PRESENTATION THEMES by Rapelang Rabana

 

 

TECH FLUENCY: TECHNOLOGY FOR NON-TECH PROFESSIONALS

Subtitle: See digital technology through the eyes of a practical, hands-on innovator.
 

Synopsis: Albert Einstein once said that ‘if you can’t explain something simply, you don’t understand it well enough’. Instead of machine learning your IoT devices with cybersecurity in the cloud that are also 3D printed on your Big Data blockchain… let’s get real, let’s stop posturing and get to grips with this stuff. Tech Fluency is about getting past the digital buzz words and understanding technology in

simple, practical ways.

To fully leverage the power of the digital technology, starts by changing how we think about technology. At its core, technology is simply a method or technique that solves a problem by breaking a previous constraint. Digital technologies offer us powerful capabilities which are crucial to understand in order to break constraints and deliver more effective solutions, across business and social needs.

• Stop thinking, ‘I need an app’ or that technology is magic. Get past the black box.
• The real purpose of technology: breaking constraints and removing limitations to unlock a world of abundance. 
• Understand digital technology through the capabilities it makes possible. Drop unhelpful jargon like AI, IoT, Big Data. All tech fundamentally enables better decision making.
• Spot the underlying technology capabilities in digital products and services all around us 
• Develop your skills to solve problems that technology hasn’t solved. Match opportunities with capabilities.

• Why and how are we here?
• Technological and macro-economic trends driving change
• The fast growth markets and multi-trillion dollar economy emerging on the continent
• Why Africa is the best place to innovate today to capture future value for your organisation

• Digital technology is breaking constraints for business outcomes and socio-economic ambitions we have always had
• Follow the human behaviours and objectives, to understand what is driving up the demand for more and more sophisticated digital technology
• Deep dive into some of our human ambitions: better decision making; good health; skilled workforce; enough food; financial inclusion; increased trade; safer, lower transaction costs; efficient, pervasive transport and logistics; essential infrastructure; cleaner, cheaper energy; greater productivity; richer collaboration and connection; narrowing the gap between physical and conceptual world
• Connect these ambitions to the underlying technology capabilities that will support their achievement

• Recognize how you see the world raise your level of awareness 
• Crack through underlying assumptions and unconscious beliefs, let go of your emotional commitment to the ‘way things are’. Don’t get left behind.
• Authentic sources of innovation - seeing the value of your lived experience
• Reflection and experimentation are at the heart of growth and transformation, aided by the scientific method to test ideas
• To be creative, you have to be willing to be uncertain
• Those who prosper are not the smartest or luckiest, they are those who learn fastest. You can’t move fast if you don’t learn fast.
• Adopt an abundance mindset to create exponential value

• Understand the difference between opportunities created by technology push and market pull
• Combining technology capabilities, human capabilities, and the innovator’s mindset to break constraints and solve problems better than ever before
• Thinking through the entire customer’s journey - from discovery to design to execution using human-centered design
• Tech Fluency is knowing which technology capabilities to use to break long-existing constraints
• The really hard steps in the customer’s journey that can break most innovative ideas
• Build products not Powerpoints - use our Rapid Value Unlock framework based on design sprints and lean startup principles

• Not all innovations drive inclusive growth - understand the different types of innovation
• The potential for market-creating innovations to create mega businesses in underserved markets
• A different type of capital to fund market-creating innovations 
• The startup skills gaps to close to build the next generation of entrepreneurs
• Africans buying African innovations - the role of public sector and corporate buyers in accelerating technology absorption and shifting the continent towards technology consumption to production

BECOMING A DIGITAL MASTER: THE ART OF CORPORATE INNOVATION

Subtitle: Beyond the technology – the role of the change agent
 

Synopsis: Driving digital transformation in an organization is about much more than learning about digital or exponential technologies. At the end of the day, professional and executives with all the training and knowledge of digital technologies, still struggle to achieve digital transformation initiatives.Deep, transformative change is not the highly academic and mechanical process that we may have been taught. It stems from a more subtle place that requires us to recognize the bubbles we live our lives in and the assumptions we operate in that block our ability to drive innovation. Being a change agent means leveraging your lived experience and perspectives your life journey to tap into areas most ripe for innovation. Rapelang brings her experience as a technology entrepreneur and the principles that have empowered her journey.

