Digital Innovation Summit Geelong 2023

Harvest Director, Maree Herath was pleased to be a panelist at the recent Digital Innovation Summit Geelong 2023

The Business nbn and Business in Heels event was a two and a half hour interactive session with dynamic thought leaders and local specialists.

Participants left inspired as to what’s possible to evolve and grow your business on the back of digital innovation.

Concepts included:

• Groing your business via digital technology
• Protecting your business from cyber threats
• Building your brand and customer base
• Inspiration from retail giant Amazon

Team Harvest had a few take-aways that we’d like to share:

• Don’t let what you post on line be a career limiting move.  Your digital footprint may be readily available for employers and future employers to view – keep this in mind – always!
• When it comes to embracing technology, standing still is a greater risk than embracing it and failing.  Don’t be a “Day 2”  company that stands still. Be a “Day 1” company that lives by a culture of experimentation, and where failure is learning.
• Amazon Web Services has a novel way of welcoming ideas and testing them:

Take the Idea: 

Ask who is the customer and what do they need?

Write a press release as if the idea has been implemented.  Include FAQs.

Write a narrative – six pages max – about the idea. “Thinking it through” is the key here.

Support the idea with data.

From here it’s a “two door decision”:

Door 1 – If you implement the idea and it goes wrong – can you reverse it?

Door 2 – If you implement the idea and  cannot reverse the decision.

Clearly Door 1 is experimental and it’s easier to go for it.   Door 2 will require more thought, guidance and support.

• Ask yourself two questions. 1. How are you using technology today to speed up your business?  2. In what way can you use technology to make some of your business processes obsolete?
• 90% of jobs in the coming years will require digital literacy. This skills gap needs to be addressed.  Enter Harvest Digital Fundamentals Course. 
• Cyber Security impacts everyone. What can small businesses do?
  • Set up multi-factor authentication
  • Use strong, long passwords
  • Password managers are good to use
  • Do auto software updates
  • Have an auto back up of your data
  • Take out cyber insurance

Overall, the event was full of valuable insights into the future and what businesses can do to move forward.