- So who knows how to hire robots?
How about manage algorithms?
Or upscale a machine learning model?
In 2011, Marc Andreessen famously declared that
software is eating the world.
By that, he meant that software is rapidly becoming
a key component of everything we do
and was actually disrupting traditional businesses
and value chains.
Now don't get me wrong.
I'm not suggesting this is a new trend.
It's just a continuation of a decades-old migration
from manual work and paper records
to a landscape of enterprise systems,
applications, and computing that's digitizing everything
from customer care to HR to finance.
I've been quite lucky to have a front row seat
as the software evolution has played a role
in the world of business services and outsourcing.
20 years ago when the world was becoming flat,
it did so in part thanks to the internet,
basically a big cable that allowed us to send work far away
where we were able to tap into that passion and talent
I mentioned earlier.
In time, simple arbitrage you could get
from centralizing and moving work wasn't enough.
So I and others in the industry began experimenting
with tools like workflow, ticketing systems,
community forums, and other software tools
to gain greater efficiency from our teams.
And remember that passion and talent?
Well folks began to realize there were better ways
to do the tasks that were often somewhat routine
rule-based and frankly just boring.
And that is why I believe concepts like robotic process
automation and artificial intelligence
have literally exploded in the last five years.
For sake of reference, I'll include some key definitions
in the exercise files.
When passion, process, and a desire to avoid boredom
are combined, it's amazing what you can create.
And frankly my head spins when I see how many organizations
and people self describe as RPA
or intelligent automation experts today on LinkedIn.
But the only constant is change.
Businesses continue to forge ahead,
often hungry for the next new thing.
In this chapter, we'll explore one view
of the technology landscape that makes up
the software classes eating
and reinventing the world of business.