Building a global community for the Next Economy

Late last year, the De La Salle University’s Graduate School of Business, together with Philstar.com and in cooperation with Jobstreet.com and Organization Technology International Phils. Inc, held an information technology symposium with the theme, "Building A Global Community for the Next Economy." This academic and business sector collaboration gave the participants and attendees an assessment of the "New Economy" that was, and presented the emerging "Next Economy."

Tasked to deliver the welcome remarks of this IT symposium, I explained to the audience why the theme was selected and what it was all about – that the New Economy is dead, but the Next Economy is now emerging.

The New Economy, as we saw it, was one characterized by rapid experimentation, unproven business models, excessive speculations and a plethora of hypes which led to its eventual demise. Its end last year came after the bloodbath that started in early 2000 when the world saw major and drastic corrections of technology-led stock markets worldwide, the closure or scaling down of hundreds of dot-com companies, the drying up of once-plenty venture capital funds for tech firms, and the loss of perhaps tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands of jobs.

Death of New Economy

Like shooting stars, Internet billionaires and millionaires saw their net worth vanish quickly before their eyes as the writing on the wall became clear – the New Economy was unsustainable and would not last long. Perhaps no entity can make this more poignant than the 90% Club in the United States, where the membership is open only to those who have lost 90 percent of their wealth because of the collapse of the New Economy. The doom and gloom associated with the death of the New Economy is giving a lot of people, business leaders and even some in the academic community, reasons to shun attention to information technology developments and e-business efforts.

However, this attitude, characterized by the de-prioritization or setting aside of investments in technology and e-commerce initiatives, is a dangerous attitude. The danger will not come from the resurrection of the New Economy, but from the emergence of the so-called Next Economy. The latter is one that is being shaped more by strategy rather than by experimentation, and where the fundamentals of business such as profitability, cash flows and value-creation previously set aside take center stage and get attention once again, together with rapid advances in technology and experienced practitioners armed with the hard lessons learned from the previous economy.

Aspects of Next Economy

There were four symposium speakers whose presentations covered many aspects of the Next Economy. First on the list was Rally Martinez, chief operating officer of Philstar.com, who spoke about portal and community development. He shared how their parent newspaper company is now "bundling" advertising offers to support their portal community development. By offering a new online channel that supplements their traditional channels and medium of news delivery, their firm is able to reach new segments and secure their business in the emerging economy.

Candice Alabanza, general manager of Jobstreet.com, shared the business model of the company she manages. She also showcased their proprietary LiNa software that automates almost all of resumé-handling tasks and which incorporates applicant tracking and processing. This LiNa software allows human resource professionals to reduce application processing times dramatically, and Alabanza attributed part of their success in the online recruitment business to the unique service proposition offered by this software.

Their online recruitment site remains to be valued by the business community, and patronage is continuously growing. During the question-and-answer session that followed her presentation, Alabanza clearly stated that their company remains a viable business for the Next Economy, and that their business model has a clear path and target to profitability.

Critical enabling skills

Romulo "Omy" Romero, managing director of OTI Consulting Phils. Inc., spoke about the critical enabling skills of the 21st century, skills needed for the Next Economy. He started by identifying major shifts that are occurring in our society nowadays: from lifetime employment to lifetime employability, from career ladders to competence ladders, from activity-driven to purpose-driven, from focus on Intelligence Quotient (IQ) to Emotional Quotient (EQ) and Adversity Quotient (AQ), and from cost-reduction to value-creation.

Given these shifts, he enumerated seven critical enabling skills that people and organizations need to master to succeed in the Next Economy, namely,

• Learning to unlearn;

• Literacy (reading, writing, computation);

• Listening and oral communication;

• Problem-solving and creativity;

• Personal effectiveness;

• Team effectiveness; and

• Leadership and organizational effectiveness.

Drawing a lot of interest and questions from the audience about these enabling skills which he identified and explained, like a true Next Economy player, Romero ended his presentation by referring the audience to his company’s website, www.oticonsulting.com, for more details.

Internet marketing

Last but not the least, Katrina Sandejas, marketing manager of Philstar.com, spoke about Internet marketing for the Next Economy. This time, she shared to the audience the four As and the seven imperatives of Internet marketing, and gave her observation that in the Next Economy, business will be more dynamic, customized and personalized.

The four As are Addressability, Accountability, Affordability and Accessibility, while the seven imperatives are:

• Use what you know to drive what you do;

• Erase the line between product and service;

• Make each relationship as different to each of your customers;

• Do as little as possible yourself; partner with other companies that are quite vital to the company’s business;

• Make your interactive process become the product;

• Factor feature value into every move; and

• Make business responsible for marketing and vice versa.

The symposium gave the participants many reasons to stop thinking and believing that information technology and e-business are already passé after the New Economy collapse, and many inputs to start preparing and benefiting from the emerging Next Economy.

Amid the global gloom, the economic and environmental challenges, the security threats and the perennial problems on world peace and order, the Next Economy is emerging. I cannot help but recall the words of Abigail Adams: "These are the hard times in which a genius would wish to live. Great necessities call forth great leaders."

Now may I ask: How are you preparing your organization and yourself for the Next Economy?

(The author is the chairman of the Information Systems and Computer Applications Department of the Graduate School of Business of De La Salle University and is an associate director of Abacus Distribution Systems Phils. Inc. He can be reached at albert_villadolid@abacusph.com.)