Balance Your Priorities
I have several interesting discussions whenever I told the audience in my Talks regarding why Smart Cities should have these traits of becoming more:
- Collaborative
- Responsive
- Cost-Effective
- Accountable
- Transparent
If you asked the citizens whether they wanted their Governments or Local Authorities to embrace those qualities, the answer would be a big “YES.” But somehow it doesn’t resonate well to the other parties (Governments or Local Councils). Why?
We knew how IT helped to make organizations more cost-effective, but when you have a deeper integration with each and every device that you monitored with IOT sensors connected, the jitter gets down to the bones of the people who managed the assets.
Imagine that when every “assets” linked to the person responsible. It can be good or bad depending on how that person handles and manage that asset.
But that’s how IOT works – reducing cost and getting higher efficiency.
If you are a Captain of a sinking ship – what’s your first instruction – plugging the hole of the ship or steer to a new direction?
Of course, the answer would be to plug the holes and stabilize the ship before you can steer to the new direction. It’s the same for any organizations, even before they create new revenue streams, they must be able to identify areas of improvement, reduce any stumbling blocks, streamline and shorten the process, reduce manual work and increase automation. And that’s what IOT does!
Countries such as Japan and Korea kept improving their services because they have reached a state where everything should be automated, and services are citizen-focused.
Thus, every country that wanted to implement their vision of Smart City must understand where the priorities are.
It’s not enough to simply “want” a Smart City. Get the trust from the citizens, and you will get them to build the Smart City that you envision.