Why Services Software is Critical in Today’s Networked Economy

The latest episode of Kantata’s Professional Services Pursuit Podcast features Ray Grainger, the Executive Chairman of Kantata and co-founder of Mavenlink. This episode, hosted by Brent Trimble, is centered around the vision for Kantata and the importance of services software in today’s networked economy. 

Below you’ll find some highlights and key takeaways from the discussion — broken down into four questions asked during the episode. Ray and Brent reflect on some of these questions and provide insight into how to solve the quickly evolving — and increasingly complex challenges — in the services industry. If you find yourself asking the same questions or want to hear the entire discussion, listen to the 30-minute podcast episode here.

What Is A Networked Economy?

A networked economy is made up of global businesses leveraging resources, talent, and skills to deliver valuable services to clients. The networked economy has flourished alongside the evolution of technology and the critical role it plays in business success today.

Ray reflects on the first signs of the networked economy coming to the forefront, “In 1993, people started to have better access to corporate emails…so you had this continuation of the speed at which people communicate. You couple that with globalization that started way before that — where people were moving operations to different countries and leveraging labor pools and talent all over the world. And then the progression now to the hyper-connected world, you can kind of see how it all fits together.”

How Does A Growing Networked Economy Impact The Services Industry?

While the concept of a networked economy may be new to many industries, the services sector has been operating in this economy for years. The very nature of selling services — and doing so profitably — relies on how well leaders can balance supply and demand across a global resource pool. 

The Covid-19 pandemic has really forced a lot of businesses into a networked economy with no choice of their own. Resources are suddenly working remotely, and typical face-to-face communication relies entirely on the technology in place at the business. Many of the challenges being faced by businesses in the wake of the pandemic are the same roadblocks faced by services businesses over the years. 

According to Ray, “I think most people now can identify with [the networked economy], having gone through the pandemic. The entire world, all at once, experiencing a work from anywhere approach, and having survived it — and some actually having thrived more productively through this period. Both technology, as well as the pandemic, accelerated the networked economy.”

How Do Services Businesses Compete in Today’s Networked Economy?

As more industries enter this global interconnected economy, the demand for services only continues to grow. Ray explains how the digitization of business and the evolution of technology has not only increased the volume of services demand, but it’s actually led to increasingly complex, unique, and never-before-seen demands from clients. 

Ray, a consultant at Accenture at the time, reflects on how digitization impacted services quickly and dramatically. “The minute that the world got sped up through the internet, through this hyper connectivity, through an explosion of technology, and every company having an imperative to digitize all of their experiences, the range of skills required and the speed at which I was required to deliver to our clients changed.” Suddenly, services businesses had to provide new skills, at a rapid pace, at scale. 

The digitization of the economy was the tipping point for many services organizations — in order to compete and scale, they needed to lean into technology to support operations. Services leaders began to turn to software systems infrastructure and technology such as Professional Services Automation (PSA) to keep up with demand. 

How Do Businesses In The Networked Economy Leverage Technology & Talent?

The pandemic has had a similar impact across all industries, across the entire world. Many businesses are finding themselves at a similar crossroads — facing the challenge of a hyper-connected world with a seemingly endless pool of talent and technology. Work is truly remote, truly global, and manual operational methods can only get a business so far. In order to compete today, a business needs technology to serve as a source of truth for project, financial, and resource data. It needs to foster global and instant communication and collaboration. 

According to Ray, the future is one where “technology isn’t a constraint on the business.” He explains coupling a global talent network with end-to-end project and resource data is what it takes to truly take advantage of the market today. Ray explains, “when you think about coupling all of the engagement planning so you have very good demand signals with the planning and execution, and then you tie in optimizing resources across a talent network…everything changes. Smaller firms can now really effectively participate with large firms because they’ve got an unlimited demand or supply. If they are good network people, they’ve got potentially an unlimited supply so they can operate with infinite scale. And so they can compete and grow faster if they adopt one technology more broadly.”

A key lesson to learn from services leaders who have navigated the networked economy for years now — turn to end-to-end, purpose built software for services when looking to streamline processes, operations, or scale at ease. Many businesses are overwhelmed by the sheer talent available, coupled with pressures to adopt technology to solve many new, complex, and unique issues. Understanding that software should not be a constraint,  but rather a tool to enable success in today’s competitive, highly complex, and ever-evolving marketplace. 

Want to Learn More?

The Kantata Professional Services Cloud was created specifically to solve the common challenges faced by services organizations today. Kantata enables exponentially more effective operations and scaling in today’s networked services economy.