AMCHAM’ Eastern Region organized an interactive breakfast and networking session at Hyatt Regency, Kolkata on February 3rd on the ‘Future of the Workforce in a Digital World’ which covered trends in the workplace, workforce and possibilities. Ms. Amada Kidwai, Regional Director – Eastern Region, AMCHAM introduced the speakers. Mr. Atanu Mukherjee, Chairman – Eastern Region, AMCHAM set the tone for the session in his welcome address.

Mr. Somnath De, Associate Partner, Lighthouse, KPMG India, guest speaker at the session, discussed the impacts of digital on the workplace and workforce giving rise to trends such as evolution of mobility driven work landscape; increased focus on education and up-skilling; and emergence of global digital platforms. He said the foremost step is to have business leaders recognize early signs of change, acknowledge its need, understand the impact of workplace trends in their enterprises and prepare for greater agility in the work environment. He discussed how leaders need to introduce digital workplace programs to augment humans, rather than replace them, and how the blend of human skills and digital technologies will lead to improved decision making and higher process efficiency. He spoke about factors for consideration while assessing skill needs and gaps such as automation of routine tasks and role of empathy in tasks involving human interactions. He emphasized how organizations need to adopt intuitive measures wrapped within a change management program, focused on upskilling and mentorship and hire new tech-ready talent to retain and re-train the current workforce. Mr. Pinaki Ghosh, VP – Operations, Data Core Systems gave the concluding remarks and vote of thanks.