Study trip to HEC Paris

18 people from DIG and their partners visited HEC Paris and Studio F:
18 people from DIG and their partners visited HEC Paris and Studio F.
By Ed.

21 June 2023 11:36

Study trip to HEC Paris

Well back from inspiring and wonderful days at HEC and Station F in Paris we reflect on new insights and key takeaways.

The DIG study trip went to one of Europe's leading business schools, HEC Paris.

A group of 18 people from DIG partners, Telenor, Gjensidige, Bergen Municipality, KPMG, Posten, Skatteetaten, Virke, DIGDIR, Finance Innovation and NHH participated.

René Eber, Academic Director and Lecturer @ HEC Paris | ML & Data-Driven Transformation
René Eber, Academic Director and Lecturer @ HEC Paris | ML & Data-Driven Transformation

At HEC we delved into the world of artificial intelligence (AI) and ChatGPT. This world will no longer just shape our future, but is already changing our everyday lives.

AI changes the way we work, communicate and offers many opportunities as well as challenges for society. One thing is for sure; no-one can choose not to be part of this digital transformation by making sense and predictions from vast amounts of data.

At the same time there are both regulations as well as ethical questions that have to be addressed. How do regulations affect the use of data and thereby competition

Julian Schirmer
Julian Schirmer, Academic Director HEC Paris, Data-driven business innovation.

At HEC we deep dived into how business needs to address the questions around big data and AI. How do we handle and benefit from huge amounts of data and how do we find the right ones? How can business leaders transform their businesses and what happens if they choose not to?

Some of the key take-aways from two intense days amongst us were:

1) focus on the job to get done and focus the use of data (data itself will not give you solutions)

2) it boils down to organizational capabilities and especially having the right structures in place

3) data governance is more and more vital – hinder that data lakes becomes data swamps

4) speeding up regulations

Dig at HEC Paris
Ptiching ideas.

The group also got to visit Europe's answer to Silicon Valley, STATION F, where 4,000 talented and ambitious entrepreneurs are gathered in one place.

Here we listened to four pitches from promising entrepreneurs, to whom we gave feedback afterwards.

We had groupwork and were challenged to develop our own ideas, which we got the opportunity to pitch to Jean-Philippe Desbiolles, Vice President & Managing Director- Financial Services | AI & Data at IBM, who gave us constructive feedback.

Thanks to HEC, Rene Eber, Julian Schirmer and Jöelle Cervoni for interesting sessions, excellent hosting, and to all participants for inspiring and pleasant company.