Technology insider Estates Gazette tech expert and software entrepreneur Antony Slumbers urges the industry to discard old IT solutions and connect with new ones
People overcomplicate technology. There are only three things you need to do: keep up to date, think about the future and don’t digitise the past. How hard is that? Too hard for many, it seems.
Each year Remit Consulting conducts a survey of IT use in the commercial property industry. This year the oldest system was 29 years old. The average, a decade.
Just think about that for a moment: the average IT system in use within our industry dates from a time before the iPhone, when broadband was not so broad, Google had only just had its IPO, and Amazon had not even thought of offering cloud computing. This is an eternity in tech, practically a different world.
With so many companies operating age-old systems, is it any wonder as an industry we fret about the future, rather than embracing it? Advocacy of the central office as critical to any business, eulogising “water-cooler” moments and a reluctance to allow remote working are emblematic of a fear of change.
When technological change was slower, it did not matter that developments took many years to complete. The world of work, or retail, pretty much remained the same, so what we built was but an iteration on what was built before.
As with the car industry, where today’s Mercedes is not very different to one from five years ago, the trick was a novel tweak, a small embellishment, an eye-catching new feature. Today, while the analogy holds, the stakes are much higher. The car as we know it is dying, to be replaced by hybrid, then electric, then self-driving vehicles. An existential threat looms.
The same applies to commercial property; what we have now, across all sectors, just isn’t designed for the world that is developing. As smartphones become more powerful, high-speed mobile connectivity becomes ubiquitous and data moves to the cloud, society is being fundamentally disrupted. The way we communicate, interact, learn, work, shop and live is changing. And this is revolution, not evolution.
Which brings me to the last thing you need to do. Don’t digitise the past. That 10-year-old system will not cut it by just being moved to the cloud. Most likely, the way it works, the processes it codifies and the experience it provides to users are no longer good enough. Or rather, they could be made exponentially better by embracing the possibilities of technology.
And to those who fear that commercial property will lose its importance, or worth, in this digital world, please don’t. Great technology works best in collaboration with great places. They just won’t look the same as they do now.
Do you agree with Slumbers? Tweet your thoughts to @antonyslumbers
Essential tech for property people: Citymapper
Citymapper provides the 1-2-3 for how to do digital. Now covering 13 world cities, it provides “The Ultimate Transport App” and some lessons for real estate.
While the desktop version is a delight, the mobile app is even better. Unlike a myriad of companies that seem not to have discovered that mobile now exceeds PC usage, Citymapper has ensured the supercomputer in your pocket gets all due attention.
The way it integrates, seamlessly and speedily, with a multitude of real time data sources, is a lesson in what is possible. You can find out how to get from A to B by bus, tube, train, tram, bike or even on foot. And you’ll get up-to-the-minute information on all of these.
And not only does Citymapper make the most of mobile, high-speed connectivity and cloud computing (the digital trinity), but the design is exceptional.
The user experience is a delight and, as I said last month, in a digital world your user experience is your brand. For example, Citymapper makes it simple to find where a bus stop is, what number you should take and when it will arrive. Then it allows you to see your progress on a map and updates as you approach your destination.
This simplicity is the result of attention to detail and insight into what a user requires. It gives you exactly what you need, when and where you need it.
One day the property industry will work like this.
