Close Menu
TechCentralTechCentral

    Subscribe to the newsletter

    Get the best South African technology news and analysis delivered to your e-mail inbox every morning.

    Facebook X (Twitter) YouTube LinkedIn
    WhatsApp Facebook X (Twitter) LinkedIn YouTube
    TechCentralTechCentral
    • News

      Listed: All the MVNOs in South Africa – 2025 edition

      19 June 2025

      TCS | Tech, townships and tenacity: Spar’s plan to win with Spar2U

      19 June 2025

      WhatsApp founders hated ads – Meta is adding them anyway

      19 June 2025

      China’s car factories run cold as price war masks deep overcapacity

      19 June 2025

      Yellow Card, Visa in deal to hasten stablecoin uptake in Africa

      19 June 2025
    • World

      Watch | Starship rocket explodes in setback to Musk’s Mars mission

      19 June 2025

      Trump Mobile dials into politics, profit and patriarchy

      17 June 2025

      Samsung plots health data hub to link users and doctors in real time

      17 June 2025

      Beijing’s chip champions blacklisted by Taiwan

      16 June 2025

      China is behind in AI chips – but for how much longer?

      13 June 2025
    • In-depth

      Meta bets $72-billion on AI – and investors love it

      17 June 2025

      MultiChoice may unbundle SuperSport from DStv

      12 June 2025

      Grok promised bias-free chat. Then came the edits

      2 June 2025

      Digital fortress: We go inside JB5, Teraco’s giant new AI-ready data centre

      30 May 2025

      Sam Altman and Jony Ive’s big bet to out-Apple Apple

      22 May 2025
    • TCS

      TCS+ | AfriGIS’s Helen Hulett on how tech can help resolve South Africa’s water crisis

      18 June 2025

      TechCentral Nexus S0E2: South Africa’s digital battlefield

      16 June 2025

      TechCentral Nexus S0E1: Starlink, BEE and a new leader at Vodacom

      8 June 2025

      TCS+ | The future of mobile money, with MTN’s Kagiso Mothibi

      6 June 2025

      TCS+ | AI is more than hype: Workday execs unpack real human impact

      4 June 2025
    • Opinion

      South Africa pioneered drone laws a decade ago – now it must catch up

      17 June 2025

      AI and the future of ICT distribution

      16 June 2025

      Singapore soared – why can’t we? Lessons South Africa refuses to learn

      13 June 2025

      Beyond the box: why IT distribution depends on real partnerships

      2 June 2025

      South Africa’s next crisis? Being offline in an AI-driven world

      2 June 2025
    • Company Hubs
      • Africa Data Centres
      • AfriGIS
      • Altron Digital Business
      • Altron Document Solutions
      • Altron Group
      • Arctic Wolf
      • AvertITD
      • Braintree
      • CallMiner
      • CYBER1 Solutions
      • Digicloud Africa
      • Digimune
      • Domains.co.za
      • ESET
      • Euphoria Telecom
      • Incredible Business
      • iONLINE
      • Iris Network Systems
      • LSD Open
      • NEC XON
      • Network Platforms
      • Next DLP
      • Ovations
      • Paracon
      • Paratus
      • Q-KON
      • SevenC
      • SkyWire
      • Solid8 Technologies
      • Telit Cinterion
      • Tenable
      • Vertiv
      • Videri Digital
      • Wipro
      • Workday
    • Sections
      • AI and machine learning
      • Banking
      • Broadcasting and Media
      • Cloud services
      • Contact centres and CX
      • Cryptocurrencies
      • Education and skills
      • Electronics and hardware
      • Energy and sustainability
      • Enterprise software
      • Fintech
      • Information security
      • Internet and connectivity
      • Internet of Things
      • Investment
      • IT services
      • Lifestyle
      • Motoring
      • Public sector
      • Retail and e-commerce
      • Science
      • SMEs and start-ups
      • Social media
      • Talent and leadership
      • Telecoms
    • Events
    • Advertise
    TechCentralTechCentral
    Home » Company News » How a pandemic accelerated digital transformation

    How a pandemic accelerated digital transformation

    By Mustek3 July 2020
    Twitter LinkedIn Facebook WhatsApp Email Telegram Copy Link
    News Alerts
    WhatsApp
    Huawei business unit manager at Mustek, Donna Mostert

    Digital transformation has been forced onto organisations. Previous reluctance to invest into the tools and technologies that harnessed the potential of cloud and the agility of digital has seen many companies upended and flailing in waters they don’t know how to navigate.

