Remote flexibility
According to a 2022 LinkedIn report, remote positions drew nearly half of all applicants. The amount of people applying to remote or flexible positions has risen nominally from 2021 to 2022, while the amount of remote jobs available has decreased.
While many companies and organizations pushed this year for a return to the office, “normalcy” as it was pre-pandemic, workers’ desire for flexibility and a better work-life balance grew. Flexibility is one of the top three priorities for workers, and that is unlikely to change. LinkedIn identifies it as one of the major factors that could increase worker retention at a company.
Cybersecurity
Cybersecurity must be an ongoing priority for businesses, especially those that store and rely on personal information. For some businesses, keeping operating systems and software on the latest update will go a long way. For others, it may be time to invest in cyber insurance. Not only will cyber insurance brokers give you concrete standards you must meet, but it provides financial relief for your business if you are attacked and ransomed.
Growing emphasis on consumer privacy and protection
People are more aware of the value their data has to countless companies and organizations. After years of people’s personal data being observed and acted upon by advertisers, content algorithms, and even what news stories a person sees first, people are saying enough. A stronger desire for privacy is present in many Internet users now, and those consumers value the companies that reflect that.
What are you doing to protect the privacy of people who visit your site, or use your business? Are you collecting data? What do you do with it? Consumers want to know.
VR and AR go to work
Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality have so far been sequestered to the realm of video games. However, this technology might be used in the future for remote collaborations and meetings. This has some awesome implications: remote work, with personality, and the option to collaborate in the “same” space, at the same time? Wowie!
According to Forbes, both Microsoft and Nvidia have already started projects with this idea. We at SpireTech, as a fully remote company, are excited to see where this will lead.
AI becomes even more common
Artificial Intelligence has become increasingly impressive in the last few years, and that trend is continuing at an even faster rate. It will play a hand in nearly every sector of business. An incredible amount of small and mid-size businesses have started to use Artificial Intelligence as service, allowing work to be streamlined, optimized, and faster.
When it comes to job recruitment, it is a program that takes the first look now. Others are deploying Artificial Intelligence in their site’s chat bot; it’s used by big box stores to determine what coupons, promotions, and products might excite individual consumers most; others use it as an HR service.
Whatever your industry or goal, there’s likely a little computer out there that’s ready to help.
AI creations
There has been a lot of media coverage recently regarding artworks created by Artificial Intelligence. On one side, there are digital artists in an uproar, because some of these AI systems either trained with their artwork, or can create artworks “in the style of” a particular artist. However, it also makes art and creativity much more widely accessible. People can create fantastic images in just a few seconds.
In 2023, expect the debate to continue. DeviantArt, for example, provides an AI image generator for anyone to use, but artists who post on DeviantArt must opt-in to the system for their art to be used as part of the machine learning. How can people use this magnificently powerful tool responsibly? How do we make this technology more accessible, while not shorting the artists who have spent years or decades on their craft? Whatever a person’s personal feelings may be, expect this technology to become more prevalent in the coming years.
Does the AI owe the artwork? That’s a conversation for twenty years from now.
This can be leveraged in business by creating thoughtful graphics in minutes. Will it be exactly what you want, and better than if you had a human on staff? No, but hey. It took two minutes.
Conclusion
At SpireTech, we understand that our responsibility to provide the best IT managed services we can to our clients means we need to stay on top of emerging trends and remain as knowledgeable as we can be. There is never a time in which SpireTech is not striving to improve. We always pass on that new knowledge in our services and education to our clients. Together, we can all improve. We’ve got this.