The future will not be made by the few, but by the many. The ones who believe in sharing their collective wealth for better learning and better being. Confluence brought together the stakeholders of this stewardship: government, academia, industry, technology. The panel sharing their views on bridging the digital divide: Doug Ducey, Governor of Arizona; Dr. Michael M. Crow, President, Arizona State University; Max Chan, CIO, Avnet; Sastry Durvasula, Chief Digital and Chief Data & Analytics Officer, Marsh; Ted N. Geisler, VP & CIO, Arizona Public Service Company; Ravi Kumar S, President, Infosys; and Salil S. Parekh, CEO, Infosys.
Key Takeaways
New skills for the new collar
Digital will be the great equalizer of our times, blurring the lines between the traditional blue collar and white collar workers. The democratization of data, automation and AI will empower a new breed to transform the way they work.
STEM is an aptitude, not a qualification
The future needs more digital talent, and fast. Anyone can code, be it a university football player, a barista, or an artist. To put the ability to do so in their hands, learning will go mobile and personalized: open-source, and open for all.
Co-creation from co-location
What happens when you put technology makers, industry shapers and academic thinkers in one room? A diversity of doability: the ability to learn three ways and a symbiotic synergy to rapidly create what tomorrow demands.
Bringing the university to work
Upskilling and reskilling existing talent can be enhanced by partnering with universities to create digital-age curriculum. This curated knowledge can be made available globally, so ivy-league learning is always within reach.
It is all at the end of the day about human capital, how we can enhance creativity, how we can enhance productivity, how we can enhance the efficiency and effectiveness, not by replacing human beings with machines, but by empowering human beings to do far more than they've ever been able to do.
