4IR: Shifting Governance and Professionals’ Thinking Mohammad Shahajahan FCS

4IR: SHIFTING GOVERNANCE AND PROFESSIONALS’ THINKING

Mohammad Shahajahan FCS

I

ntroduction

Now-a-days technologies became indispensable in every sphere of life and devices are interlinked and interconnected through cyberspace which enables communication, education, hiring car, letting residence, online shopping, online trading, medication, consultation, online conference, meeting, presentation, research, etc. Multinational companies and chaebols are increasingly promoting the networking tracking devices to enhance corporate and business performance. Public sector in Bangladesh has adopted e-filing for enabling virtual office, iBAS++ for real time financial management and governance and digitalization of most of the public services for transparent and smooth public service delivery. The private sector is also deploying and implementing the most recent technologies to sustain in competitions. The modern age is differentiated by the speed of technological breakthroughs, the pervasiveness of scope and the tremendous impact of new systems and emerging technologies. The breadth and depth of the techno-digital transformation in the era of 4th Industrial Revaluation (4IR) demands rapid changes in entire systems of production, management and public governance. The response to that rapid changes cannot be left to state institutions alone but requires the active engagement of citizens, the private sector, the academy and civil society. Policymaking cycles and processes used previously became inadequate due to the pace of technological development, its characteristics and quicker scale of emerging technologies comparing to previous industrial revolutions. This paper aims to evaluate the 4IR and its influence to shifting of governance, desired governance model and changing role of company secretary as governance professional during 4IR and finally, to recommend the preparedness of education and governance institutions in Bangladesh to ensure adequate measures at the pace of technological development during the 4IR.

4th Industrial Revolution (4IR)

The first industrial revolution involved changes of agrarian societies to greater industrialization due to the consequence of the steam engine and other technological developments, the second industrial revolution expanded the industries and mass production due to the electricity and technological advances, the third industrial revolution expanded human activity due to modernization in cyberspace i.e. computers and networking. The 4th Industrial Revolution (4IR)/ Industry 4.0 is the current and developing environment of disruptive technologies and trends which are changing the way we live, work and relate to one another due to the adoption of cyber-physical systems, the Internet of Things (IoT), robotics, virtual reality (VR) and artificial intelligence (AI). In factories and workplaces, smart technologies are being used to connect machines to interact, visualize the entire production, supply chain and make decisions autonomously. This revolution is expected to impact all disciplines, industries, and economies and hence it is disrupting almost every industry in every country and creating massive change in a non-linear way at unprecedented speed due to the velocity, scope and systems impact of the changes of the Industry 4.0. According to Professor Klaus Schwab- the new age is differentiated by the speed of technological breakthroughs, the pervasiveness of scope and the tremendous impact of new systems. The breadth and depth of the transformation demands changes in entire systems of production, management and public governance. Responding to the changes requires active role of state institutions, the active engagement of citizens, the private sector, the academy and civil society. With the pace of rapid technological development the data protection regulations also became a prime concern to protect the risk of data misuse especially after high profile data security breaches at AOL Inc., Sony, Yahoo, etc.

Shifting of Governance

The 4th Industrial Revolution is complex, transformative and distributed nature. Therefore, a new type of governance is required to address the interlinked dynamics of the pace and synergistic nature of emerging technologies, the transnational impact of technologies and broader societal implications and the political nature of technologies. Policymaking cycles and processes used previously became insufficient and outdated due to the pace of technological development, its characteristics and quicker scale of emerging technologies comparing to previous industrial revolutions. Emerging technologies build on and diffuse over digital networks, which enable them to mature at a pace and on a scale previously unseen. Technologies are rapidly developing around the globe, irrespective of development of new governance systems to manage the use of these technologies. Besides, as these technologies mature, they converge and combine, creating ever stronger and impactful ecosystems, which can become self-governing by algorithms, coding rules and internal dynamics independently of human action and decision. Therefore, for achieving a shared and common objective, a time bound decision and action should be taken to shape the configuration and impact of technologically driven systems.

