SME Monitor 2018: Under the spell of digitalization and Work 4.0
SMEs show a lot of optimism, describe themselves as digitally well positioned, but also see themselves confronted with changes in the world of work.
Once again this year, members of the management of SMEs or other people with management functions took part in a small online survey conducted by the trade magazine ORGANISATOR. They were asked about the economic outlook for the next twelve months. In this respect, 43 percent of the respondents are looking positively into the future, 48 percent assume that nothing will change in the current economic situation, and 9 percent assess the outlook as rather negative. Compared with the previous year, optimism has declined somewhat, although in 2017 58 percent of the SMEs surveyed still assessed the economic outlook as positive. It therefore appears that realism is spreading among companies. Nevertheless, the overall conclusion of the current SME Monitor is that the basis for 2018 is probably much better than last year.
(Still) little interest in agile methods
In addition to questions around economic prospects, challenges and investment behavior, this year's survey also asked how changes in the world of work are reflected in work organization. Here, a differentiated picture emerges: In addition to the digitalization of work processes, which is primarily noticeable in operational terms, a greater need for flexible working hours and more demanding employee management are at the top of the responses. At the bottom are collaboration with freelancers and the introduction of new work methodologies such as Scrum, Lean Management or similar. Since it was primarily small companies that took part in the survey, this finding is hardly surprising - however, for small companies in particular, working with freelancers would be an opportunity to better focus on core processes.
Digitization has arrived in the companies
How digitally positioned do the SMEs surveyed see themselves? The results show: Digitization has arrived in the companies. The majority of respondents see themselves as "solidly digitized," which means that a large proportion of support processes and even some core processes are digital. However, whether this is enough to be well positioned for the future is another question. At least a little more than one-fifth of the companies surveyed consider themselves to be "fully digital", i.e., they have their own digital business models or are, as it were, "children of digitization". The blessings of digitization - such as cost savings or efficiency gains - do not yet seem to have any influence on the workload of employees. Even if more and more machines or software take over the work: The majority of companies do not have less to do or more to pay.
Information about the sample
The companies surveyed for this year's 2018 SME Monitor were 76.8 percent from the services and trade sector, 16 percent from industry and manufacturing, and the remainder from the commercial sector. The majority (64.3 percent) of companies surveyed have fewer than 50 employees, 7.1 percent are in the 50-100 employee range, 16 percent are in the 100-250 employee range, and 12.5 percent have more than 250 employees. Turnover is below CHF 5 million for 50 percent of respondents. Overall, the sample is not representative, but it largely reflects the reality that over 90 percent of all Swiss companies are SMEs with fewer than 20 employees.
The ORGANISATOR special publication "KMU-Monitor 2018" with further information, commentaries and interviews is available download here available.
