INTERVIEW
AS THE LATE Stephen R . Covey , business and leadership expert and keynote speaker , once remarked : “ Trust is the highest form of human motivation . It brings out the very best in people .”
In a business relationship , trust is one of the most , if not the most , vital components .
No self-respecting organisation is going to continue to do business with another if trust has been grossly breached in any way .
And although most businessminded people can usually trust their gut as to whether they should begin to trade with someone , a strong bond of trust between organisations is something that takes quite a while to build up .
With blockchain technology , there is a guarantee of who you ’ re doing business with and an authenticity surrounding the transaction . That ’ s why Paul Devlin , SAP Ariba ’ s General Manager for EMEA and MEE , believes we are about to see a wave of transformation – not just in the procurement industry and across the supply chain , but in terms of global trade itself .
Devlin is clearly a big believer in the technology and recognises how disruptive it is . He also reckons it won ’ t be long until everyone is embracing it .
“ Blockchain is enabling trust in technology almost like nothing else that exists today ,” he says .
“ It will really be at the root of all global asset movement and that will be regardless of which particular market or commodity we are talking about . In the way that we ’ ve just taken for granted the fact that we do 90 % of our work today on a smartphone , we will think about blockchain in that way in a three-to-five-year window .
“ It ’ s just going to be the way we do things because of the provenance , trust and guarantee that it offers .
“ It will then be about how companies want to imagine and innovate the usage of that .”
But , for the uninitiated , what is blockchain ? How does it work ? And how does it engender the trust , provenance and guarantee that Devlin talks about ?
“ At its core , it ’ s a digital ledger of transactions , agreements , contracts , anything which really needs to be independently recorded and verified as to actually having happened ,” he explains .
12 November 2017