Secondly, the use of new technologies has global scope and broad societal impact as these diffused technologies have impact on surrounding systems, including investments, organizational strategies, productivity, consumption and human behaviour. As disruptions to labour markets, the environment and human interactions is obvious due to emerging technologies, they challenge the governance of technologies themselves. So new policies, approaches and social protection mechanisms are become crucial to manage the emerging technologies. Laws to preserve democratic participation, national and international interventions to influence the power of emerging technologies, rules and policies to ensure that the human labour and creativity are augmented rather than replaced, and development of new processes to facilitate synchronization and learning between governments in undertaking similar issues are felt to be in place without any delay.

Thirdly, the political nature of emerging technologies impact the society. Therefore, for equally impact in society rather than supporting either ‘right wing’ or ‘left wing’, the neutrality, values, assumptions and principles of technologies should be ensured fairly at the time of its development, deployment and implementation. From artificial intelligence (AI), it has seen clearly that the ideas going into them. So the ideologies of the developers creating AI, the norms and values in the context within which AI is developed and deployed all have an impact on its applications and outcomes. The racial biases, gender discriminations, ethics in editing genome etc. need to consider in this context. National vision and understanding should be fairly shaped by the political nature of the emerging technologies and their governance should be based on building economies, societies and global views.

Desired Governance Model during 4IR

With the pace of the emerging technologies, powers are being shifted away from governments towards companies and non-state actors, simultaneously, the traditional view of governance is also being shifted and expanded as a concept. Due to the dynamics and facts of the 4IR, humanity is facing the innumerable challenges which cannot be solved by any single sector alone. Therefore, it is suggested that governance must become a multi-stakeholder endeavour and this shift in governance is also occurring because governments and policy-makers are increasingly forced to be reactive to the speed of technological innovation which creates a new role for the private sector and academia working alongside public officials to provide expertise on the technologies they are developing, deploying and potential consequences of technologies. Powerful technologies produced in private sector and their dissemination have a fundamental influence on social and economic structures i.e. from AI to autonomous vehicles to the confluence of systems underlying the gig economy. These technologies and their enabled systems are rapidly shifting behaviours and creating new rules for human interaction due to the incentives and boundaries built in design of the technologies. Though lack of a political mandate, technology pioneers are increasingly developing private rules, certification schemes, standards, social norms or policies that end up, by default, governing the way people live, work and interact and often without being restricted by national borders or limited to a single jurisdiction.

The benefits of emerging technologies are welcomed while their disruptive elements of such emerging technologies need to bring to the minimum level as desired. Therefore, it is required to address their interlinked dynamics, their impact on trans-nations and societies and their political nature.

Traditional governance models are being disrupted by technologies (Arnaldo P. Vanesa W. Maria M. Fred C.

2019). The following ASEAN principles for national and regional governance during 4IR are prescribed:

Speed: Policy makers must recognize that the process of making rules and setting standards must keep up with technological shifts.

Agility: Government organizations, regulators and policy makers must have flexibility to respond rapidly to changing circumstances, without losing sight of the overarching goals and values.

Experimentation and iteration: Policy makers will need to develop ideas quickly, implement these ideas in time bound and experimental settings, learn lessons quickly and steer this feedback into the policy-decisions-making process.

Inclusivity and multiple stakeholders: Truly effective policymaking and regulations will require inputs and views from multiple stakeholders.

Openness: The 4IR is a global phenomenon. Hence, policies and regulations should continue to support collaboration, sharing and exchange between countries within a region and across regions.

New governance models must highlight and integrate the fact that the responsibility for governance does not lie purely with the public sector. Instead, it must harness the insight and influence of the private sector while ensuring that citizens are protected from the negative and disruptive elements of emerging technologies.

Therefore, agile governance can proactively help to shape and direct how technologies impact people and communities in a malleable way through an iterative process. The pace, scope, scale and political nature of the 4IR and its human-centred impacts suggested that agile governance model is being effective. It is necessary to rethink and redesign policy processes by acknowledging that the changes and disruptions are much faster and more complex than before they forced.

Secondly, the concept of political nature of technologies suggested for agile governance in the area of developing emerging technologies, their applications and their consequences. This includes identifying where and how values are formed in the development and use of technologies and determining the optimal political frameworks for integrating values in both spheres.

Thirdly, agile governance is best fit for positioning values that promote societal benefit and well-being as priorities. It can direct the development and use of emerging technologies and to whom they offered benefit.

