Your job should be to find how technology can replace you and then seek to advance the initiative to actually do it…
One of the things we should all be considering is how technology will impact our commercial real estate (CRE) portfolios. Technology is a smart way to harness the power of data, analytics, AI, innovation, and, most importantly, automation—so many things can be made better using the innovation of technology. In CRE, these opportunities are like low-hanging fruit—some perfectly suited for your building needs and others completely inappropriate, too costly, not tested, perhaps too “out there”—with lots in between.
We would all proceed if time, knowledge, and resources were infinite, but this allocation is uneven and constrained. Disruption in the CRE space is inevitable and happening right now. Perhaps we should disrupt things ourselves rather than wait to be disrupted by others? Operating on our own timelines and priorities seems better than being forced to act. Perhaps adding some bits of disruption regularly into our lives and work will prepare us to innovate more easily.
Looking at the tasks involved in doing our job is a great place to start. How we organize ourselves to act on the right information, apply appropriate resources to solve problems and follow through to see results is interesting. Artificial intelligence and its variations, such as generative AI, can do amazing things today. Could this replace us? Certainly. Along our journey of exploration, someone or something that can do our job better than us might replace us unless we act intentionally to do better ourselves with the same tools. Disrupt your status quo.
My advice is to start small. Find the tasks in our jobs that are important to your success and are tied to your unique skills, and find technologies that can do it faster, better, and with fewer resources. Ask someone young in your business how that would do your job better using technology. Do a search on the Internet for your unique skills—drawing, analytics, data crunching, assessing risk. Is there an AI tool doing it better? Maybe there is a software program that does it faster and more comprehensively? Perhaps there is an expert out there focusing on a tech-driven niche solution? Investigate, explore, and challenge yourself.
What would have to be true for this approach to work for you? Innovation doesn’t require permission, but requires you to change something. Book time into your schedule to think, be vulnerable to disruption, and find novel ways to replace yourself. Along the way, you will likely be stronger, more valued, and a better contributor to success in your business.
Intelligent Buildings offers CRE technology services that can help you decrease inefficiencies and cyber risk.
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https://intelligentbuildings.com/cost-savings-report/