Overview of Amazon Go, its Self-Service Model (A), and its Significance in Revolutionizing Traditional Retail
Amazon Go symbolizes a big revolution and redefined the modern shopping experience. Amazon Go is a 21st-century innovative model that allows customers to avoid the traditional checkout process. With a smartphone app connected to one’s credit card, clients can enter any store, check out the merchandise, choose what they want, and exit without interacting or queuing for checkouts (Siderska, 2020). The benefits of Amazon Go to the contemporary business landscape extend beyond mere convenience and symbolize a transformative force established to confront and challenge the conventional norms in the traditional retail business. By relegating the role of the traditional checkout lines and cashiers, the Amazon Go concept has significantly revolutionized the customer experiences, providing unmatched efficiency and speed. Besides enhancing customers’ overall shopping experience, this technology also presents an incredible threat to different subsectors within the more significant retail industry. For instance, potential disruption is glaring at convenience stores, fast food establishments, and grocery stores owing to the emergence of Amazon Go.
Business Automation Technology
Definition and Scope of Business Automation
Business automation is applying technology to execute routine and continuous organizational tasks, thus enhancing efficiency and reducing physical intervention (Dubey & Tiwari, 2020). The scope of business automation in the retail business extends across different organizational operations, often consisting of tasks such as workflow management, data entry, and decision-making processes. The fundamental objective of automation in the retail business is to maximize the use of limited resources, reduce potential errors in the production processes, and promote faster operations to ensure a continued supply of goods and services to the market (Lee & Meng, 2021). Business automation is all about using technology to foster innovation and productivity in the organizational workflow. In the last couple of years, retail automation has significantly increased due to its ability to reduce labor costs and streamline operations. Retail management is increasingly realizing the need to replace people with machines in any way possible to cut labor expenses and other social demands that come with human resources (Amazon, 2021). Retail giants such as Amazon have embarked on in-store digital automation as the foundational step towards the capitalization of modern technology.
Integration of IT in Streamlining Retail Operations
Sadiq (2019) implies that information technology is a game-changer in the 21st century due to its unimaginable impact on business systems and operations. Integrating modern information technology in the retail business is instrumental in ensuring organizational performance and successful execution of the automation processes. By adopting complex software solutions, retail businesses have now managed to automate tasks conventionally subject to human error and time-consuming. Another essential element of IT integration in retail operations is data-driven decision-making. Data is primarily a goldmine for many retailers as it offers deep insights into sales trends, customer behaviorism, and the operational efficiency of the retail business (Siderska, 2020). IT system integration allows retailers to collect, analyze, and effectively use the data to enhance positive change. For example, the Amazon Go concept’s integration with data analytics tools has enabled retailers to identify products selling well, often used to enhance inventory management and target marketing campaigns to specific areas (Amazon, 2021). Managing inventory and the supply chain processes is a complex and challenging task for many retailers. The IT systems, such as Amazon, ensure these are more manageable. Integration of Amazon Go with inventory systems allows for automatic reordering when the stock in the shops reaches a particular threshold. This prevents the retail from running out of stock and reduces the chances of having excessive inventory, freeing up the retail capital (Amazon, 2021).
Future Disruption Potential
The Amazon Go is an advanced technology widely adopted in retail to promote accuracy and efficiency and ensure scalability. Even though this technology has brought about significant effectiveness and efficiency in business operations, other fundamental factors have also pushed businesses to integrate these advanced technologies. According to Siderska (2020), the clamor for a competitive edge and the desire to cut the cost of operations motivate retail entities to incorporate advanced technology such as AI and automation. According to the recent Amazon Inc. report, the company, using its maiden Amazon Go technology, is embarking on a journey to install this advanced technology in all its stores, completely mitigating the demand for manual intervention for its operations (Amazon, 2021). As a result, customers will need to walk into the convenience stores, pick what they want, and walk out without restrictions. Undoubtedly, all of these features and facilities have made Amazon the best choice for customers.
However, adopting and integrating these automated technologies in convenience stores has significantly threatened other businesses in the same retail industry. Three primary business industries have significantly been adversely affected by the rise of automated technologies like Amazon Go. While these technologies have created significant opportunities for businesses to grow and become more efficient in their operations, they have incredibly reduced the costs of compensation and wages. As a result, the business has become more elastic and innovative, attracting customers’ attention to enhance the overall organizational revenue (Aysolmaz et al., 2023). Furthermore, automation technologies in the retail industry have also disrupted the workforce, as they are required to be more skilled and knowledgeable now than ever. This is fundamental because the workers and other professionals need to maintain a certain level of professional competency to ensure high competence and effectiveness in the organization.
Importance of The Digital Skills Required for Competency Within the Workplace
Fonseca and Picoto (2020) describe digital skills as a wide range of technological knowledge and skills such as competitor applications, software, digital devices, and hardware. They refer to the technologies widely utilized in organizations and are the basis for achieving competency while maintaining effectiveness and professionalism within business operations. Therefore, these digital skills are instrumental in helping employees or the organizational workforce to attend to the various activities and tasks to achieve the organizational goals. Digital office software is top among the digital skills for competency in the workplace. At least every business leveraging advanced technology has adopted either one form of digital software to enhance communication and email programs, maintain daily data, and link with customers (Bejaković & Mrnjavac, 2020). These skills are also crucial in other business operations where employees must use a collaborative virtual calendar to post promotional and team events. Therefore, equipping employees with essential digital office software is critical in allowing them to quickly enhance their skills and improve their competence.
Another essential digital skill for competency in the workplace is data analytics. This is the process of gathering and interpreting data from a wide range of sources and using it to make informed decisions. According to Schlegel and Kraus (2023), data analytics is a crucial skill that workers must possess to ensure they are more competent and effective. Many business organizations use customer data to improve their sales, and data such as several purchases and customer feedback are critical sources of reliable information used to improve services ((Dubey & Tiwari, 2020). Therefore, owning these skills is essential for the workforce to spur changes that contribute to the organization’s overall development.
Conclusion
Overall, this report has examined technology automation in the retail industry and the significance of digital skills in enhancing operational efficiency. IT integration into retail business is a long-awaited endeavor that, since its adoption, has created a massive disruption with opportunities for businesses to cut costs and enhance productivity. Amazon Go is the novel advanced technology that has ensured that convenience stores are reaping well from this technological growth, often allowing customers to walk in and out of the store without being restricted. With digital skills, such as data analytics, employees in such organizations are also destined to benefit from the advances in technology, and business organizations need to enforce these skills into their workforce to ensure competitiveness, high revenue flow, innovation, and the organization.
References
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