A meeting of prominent Australian CEOs recently discussed the constantly-evolving face of digital technology in the workplace.

Chief executives from REA Group, Carsales.com and others in the online market discussed what the corporate realm should do to make sure it takes full advantage of emergent devices, while not leaving employees behind.

It is vital companies avoid being buried by not up-taking a technological revolution when it happens, but being to eager to jump on the next big thing can be detrimental too. Corporate and executive educators Change2020's co-director Vicki Daniel says: “The common refrain we always hear when we go in to help executives with major change programs is ‘Our employees are pretty exhausted, morale is relatively low, there’s been a lot of change.’ They are change fatigued.”

Ms Daniels' advice for companies suffering from 'change fatigue' is to collectively take the time to slow down and breathe, assess the list of goals and tackle a smaller amount of challenges with greater focus on completion. She says while new technologies can greatly improve productivity, they have an equal ability to destroy it, and that all new tech roll-outs should come with a reasoned and well-planned system for implementation.

“I’d be really pushing for business people to be very curious, have a look around at what competitors are doing, what people in other industries are doing with the new digital technologies, read widely … but never ever be overawed by the technology,” Daniel says, “if you cannot get a plain English answer out of a technical person about how easy it is to roll the technology out, how easy it is to use and what value it will bring, I’d be very suspicious.”