Changing Role of the Company Secretary as Governance Professional during 4IR

The success of the 4IR is depended on leadership from all sectors working together to leverage the opportunities and address the challenges of the 4IR. Political leadership is responsible for developing and implementing an environment that enables digital transformation and innovation. Business leadership is responsible for leading think tanks and the much-needed innovation in the 4IR. Social leadership should play an important role in preparing society for the changes brought by the 4IR (M. Ickson Manda, S. Ben Dhaou. 2019).

The Governance Professionals have relevant competencies to work to enhance the governance in the organizations or companies for achieving the business’s commercial interest, safeguarding the interest of stakeholders, creating values and ensuring social responsibilities. Following the global financial crisis, giant corporate scandals and the high profile data security breaches at AOL Inc., Sony, Yahoo, etc. the increased and new regulations and emphasis on governance across all sectors and organizations throughout the world demanded for skilled corporate governance professionals like chartered secretaries, chartered accountants, cost & management accountants, legal experts, auditors etc.; and it is anticipated that this demand will be remained high for decades even in the era of 4IR.

Over the years, despite the changes in the industry, especially in the movement to the fourth industrial revolution, the role of an efficient Company Secretary fundamentally remains the same because the modern company secretary should be a business solutions provider, and an expert in negotiation, communication, stakeholder engagement, etc. They have to pay attention to details, be patient, open-minded and humble that impact largely on regulation and legacy (C. Rollini, 2018).

With regulation, company secretary is needed to summarize it as the pace of changes in that area and the ever increasing complexity which impact many aspects such as suitability, accountability, segregation of duties between a board and an Executive Committee, the license to operate, risk management, shareholders/ stakeholders relationship, any other aspects which require a company governance to be constantly assessed, reviewed and adapted (C. Rollini, 2018).

With legacy, company secretary is needed to continue as the relatively recent approach consisting in reassessing companies past activities, behaviours, statements, etc. in the light to today’s criteria and set of values, which forces to consider how something will be perceived in ten or more years’ time, in order to mitigate potential futures risks (C. Rollini, 2018). As with the pace of technological development the risk of potential data use has already emerged, he/she also need to have vast knowledge on the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) which is now the first requirement to protect the benefits of both business houses as well as existing and potential consumers.

Company secretary should be careful enough to provide timely and relevant contextual information to enable the Board to make equally timely and relevant decisions. The decisions and discussions should be properly set in minutes and effective follow up should be done by the company secretary for achieving the strategic objectives of the organization. As governance professional, he/she should assume robustly, ask for solution by keeping things simple and should establish his/her reputation and credibility, not only among the Board members but also throughout the organization as a trusted dialogue partner, advisor and solution provider. By using the emotional intelligence, he/she needs to engage, both individually and as a team, with the Board members in between the meetings to get to know them and better understand the way they work. As much as possible, he/she is needed to expect and anticipate the unexpected thing that may make Board members surprised and irritated (C. Rollini, 2018).

Preparedness of Governance Professional Institute: Bangladesh Perspective

Emerging technologies of the 4IR create ways of developing, exchanging and distributing value across society with faster changes and hence, the organizations and individuals are experiencing the uncomfortable pace of change. These changes are challenging as today we have to address a range of 21st-century challenges, armed with 20th-century mind-sets and 19th-century institutions (Elmi & Davis 2018).

The changes by the 4IR are affecting knowledge systems and it will continue over the coming years. Critical changes for research include new data-driven technologies that will allow governments’ access to real time information. Development of processing and synthesis skills, promoting digital literacy, ensuring data reliability and inclusiveness and data privacy are required to respond to the change. Professional and education institutions, in collaboration with governments and industry, need to prepare lifelong learners, emphasising critical thinking and collaboration skills. Policy experimentation through open innovation platforms at different levels by including citizen participation and collective action strengthened by new digital technologies will be more recognized and used as a way to test policy solutions. Professional knowledge require much more integration of skills, digital literacy, data protection and reliability, ethics, participation and collaboration which as legitimate elements of knowledge systems. So, as knowledge institution, Governance Professional Institutions should adopt policies that can foster- 1) a strategy to govern the techno-digital transformation and 2) a strategy to support leadership and human development capacity (Lee, M. et al. 2018).

