Top GCC Leaders say customer-centric businesses will continue to splurge on technology in 2023

Global capability centers within customer-centric businesses have ushered in a permanent change in the business landscape in the post-pandemic era and they will continue to adopt technology to build their way onward and upwards. The phenomenon will replicate across the spectrum, from retail to insurance, with a focus on innovation to build a cohesive and unified Omni channel experience for customers who are increasingly preferring to have access to digital shopping.

The vision, according to Lowe’s India’s Sr. VP (Technology) and Managing Director Ankur Mittal, is to accelerate innovation. “Firstly, leveraging new-age techs such as the metaverse and Web3 to give customers a safe, immersive shopping experience and equip them to make the right purchase decisions. Secondly, the ability to build an integrated, agile and flexible tech stack to solve customer problems will define business growth,” he said.

Walmart Global Tech India’s SVP (Retail Tech Platforms) and Country Head Hari Vasudev said the lines between digital and physical have blurred in recent times and technology will continue to play a vital role in serving customers when, where and how they want. “In the coming years, customers will witness shopping experiences that are more inclusive, immersive and personalized,” he said, suggesting that technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) would play a pivotal role in understanding customer preferences more deeply and in driving personalization at scale across digital channels.

Interestingly, even in the face of global headwinds, retailers are not unnecessarily perturbed in their quest for technology adoption and upgradation. Far from that, they find the impending recession a huge opportunity to help change the direction of the retail course forever with a paradigm facelift.

In this new age of digital transformation, Vikram Ahuja, Co-Founder of Talent500 said, “2023 is the year that AI will transform recruitment. Recruiting teams spend 45%-55% of their time today screening profiles and trying to shortlist the best-fit applications. By using Natural Language Processing (NLP) techniques, AI will make this process more efficient, as it can scan thousands of resumes in seconds and deliver those that match the job description.” The sensitivity here, however, lies in leveraging sophisticated AI to improve efficiency and maintaining a human touch, he added.

Here, the incorporation of Conversational AI-powered chatbots and virtual assistants have been gaining immense traction in the year gone by, and 2023 will witness significant innovations in this area. Intelligent chatbots know when to hand over the chat to a human and achieving this balance between chatbots and human resources will prove key in improving customer experience.

“For this transformation to be successful, organisations need to look at not just digitizing the front-end systems but it’s equally important to get the necessary muscle (back-end processes) to be digitized as well so that it’s synchronized and can provide for strategic agility in a fast-changing environment,” said Murali Achuta, Head of Finance SVB India.

Technology in conjunction with innovation is the way to optimization and businesses, regardless of their industries, aim to imbibe this to build richer customer experiences.