The pandemic has done more for digitalization in Serbia than any state program. It changed the experience of people, who for the first time found themselves able to work from home, created a real market boom in purchasing equipment and mastering new services, and opened the question of whether working from home remotely should become part of the standard approach of companies in organizing work and using business space
“Covid-19 has moved some industries in Serbia forward by at least two years when it comes to digital transformation,” said Zeljko Crnjakovic, coordinator of the Startit Center in Subotica and owner of the digital content development agency Solotium at the May online presentation of Payoneer’s global report, about the impact of the pandemic on the activities of freelancers who have long since discovered online work from home. This gathering also highlighted those sectors that traditionally do not belong to the online sphere of work and business. As Tamara Gavric, the ambassador of Upwork for Serbia, one of the world’s largest online platforms for hiring freelancers, says: “Finally, I don’t have to explain to anyone what online work is anymore.”
In the first quarter of 2020, the largest increase in laptop deliveries was recorded compared to the previous 55 quarters, that is, for almost 14 years. That increase was influenced by several large state tenders, but certainly by the transition of companies to work from home and the organization of online classes for children. This information was recently presented by Milovan Matijevic, an analyst in the field of information and communication technologies, at the presentation of the new edition of the study ICT in Serbia: At a Glance 2020 of the Vojvodina ICT cluster.
These market data agree with the results of a qualitative survey among employees conducted by the Center for Policy Research in April. They point out that workers and employers have reoriented themselves to online work from home in all those sectors where this has been possible, which according to the Business Registers Agency classification includes professional, scientific, innovation and technical activities, “other service activities” (various consulting services), information and communication and public administration, education and financial activities. Perhaps the biggest step forward in distance work was made by teachers, who shared their experience with us through a survey.
In the research, the answers were offered by 180 respondents of all age groups, among whom highly educated and women dominated. Most of the answers were from Belgrade, but the transition to teleworking was not only reserved for the capital of Serbia, but also from home in Vrnjacka Banja, Kikinda, Ruski Krstur, Ruma, Uzice, Zrenjanin, Nis, Novi Sad, Kragujevac, Sombor, Cacak. , Leskovac, Trstenik, Ivanjica, Senta, Veliko Gradiste, Kovin, Kraljevo, Zajecar, Pirot, Ada, Zrenjanin, Pozarevac, Kladovo and Aleksinac. This research is part of the wider research endeavor of the Center on the transition to online work and the degree of digitalization of the work of companies that, even before they expected, found themselves in the “future of work”.
“We simply could not defend ourselves against the requests of companies that were interested in digitalization. Currently, 600 companies in Serbia use the help of the Center for Digital Transformation of the Serbian Chamber of Commerce,” said Tomislav Knezevic from the German International Cooperation Organization (GIZ) Center, at the presentation of the mentioned ICT study, Nova Ekonomija reports.
