Three Essential Skills for Smart City Practitioners
Are you working in the smart city industry? If you’ve recently entered this field, you’ve likely had a similar experience to many others. Those aspiring to become smart city professionals typically join companies targeting the smart city market or departments focused on smart city initiatives. However, after joining, many find that few companies provide a clear orientation on what exactly a smart city is or how smart city-related tasks are managed within the organization. In my experience, both companies I joined offered general orientation sessions about the company, but neither provided specific training on smart city concepts or operations.
In such situations, those who joined the company with hopes of becoming smart city professionals often begin to feel disillusioned with the industry over time. New employees become overwhelmed with handling the tasks assigned to them, without a clear understanding of their role or why certain responsibilities were given to them. Often, there is no one available to provide detailed guidelines or explanations. As a result, many grow frustrated with the vast scope of the smart city industry and the uncertainty surrounding their roles. I, too, experienced these challenges and faced similar difficulties.
This may be partly due to a unique aspect of Korean corporate culture. Compared to foreign companies, Korean firms tend to have less clearly defined roles and responsibilities (R&R). Although this has improved significantly over the past two decades, culturally, there is often greater value placed on individuals who quietly take on tasks outside their formal duties, rather than those who strictly adhere to their defined roles and resist assignments unrelated to their original tasks.
Returning to the main point, I’d like to discuss three key skill sets essential for successfully driving smart city projects, especially for those looking to start a career in this field. The skills listed below represent roles that already exist and are in demand across various industries. In large companies, expertise in just one of these areas may be sufficient, whereas in smaller companies, you may need to juggle responsibilities across all three. Nevertheless, by understanding the framework of these skill sets and applying them to your smart city tasks, you’ll gain valuable insights into your strengths, the skills you need to develop, and any gaps in your current projects. I’m confident that this understanding will be a valuable asset as you navigate the smart city industry.
1. Business Development Skill
In the business domain, Business Development (BD) refers to strategic activities focused on driving a company’s growth and generating new opportunities. Simply put, a business developer’s role is to identify new markets or discover new business models that can drive a company’s revenue growth. For example, Amazon’s expansion from the online retail market into the cloud services market, or Samsung’s move from the semiconductor industry into the mobile market, likely involved significant contributions from business development.
In the smart city industry, business development involves creating projects from the ground up — formulating smart service strategies and securing budgets where no prior plans existed. In essence, it’s about transforming ideas into tangible business opportunities that neither the market nor the client had previously envisioned. For instance, imagine a client has a remaining budget of around 1 million dollars and is interested in exploring IT-related projects. A smart city expert with business development skills could approach the client and propose various ‘smart’ services tailored to their specific needs, such as Smart School for school principals, Smart Shelter, or Smart Mobility for municipal transportation department staff. These proposals would be developed by considering industry trends, competitive dynamics, and the unique characteristics of the client’s business or responsibilities. Through this process, the expert uncovers the client’s needs and collaborates to develop a tailored project. Ultimately, the smart city business development expert identifies new business opportunities, outlines the general budget, and determines key areas for solution implementation.
As the explanation suggests, a smart city expert must possess in-depth knowledge of the latest technological advancements, specific domain trends, and overall smart city industry trends to effectively guide clients. In summary, smart city experts need the ability to analyze problems from the client’s perspective, determining which types or domains of IT services or solutions would be most beneficial to them.
2. Business Architect Skill.
The role of a Business Architect is also recognized within the business industry. Generally, a Business Architect is responsible for aligning a company’s business strategy with technology by designing and structuring processes, solutions, and collaborations to effectively execute projects and achieve organizational objectives.
In the context of the smart city industry, a smart city expert with Business Architect skills plays a crucial role in transforming business opportunities generated through business development into actionable, concrete projects. They identify key elements such as which components to purchase, which to develop, which companies to collaborate with, and what unique capabilities are required to ensure the project’s success. The smart city expert structures the optimal combination of solutions, identifies key differentiating features, and allocates the most suitable solution providers, all while adhering to the budget and project details gathered during the business development phase.
In the smart city industry, clients often assume that once a service domain, such as Smart School, Smart Mobility, or Smart Health, is decided, a single company can manage the entire implementation. However, in reality, most companies either sell single solutions or products or provide only part of the necessary functionality. Therefore, once the vision for the desired service and its details becomes more defined, a smart city expert must utilize their network to determine whether their own company can meet the project’s requirements, identify other companies with relevant expertise, and assess whether the required functionality already exists or needs to be developed. Through this thorough analysis, the smart city expert is able to create a feasible project plan that can be implemented within a given timeframe.
While the role of business development focuses on understanding broader market trends, the Business Architect role must have a deep understanding of solution trends and the smart city industry ecosystem, along with a strong network. The smart city experts need to know which leading companies provide reliable services in areas like smart city big data, what solutions are available in the healthcare sector, and what the latest product versions offer. This level of knowledge is essential for designing projects that are both financially and technically viable.
3. Project Management Skill
Project management is the process of planning, organizing, and overseeing the execution of a project to achieve specific goals within a defined timeframe and budget. It involves managing resources, tasks, and stakeholders, while addressing risks, ensuring quality, and maintaining effective communication to successfully complete the project. Key aspects of project management include scope definition, scheduling, budgeting, risk management, and progress monitoring to ensure the project meets its objectives. Up to this point, these are the typical responsibilities of project management. When a smart city expert takes on the role of a project manager (PM), there are two unique challenges that need to be understood.
First, client requirements are often unclear. While the project scope may be defined at the Business Architect stage, more detailed information is often needed during the implementation phase. However, since many smart city projects are initiated not because of a direct client need, but due to government-driven smart city initiatives or proposals from business developers, the team must often take a proactive role in developing more detailed aspects than initially expected. Proactively defining requirements, unfortunately, is an unfamiliar task for most small to medium-sized IT companies that specialize in implementation(This might also be a characteristic of Korean companies).
Second, most smart city projects are one-off initiatives. Smart city projects tend to have a prototype nature. Most participating companies are often involved in this type of project for the first time. Unlike fields such as construction or civil engineering, where long-established practices allow for a more predictable workflow, smart city projects often lack such precedent. Furthermore, these projects often involve participants from various industries who may use different terminology or follow their own practices, requiring a deep understanding and coordination of each party’s interpretation, as well as careful attention to any missing details. The project manager also faces the responsibility of persuading stakeholders, from clients to suppliers, to ensure the successful implementation of proposed smart services. Regulatory hurdles can also become obstacles during this process, necessitating a meticulous approach to managing all aspects of the project.
The history of smart cities spans over 20 years when considering that a similar urban model, U-city, started in Korea in the early 2000s. Personally, I feel that, despite the time that has passed, the field has not yet developed sufficiently in terms of practical application or theoretical framework. Although this is just a small piece of writing, I hope it can be of some help to young professionals aspiring to become smart city experts.