 

THE DIGITAL EMPLOYEE EXPERIENCE: BUILDING AN ADAPTABLE, RESILIENT ORGANISATION

Subtitle: empowering people to adapt to the changing world of work
 

Synopsis: Adapting your business to respond to market needs will not be possible without bringing your people along for the journey, which is much deeper and slower work than changing strategy or systems. This entails designing employee experiences with the key elements that empower teams and individuals to perform at the task at hand, from enhanced engagement and communication, to twoway feedback and continuous learning. The digital employee experience is the also basis upon which companies can drive the herculean task of reskilling and upskilling for future fitness. This extends beyond technical skills, to cultivating highly adaptive mindsets and behaviours required to thrive in a

new world of work.
 

The next time you are mulling over how to unlock the creativity of your teams, or close the gap between executives and the rest of the organization, or close the misalignment of teams across the country that are supposed to be doing the same thing - ask yourself if learning has joined the digital transformation.
 

RE: EDUCATION: DEVELOPING MINDSETS, BEHAVIOURS AND SKILLS OF THE FUTURE

Subtitle: shifting the focus from what we learn to how we learn
 

Synopsis: Historically we educated and trained for content and knowledge transfer, assuming what learners know would be valuable for the next 20-40 years. Now, we know that half-life of content is incredibly short, and we can't actually comprehensively transfer for future needs. Rather we need to be thinking about the 'how of learning' so that we are actually building the mindsets, behaviors, and the mental frameworks, that enable people to learn quickly. These are very different skills than what we're currently teaching at universities or in schools where we are still focused on the ‘what of thinking’.
 

Neuroscience research has given us some direction on the how of learning, and requires a shift from crafting content, to crafting of well-pitched learning experiences. We need to develop a new shared language that speaks precisely to the mindset and behavioural outcomes we seek from education, so we can more systematically define, measure and develop for them.
 

INSIDE INNOVATION AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP: MY PERSONAL JOURNEY

Subtitle: Realizing your potential through greater self-awareness
 

Synopsis: Self-awareness is the meta-skill of the 21st century. Research shows that ‘when we see ourselves clearly, we are more confident, more creative, we make sounder decisions, build stronger relationships, and communicate more effectively. And we’re more-effective leaders with moresatisfied employees and more-profitable companies’ according to Tasha Eurich.
 

Rapelang unpacks her journey of entrepreneurship and how an organic journey to greater selfawareness has been quintessential to her success. She looks specifically at how greater awareness is the genesis of much celebrated business ideals – the capacity to be more innovation, the ability to take risk, and the capacity to create value from our unique, differentiated perspective of the world.
 

INNOVATION FOR INCLUSION: ACHIEVING INCLUSIVE ECONOMIC GROWTH

Subtitle: Drawing the link between the promise of technology and uplifting growth
 

Synopsis: Not all innovations are created equal and according to Clayton Christensen’s work, only market-creating innovations achieve inclusive economic growth. and the instrumental roles ecosystem players need to play to support. Deliberate efforts are required by all players in the innovation ecosystem from governments, big business, and start-ups must undertake to leverage market-creating innovations, as opposed to the current focus on sustaining and efficiency innovations.

Rapelang shares her views on the stumbling blocks to achieve inclusive economic through innovation. 'Growth is never by mere chance; it is the result of forces working together,' James Penny.
 

THE AFRICAN ADVANTAGE: THE VALUE OF PROBLEMS

Subtitle: How leapfrog technology is being exported around the world
 

Synopsis: These are many issues that blur Africa’s potential. But it is precisely the quantity and depth of these challenges that enable African entrepreneurs to appreciate problems and inefficiencies in a way that's not possible when the challenges are not so serious. Leveraging the power of emerging exponential and digital technologies, African entrepreneurs are now living through an unusual time, in which the capacity of technology to solve problems is starting to match the scale of these market challenges.
 

Many of the challenges we see in Africa were solved long ago in countries with much higher gross national incomes (GNI), and solved before the advent of digital technology. Typically, they were solved using analogue solutions, and even if things aren’t perfect, they work well enough for everyone to forget the flaws. Ironically, this has the effect of making inefficiencies less visible, and therefore provides less of an incentive for the creation of innovative digital solutions. This is what gives African entrepreneurs an advantage.

PRESENTATION THEMES by Rapelang Rabana