There is no such thing as going back to normal thanks to the devastation Covid-19 is making, asserts Telenor Research.
“The pandemic has shown that necessity is the mother of all innovation. It is clear that the pendulum is swinging towards the need for reflection and deeper changes in the way we run our cities, our companies and our communities,” says Gorm Andreas Grønnevet, vice president at Telenor Research, according to a press release.
As Telenor’s research arm, the team has taken a step back in order to look forward, identifying three key predictions that would shape our new, post-coronavirus reality.
New city infrastructure to facilitate new way of work
As the pandemic forces many typically office-bound workers to work out of their homes, this has opened people’s eyes to the possibility that traditional office complexes are not so essential after all.
More and more people are starting to adjust to working remotely, either from home or near home, for example, in a co-working space.
More governments will start to rethink the way they organize their cities, re-allocating more resources to digital and communications infrastructure as the number of workers operating from home or co-working spaces increases.
These hubs will allow workers to be scattered across the cities and closer to residential areas to cut down on commuting time needed.
Less commuting means less time spent in traffic and less traffic in general, which leads to less pollution, cleaner air, improved public health and increased productivity and efficiency.
Recruitment + AI = Match
While millions of jobs were lost, the world also saw new types of jobs emerge to cope with unique needs stemming from the pandemic and the new limitations on immigration.
In a job market saturated with displaced workers and new manpower needs, the traditional forms of hiring just take too long and many existing skillsets are in dire need of updates.
Telenor predicts that that artificial intelligence (AI) holds the key to transform the employment game for the better.
By processing comprehensive background information about employers and potential candidates, algorithms will filter out unsuitable positions and candidates, and connect the right seekers with the right employers.
The speed and accuracy from AI headhunting will not only reduce time and money spent searching for jobs and new employees, it will also reduce turnover as the chances for a ‘perfect match’ between both parties increases.
Crowd movements to the rescue
A Harvard Business Review article attests that telco data can be used in public health emergencies in a responsible and anonymized format, citing Telenor’s collaborations with local health authorities to model, predict and respond to outbreaks around the world, most recently in Norway and Denmark.
Previous Telenor studies in Pakistan and Bangladesh in predicting the spread of dengue and malaria also prove that aggregated mobility data improves the accuracy of epidemiological models, enabling governments and health authorities to better target their containment measures as well as relief efforts.
The potential for mobility analytics stretches far beyond disease prediction.
It can also contribute to smart city planning, environmental analysis and helping industries like travel to get back on their feet.
