According to J.P. Morgan’s article: The Next Normal Arrives, Trends that Will Define 2021 and Beyond, we are in the year of transition in which businesses and society start to look forward to shaping their futures. This future is digital, for the last 18 months the acceleration in the use of technology, digitalization and new forms of working allowed companies to move 20 to 25 times faster.
Mckinsey’s survey, “How COVID-19 has pushed companies over the technology tipping point—and transformed business forever”, found that companies are three times more likely than they were before the crisis to conduct at least 80% of their customers’ interactions digitally. So if you have not done it yet, now is the time to build or reinforce your team with digital capabilities.
Talent becomes crucial to thrive, move from reacting to the crisis into building what will work in the foreseeable future. You will need a combination of technical and business capabilities, depending on the size of the challenge you are trying to solve.
If this is the first time the business will be having a digital team you might consider the “Minimum Viable Team” concept, which is an adaptation of the “Minimum Viable Product” from the Lean Startup Methodology: start building with the smallest form of your desired team, get experience, and then grow bigger.
Technical Team
Either if it is an external provider or an in-house hire there are at least three core roles needed to build a viable digital platform:
Back-End Developer: You need a qualified developer who can deploy new applications or sites to expand your digital properties and solve database challenges or workflows to meet the needs of new processes or implementations. They will also be responsible for enforcing cybersecurity standards to protect the integrity of the systems, a feature that is even more important if your site has an e-commerce platform or you manage user data.
Front-End Developer: This role is in charge of selecting frameworks and coding standards for the technologies that will be used, HTML, HTML5, mobile etc. It is important that both back and front end work together to make sure that the full user experience can be implemented.
Data Analyst: This role entails being In charge of developing the specific data models and plans for data management. Data Analysts are also crucial to keep your databases “clean and healthy” evaluating periodically if there is something wrong. It is a role in high demand due to the need to build up analytics capabilities at a rapid pace to meet the boom in e-commerce, growth hacking, etc. IDC forecasts that big data and analytics software revenue will reach $66.8 billion dollars in 2021.
Digital Business Team
UX Researcher-Designer: This person is the one with a sixth sense – based on research and experience- to really understand the audiences that will be using the site, digital products or services. The UX team has to work side by side with front end developers to create a customer experience that translates into sales. Linkedin listed UX design as one of the Top 20 skills to learn in 2020, and since we are spending more time online, the need for these professionals will continue to grow.
Digital Marketing Strategist: Growth and lead generation are two of the most important things a digital marketer offers to the business. To do so, this role chooses between social media, content marketing, pay-per-click, email marketing, social ads, and many other strategic paths. Your business will definitely benefit from a strategist that makes the most of the growing opportunities, considering that according to the Datareportal report, Digital 2021 Global Overview, there are trillions of dollars spent on e-commerce around the world, and more than 1.3 million new users joined social media every day during 2020.
SEO Expert or Content Developer: Trends like shoppable posts, video marketing, and interactive content require someone who knows how to work with the algorithm, and create compelling stories that combine brand identity with customer needs.
Not unlike any team, it is important to create well-defined responsibilities and processes to get them organized in the most effective manner. Remember to hire considering alignment with the purpose, objectives, and general business strategy of your company as well as looking for balanced talents.
Do you want to learn more about this topic? Find more in the MBA Lifestyle Business program.