    As the crisis slowly releases its grip on the nation, and the globe, it has become essential that organisations take the learnings of the past six months and use these to springboard into a more agile and flexible digital future.

    According Donna Mostert, Huawei business unit manager at Mustek, while few organisations were ready for the pandemic tsunami, it is not too late to refocus on infrastructure and investment that will prepare the business going forward.

    Companies that didn’t have innovative or out-of-the-box thinking were hard hit by the pandemic

    “Suddenly everyone was working remotely and the organisation had to figure out how they collaborated, shared information, monitored their working hours, managed security issues, and used enterprise servers and systems to access content,” she says. “Functional and operational issues have been significant and challenging. To ensure that there were systems in place that allowed for people to adapt to remote working and flexible hours, digital transformation was accelerated to the point where it has become the norm.”

    However, despite potholes, glitches and complications, most organisations and employees began to embrace this way of working as the new normal. Employees recognised that, if they wanted to keep their jobs, they had to make it work for them. Organisations recognised that people were generally capable of learning and implementing new technologies to the benefit of the company and their own career growth. The burst of technology into landscapes previously sinking into the murky sands of tradition and legacy systems has reinvigorated many organisations and given them new leases on life.

    Entirely new level

    “Companies that didn’t have innovative or out-of-the-box thinking were hard hit by the pandemic,” says Mostert. “They realised that they couldn’t deliver their services or their solutions. Some didn’t make it. But those that did have walked out of the chaos with tools that they can leverage to take their companies and their offerings to an entirely new level, and into new markets.”

    One of the benefits that has been experienced by many companies is time. Employees are no longer late due to being stuck in traffic. In fact, they don’t have to deal with it at all. This allows for people to get more work done in optimal time frames and in ways that suit their workstyle. This is a growing global trend – it was already making headway in Europe before the pandemic – that recognises how different people work and how to allow for multiple workstyles and approaches to drive productivity and engagement.

    “Employers can get so much more from disciplined staff now than ever before,” says Mostert. “There are plenty of positives to not sitting in traffic. People get more time, companies get more of their time, and there is a sense of space in which to focus on delivering more value to both company and customer. This is an opportunity for organisations to ask how they can reinvent themselves and do things differently, look at how the company culture can adapt to these working dynamics as lockdowns ease and office working becomes more commonplace. It’s not a good idea to simply go back to how things were.”

    Certainly, those organisations that try to shoehorn people back into the age-old systems are likely going to lose talent to those organisations that are interested in doing things differently. This may not be possible for some companies and verticals, but for those that can adapt to the 21st century way of doing business, it will be a game changer.

    “Digital transformation has opened up new gateways and opportunities for organisations to further their investments into digital, people and customer,” says Mostert. “The agility and flexibility that digital brings to the company allows for it to prepare for uncertainty, embrace change and be ready for whatever happens next. And yes, there will be another crisis and another unexpected unknown, but the digitally agile organisation will be more capable of weathering the storm.”

    • This promoted content was paid for by the party concerned


    Donna Mostert Huawei Mustek
    Subscribe to TechCentral Subscribe to TechCentral
    Share. Facebook Twitter LinkedIn WhatsApp Telegram Email Copy Link
    Previous ArticleTencent shares hit new record as it opens US game studio
    Next Article As we move our lives online, ESET has us covered

    Related Posts

    China is behind in AI chips – but for how much longer?

    13 June 2025

    Huawei bets on brains over brawn in AI chip race

    10 June 2025

    The most expensive smartphones in South Africa in 2025

    5 June 2025
    Company News

    Why parents choose CambriLearn for online education

    19 June 2025

    Disrupt first, ask questions later – the uncomfortable truth about incident response

    18 June 2025

    Sage brings together HR leaders to explore the future of payroll and people management

    18 June 2025
    Opinion

    South Africa pioneered drone laws a decade ago – now it must catch up

    17 June 2025

    AI and the future of ICT distribution

    16 June 2025

    Singapore soared – why can’t we? Lessons South Africa refuses to learn

    13 June 2025

    Subscribe to Updates

    Get the best South African technology news and analysis delivered to your e-mail inbox every morning.

    © 2009 - 2025 NewsCentral Media

    Type above and press Enter to search. Press Esc to cancel.