Alexandru Stoenescu, Vice President, Europe Operations, Country Lead of Romania & Bulgaria, Genpact: By encouraging fresh perspectives and embracing new ideas, we can stay at the forefront of our industry

In the fast-paced world of business, adaptability and innovation have become the cornerstones of success. In the face of challenges, let us not only persevere, but adapt and thrive. Each obstacle is an opportunity for growth so let’s foster a culture of continuous learning and innovation within our teams.

By encouraging fresh perspectives and embracing new ideas, we can stay at the forefront of our industry. I also think that we all have a responsibility in Romania to further grow the business services sector and give back to the community.

Whether it is looking for ways to foster better skilled professionals, working with academia to prepare new talents for the work environment or helping local communities through CSR programs, we should all partner to make Business Services in Romania the sector of choice for both customers and key talent.

Also, we saw how quickly new technologies can evolve and how companies need to be at the forefront of these new technologies if they want to benefit from them.

To do this companies need to foster strong partnerships and invest in their employees.

In the digitized era in which we live, soft skills and the human touch will continue to play a significant role. We, at Genpact, will continue to focus on our employees’ development and their well-being, equipping them to navigate a constantly changing digital landscape.

Artificial Intelligence will be on the agenda of many industries, and we will witness innovations and fascinating concepts and solutions.

We are well on our journey to be an AI-first company and continue to pioneer in this fascinating domain to unlock value for our customers. AI in general and GenAI in particular will continue to be a field with significant potential from all points of view. We are still at the beginning of an interesting journey to fully unlock generative AI’s power, reach, and capabilities, and we are excited to support our clients as we build new solutions together. Beyond 2024 our research shows that GenAI will reach up to 30% of the AI market, cutting across industry sectors and being amongst the top investment priorities for CIOs and CDOs along with Cloud Services, Security infrastructure or Analytics.  

The evolution is also due to the changing expectations of the workforce. Gen Z is beginning to make up a significant percentage of companies, even in managerial positions, and we can also see a clear change in other generations as a result of technology changing the business world at an increasingly faster pace. Leaders today are expected to set an example and ‘walk the talk’ not just when it comes to business, but in terms of wellbeing, work-life balance, and the kind of people they are in and out of the office.

There is a bigger emphasis than ever before on soft skills. Leaders who are ready to learn, be empathetic and genuinely care about their teams are well-positioned to succeed and inspire. This of course in addition to taking calculated risks, encouraging bold ideas from diverse teams and driving a maniac focus on clients’ needs.

The shift to a more human-centric leadership approach is due partly to the rise of AI. Leaders need to embrace AI and work with it, recognizing what AI can and can’t do. AI chatbots may be able to imitate human attributes like empathy and curiosity but it cannot substitute genuine conversations.

Beyond this, there is a need to foster innovation, curiosity and grit within the teams as key skills have to include the fast adaption of new technologies (in ever shorter cycles) coupled with a great ability of learning to un-learn and being change tolerant.

Customers across industries face pressures of various kinds. Increased inflation affecting consumer spending, supply chain shortages, competition on the labor market and the emergence of GenAI is posing new challenges across industry sectors. There are two behaviors which emerge relevant to our industry. Firstly, there is a need for transformative solutions to deliver value, well beyond cost with liquidity and supply chain effectiveness at the forefront. Secondly, we see the need for accelerated delivery of said value in shorter cycles and stressing the available innovations through AI enabled technology. At Genpact we see this as a great opportunity to capitalize on the evolution of the emerging technologies and focus on business outcomes.

As we set our sights on the future, I think we should continue to focus on collaboration. Our collective strength is greater than the sum of our individual efforts. By working hand in hand, we can achieve remarkable results and reach heights that seemed insurmountable.

We also need to remain curious and be continuous learners. One of the biggest skills is being able to learn something new and the ability to reskill yourself. For example, as we did in previous years, we should continue to improve our team’s Artificial Intelligence skills, acquire new ones, and strengthen the existing ones. Considering the big advantage offered by Genome, our state-of-the-art learning platform where each employee has access to a variety of tailored curriculums, from soft skills to digital ones, from Storytelling to GenAI, I encourage all my colleagues in Romania to continue to stay curious, learn constantly and inspire others.

One of the most important achievements in 2023 was the opening of our collaboration hub in Iasi as Genpact is committed to growth in Romania. We expect to create up to 1,000 jobs in finance, risk management, sales and commercial services, IT support, and data analytics for Romanian citizens living in and around Iași. We already have a very talented team in that region, and we wanted to offer them a thriving workspace and meeting point for clients and employees working in remote capacities.

We continued to hire colleagues throughout Romania and constantly investing in their growth. Also, in the previous year, we’ve intensified our efforts in collaborating with NGOs, universities, and student associations with a clear purpose of making Romania a better place.

In 2023, we’ve added many new clients to our Romanian service delivery portfolio, from various industries. This is reconfirming of the fact that Romania remains an important country within the global ecosystem of Genpact and our biggest delivery center in the region.