Driving Innovation as a Customer-Centric CIO
It's a remarkable time to be a Chief Information and Data Officer. This summer I had the privilege of diving into the challenges facing construction industry CIOs at Procore’s inaugural CIO Forum. Today’s CIO must dynamically lead through an extraordinary rate of technological advancements, a high bar for enterprise readiness and enormous data oceans. That’s why the CIO of tomorrow must be a force for change within their organization.
Adopting AI Agility
With generative AI, we are witnessing a paradigm shift across the tech landscape similar to the early days of the internet. Generative AI is already democratized. Everyone from my 77-year-old-mother to my 10-year-old nephew can access powerful large language models with ChatGPT, Bard or Jasper Chat. To get organizations to embrace emerging technology, CIOs must connect the value of implementing generative AI to top-line and bottom-line margin growth.
To avoid perceptions of falling prey to the shiny new object, it’s crucial to correlate early use cases to business value. According to McKinsey, “Generative AI’s impact on productivity could add trillions of dollars in value to the global economy.” On the Data, Technology and Security team at Procore, we achieve this by asking ourselves – how can we save employees 2-4 hours each week? As advancements in artificial intelligence start to outpace our ability to manage change, remaining agile and evolving our workplace culture will be key.
Construction CIOs also look to other industries like tech and automotive to inject outside expertise into their emerging technology playbooks. In fact, construction technology leaders are eager to adopt cutting-edge AI. A recent report indicates that 92% of construction companies are either using or intend to use AI in comparison to 87% of manufacturers.
Catalyzing Innovation
Contrary to misconceptions that construction is behind the curve, when it comes to digital transformation, I was blown away by the pockets of brilliance from construction industry CIOs. Construction is poised to be first adopters of innovative solutions to business challenges felt beyond construction. For example, 91% of construction firms report experiencing labor shortages and the industry needs an estimated 546,000 additional workers on top of normal hiring rates to keep pace in 2023. By embracing leading-edge solutions like computer vision and automated reality capture, construction can augment their workforce with real-time schedule updates, and on-demand workforce planning.
Today, enhancing a workforce with sophisticated technologies requires significant capital outlays. But as these emergent technologies become more widespread, we could see a proliferation of automated data capture mechanisms on jobsites. Robotics also has massive potential to automate repetitive and dangerous tasks for the industry. Because the labor shortage and perils of an aging workforce impact industries outside construction, we can all learn from construction’s journey solving business problems with innovative solutions.
Regardless of industry, CIOs can elevate their game by responding to disruptive technologies with agility, cultivating a data-driven culture, and catalyzing innovation for the business. The opportunity to meet this moment of digital transformation with vigor and vision is why I joined Procore.
Looking to learn more about the industry’s approach to technology, data, and AI from a CIO’s perspective? Register for Groundbreak.