In middle-income country like Bangladesh, investment in knowledge systems and fostering interactions among their core components is very highly recommended as it gives scope to education intuitions to prepare researchers and civil servants who are responsible to adapt and adopt new technologies to address the specific economic and social problems of their countries. They are responsible to design the required enabling environment to increase productivity and strengthen competitiveness to ensure a sustainable and inclusive economic growth benefits for all.

Similarly, the middle income country like Bangladesh should highly prioritize the investment in research systems to building a national research culture for strong local innovation, citizen and professional lifelong learning and knowledge which are important to successful implementation of any changes. This will help middle-income countries like Bangladesh to take advantage of the benefits of the 4IR to strengthen their economies as well as their social development (Arnaldo P. Vanesa W. Maria M. Fred C. 2019).

Therefore, public and private universities in Bangladesh, professional institutions (Institute of Chartered Secretaries of Bangladesh-ICSB, Institute of Chartered Accountants of Bangladesh-ICAB and Institute of Cost and Management Accountants of Bangladesh-ICMAB) and other governance institutions in Bangladesh need to update their education systems and competency framework that best fit to face the rapid changes and disruptions occurred due to the 4IR. Professional institutions need to employ their endeavours to update their members with much more integrated skills, digital literacy, big data analysis

ability, knowledge on data protection and data reliability, ethics, capacity for participation and collaboration. Lifelong learning like Continuous Development Programs covering the recent changes, techno-digital transformation, shifting governance model, Sustainable Development Goals, General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), etc. should be convened regularly to update the members of the professional institutes to make them confident to implement the technological changes and manage its consequences within the organizations. Governance professionals need to acquire knowledge and skills on powerful technologies produced i.e. Artificial Intelligence, and their fundamental influence on social and economic structures i.e. the gig economy. They also need to be familiar with technology pioneers, their private rules, certification schemes, standards, social norms or policies (which are by default building in technologies) that are governing the way of living, working and interacting and impacting globally. Therefore, governance and professional institutions need to affiliate with other national and international organizations with a view to collaborate, synchronization of practice and sharing learning between organizations nationally and globally working on the similar issues.

Conclusion and Recommendations:

The 4th Industrial Revolution is complex, transformative, distributed and disruptive nature. Emerging technologies of the 4IR create ways of developing, exchanging and distributing value across society with faster changes and hence, the organizations and individuals are experiencing the uncomfortable pace of change. Rapid development of technologies, global scope and broad societal impact of these diffused technologies and the political nature of emerging technologies’ impact on society suggested that agile governance model is best fit to exploit the benefits of emerging technologies while minimising the disruptive elements of such emerging technologies. Therefore, huge investment in education and research system is highly recommended in middle income country like Bangladesh to building a national research culture for strong local innovation, citizen and professional lifelong learning and knowledge which are important to successful implementation of any changes and to take advantage of the benefits of the 4IR to strengthen their economies as well as their social development. Public and Private Universities, Professional and Governance Institutions need to update their education systems and competency framework that best fit to face the rapid changes and disruptions is being occurred due to the 4IR. Lifelong learning programs, digital literacy, recent technology development and knowledge on their underlying private rules, certification schemes, standards, social norms or policies, risk of the potential misuse of data, General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) etc. are required for updating the governance professional. Finally, collaboration, synchronization of practices and sharing learning of professional and governance institutions with other national and global organizations working on the similar issues will help to capitalize the benefits of new technologies of 4IR.

References:

1. Arnaldo P. Vanesa W. Maria M. Fred C. (2019):

State Capability, Policymaking and the Fourth

Industrial Revolution: Do Knowledge Systems

Matter?

2. C. Rollini, 2018: Fourth Industrial Revolution: How has it changed the Role of a Company Secretary?

3. Elmi, N. & Davis, N. (2018): How governance is changing in the 4IR, World Economic Forum.

4. Lee, M. et al. (2018): How to respond to the fourth industrial revolution, or the second information technology revolution? Dynamic new combinations between technology, market, and society through open innovation.

5. M. Ickson Manda, S. Ben Dhaou. 2019: Responding to the challenges and opportunities in the 4th Industrial revolution in developing countries

6. World Economic Forum, 2018: White Paper- Agile

Governance Reimagining Policy-making in the

Fourth Industrial Revolution

» About the Author

Fellow Member of the Institute