The autonomous enterprise: Everyone’s trying to get there; can we?

2023 is the year of digital dichotomy as enterprises need to balance the macroeconomic slowdown with the big hurry to innovate. The changing business environment has flipped business needs and mindsets toward automation. This year represents the third phase of inflation-triggered enterprise innovation in the history of business operations. We believe that the case for building an autonomous enterprise is stronger than ever before, and the C-suite must invest to enable technologies, encourage mindset change, overcome data silos, and embrace ecosystems.

A panel discussion on the autonomous enterprise at the HFS Horizons London Summit included industry experts Shelly Davies, Global Process Excellence and Automation Lead, Anglo American; Divyanshu (Divy) Anand, Chief Digital and Technology Architect, Haleon; Mark Stubbs, Head of EMEA Technology and Solution Office, Hitachi Vantara; and Mohammad Ali Malik, CA, DGBS. Ralph Aboujaoude Diaz, Practice Leader, HFS, moderated the panel (see Exhibit 1).

Exhibit 1: Industry experts discussed the autonomous enterprise at the HFS Horizons London Summit

Source: HFS Research, 2023

An autonomous enterprise is about delivering the data at a speed that will drive success

The goal of an autonomous enterprise is to allow humans to remove themselves from some parts of the system so we can continuously improve the whole ecosystem. An autonomous enterprise is one with leadership that continuously seeks to refine the data it needs in real time to be successful. Its governance capability ensures it has the talent, tech infrastructure, automation, and AI to deliver the data that will drive success with minimal manual interventions impeding progress and speed. Our latest Pulse study revealed that enterprises are embarking on a wide range of initiatives that are the building blocks and driving forces behind the autonomous enterprise (see Exhibit 2).

Exhibit 2: Improving automation, leveraging emerging technology, and responding more effectively to contextual changes are the top three initiatives enterprises prioritize

Sample: 602 executives across Global 2000 enterprises
Source: HFS Research, 2023

The autonomous enterprise is a principle-guided mindset

For starting the journey toward an autonomous enterprise, leaders need to be clear about the values they want to drive and drive them end-to-end across the organization. We have put together six principles in Exhibit 3 that leaders need to adopt to ensure they can keep refining the autonomous abilities of their enterprise within its business ecosystem and adjacent ecosystems. The capabilities are out there—from automation to conversational AI, low code applications, and generative AI. However, the internal change mechanisms for employees and the softer elements of making the available technologies work for the organization are critical elements. As Shelly Davies said, “It’s doable. It’s a mindset and capacity.”

The COVID era accelerated an unprecedented and unexpected adoption rate for new technologies. Many businesses used the pandemic as an opportunity to capitalize on innovation, while some lagged. It seems the inflection point has passed. Now, more businesses are balancing short-term survival and avoiding extinction by urgently leveraging transformation technology.

Additionally, new technologies are appearing faster than ever before. For instance, generative AI has opened new ways of doing previously unimaginable things.

In the words of Divy Anand, “Automation is not a choice. We need to do it or risk falling behind.”

Exhibit 3: The six principles of autonomous enterprises are leaders, teams, infrastructure, trusted and scalable capability, AI, and governance

Source: HFS Research, 2023

Building the autonomous enterprise requires overcoming functional siloes and developing a true end-to-end view of the organization across value streams and process maps

Shelly, who has worked both sides of the fence, shared her experience that end-to-end automation of an organization presents a persistent challenge, with processes and departments running in siloes and making siloed technology choices. Organizations don’t give business functions enough scope to drive better internal alignment toward building end-to-end solutions that are fundamental to the autonomous enterprise. At the same time, it’s imperative to have the goal of an autonomous enterprise in mind while taking smaller steps at the beginning of the transformation journey rather than overhauling all the processes simultaneously.

Ecosystem partners play a huge role in balancing the need to deliver at pace and make progress on developing the autonomous enterprise

Get your strategy right to make your ecosystem work in the same direction as you, focusing on the outcomes and business value that matter most to your organization. Leverage partners and internal capabilities for controlled democratization when driving an automation strategy with standards and guardrails. Mark Stubbs explained that since most companies operate pretty lean, choosing the right providers is the key to getting the right capacity and skills to grow successfully and with less risk.

Quoting Mohammad Ali Malik, “For GBS organizations, businesses have started demanding and expecting more. The expectation from GBS and service providers to deliver more value from the wealth of data that they have accumulated over the years has increased exponentially.”

The Bottom Line: Creating an autonomous enterprise is a when—not an if. Clearly, leadership is trying to configure the right solutions to get there.

There is major rethinking taking place for 2023. Many firms simply struggle to navigate this complex and costly maze. The autonomous enterprise vision is where the survivors are looking, but getting there requires fewer people and politics, less resistance to change, and great partnerships.

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