• by Danielle Sauvé , Op-Ed Contributor, January 3, 2018

I’m not sure why I bother to carry a purse anymore. I carry my checkbook, my filing cabinet, my photo album, my identification, my address book and more in my jacket pocket. One device has converged the capabilities of my single-task tools, and the latter now seem nostalgic and clunky. What perhaps started with the Palm Pilot has created an appetite for more tools that multi-task for us, allowing us to do more while also simplifying our lives.

And it’s not just in tech; I see this across industries. Years ago in the beauty industry, BB creams emerged delivering several beauty benefits in a single product. A popular Swedish retailer has increased its number of bed options that include added functions like under-bed drawers, behind-headboard bookcases, or even beds that expand from single to queen and have drawers. In accessories, the cross-body bag has virtually replaced many forms of purses because of its versatility to be carried or worn different ways. Due to the rising popularity of wardrobe capsules, a sweater is advertised by the number of ways in which you can wear it (my most recent sweater purchase boasted seven possible looks).

Your choice of smartphone, beauty products, furniture, accessories and even clothing provides you with solutions to multiple problems, so it’s only natural that the technology you use in business should also multi-task for you, to achieve simpler experience to getting your work done.

Yet, we find it easier to settle for a disconnected, inefficient experience at the workplace. We accept that “this always takes this long” or “that person just never gets back to me” or “it is the way it is.” C’est la vie.

But this is changing in the packaging industry, and I expect it to intensify in 2018. 

More and more, businesses are expecting technologies to work together, including the packaging tools they use to create value for their companies. They are refusing to accept that a voicemail can’t be converted to text, that software and systems don’t integrate, that there isn’t an app that can do something faster than they can. I once visited a business whose associates used 20 different software apps to get one job done. Before I left, we had replaced seven with a single tool. Packaging technology is converging.

To get existential for a minute: people are less inclined to waste their limited time on this earth doing work that can be executed by a bit of code or a string of logic (often with better accuracy). But practically speaking, many of them can’t afford to waste time anyway, due to staff reductions and budget freezes. Their agenda is already spilling over into the grayed out blocks on the calendar, and they desperately need digitization, automation and connectivity to relieve the pressure they experience on a daily basis. 

Now that we’ve grown accustomed to technology multi-tasking and simplifying our everyday lives, this digital transformation needs to pull together to simplify the tasks we perform at work. We need more system thinking to show us opportunities to converge technologies so our associates can multi-task, meet expectations and even be poised for future growth. In 2018, more and more simplified solutions will arrive, for both our personal and professional lives and as consumers and as professionals, we shouldn’t be satisfied with anything less.