come into play. They both need to be approached with two separate sets of skills; one is related to a business analyst role and the second set is related to the actual technical solution implementation, which entails actual technology mastery. Whichever you consider, business analyst skills include a strong knowledge of the actual business process that is being looked at to evaluate the potential for automation – which does not necessarily need deep technological knowledge.
Recognise your value
Not only are these technologies incredibly exciting but they’re in demand. The adoption of digital solutions are highly strategic to most organisations – so much so that many digitalisation initiatives are usually spearheaded from a separate entity that handles both digital and innovation strategies: the driving engine for all areas and initiatives. This amounts to a digital strategy that creates among others, a fully automated customer experience that customers do enjoy, all whilst remaining profitable.
For women, the good news is that the dynamics of a digitalisation strategy play to many of the natural strengths that women possess – it is about taking a holistic approach to moving a company from where it is today to where it needs to be tomorrow. It’s about creating a roadmap to realise that journey – one that achieves unanimous buy-in and helps everybody reach the final destination. So, if you’re a woman looking to enhance your skill, look out for any digital and innovation initiatives in your organisation.