Technology is accelerating. Regulation is tightening. Complexity is now part of everyday reality. The real transformation does not only occur within structures, it also lies in how we collaborate and work together. Those who truly progress are not simply the most specialized or the quickest, they are those that learn collectively, move beyond rigid roles, and share responsibility for navigating the unknown.
To illustrate this change, we looked collected perspectives from five very different worlds. Their perspectives do not always align, and that is exactly the point, as the differences in our approaches are not only an important part of this discussion, they are the discussion.
The idea that mastery in one field alone is enough does not really hold up anymore. I used to think progress was something linear in the sense of clear steps, attached to defined roles, and somewhat predictable outcomes if you just got good enough at your craft. However, that view does not match how things actually move today. In reality, progress is far less tidy. It takes shape in the messy middle, in conversations that cut across roles, and in the gray areas where no one has full ownership. It sits in the tension between what’s possible and what’s allowed.
At the same time, technology is accelerating, automating parts of our work, and constantly redefining what knowledge is actually useful. That means it is no longer enough to stay within your own discipline and execute well. What sets all of us apart now is our ability to keep up with technological innovation, understand the broader context, connect perspectives, and navigate where different fields overlap. That’s where real relevance is built.
That shift is also what made me curious to ask colleagues across our five different business areas at Knowit how they experience these gaps. They each work at different intersections of technology, regulation, design, and business strategy, and their perspectives made one thing clear: the differences are not just about expertise, but about how we approach problems, move decisions forward, determine what matters, and how we continue to expand what we know.
What I found myself wondering was this:
“Where have you seen the biggest gaps between perspectives and how has that changed how you work beyond your own expertise?”
Below are their reflections on that question, each from their own perspective.
Business area Insight: Johanna Wallnäs – Advisor at the intersection of Law, Organization & Strategy
Part of my role is to operate across law, sustainability, and innovation, and to create that space – bringing in different perspectives early, before positions harden. This means holding room for unfinished thinking instead of rushing to alignment, and framing challenges as shared problems rather than handovers between disciplines. It’s about building collaborative trust so that disagreement can surface – and actually move us forward.
At the same time, I work closely with top management to build alignment and buy-in – not just for outcomes, but for the time, space, and understanding required for the development process itself. In doing so, leadership must understand the business value of creating that space, otherwise, it will always be the first thing to go.
Business Area Solutions: Juulia Suvilehto – Data Engineer, helping clients extract real value from their data
– The work I do as a data scientist and data engineer at Knowit Solutions is often very dependent on different stakeholders with varying backgrounds. Moreover, I often work close to people whose technical skills are differently shaped than mine. What I have noticed is that the biggest gaps often arise in people's blind spots, or unknown unknowns. This is when someone doesn't even realise that there is a gap in their understanding.
This is often revealed when someone asks a question that seems bizarre to the receiver: "What does it cost to buy one of these AI models?" or "Why is the legal review taking so long? It's just a standard contract."
I've been on both sides of that look. These moments used to frustrate me, but I've come to see them as useful signals, a sign that two people are operating from genuinely different maps of the world. The most productive thing you can do is get curious rather than impatient. And it goes both ways: somewhere out there is a legal expert quietly wondering why the data pipeline is taking so long, equally unaware of what's actually involved.
Business Area Experience: Stina Borgström, Head of Brand Experience, focusing on how agentic AI is reshaping brand discovery and conversion
– I actually think this shift is already in motion. The biggest gap I see right now isn’t about disciplines, but about who actually starts. In the same organization, some people are already testing new ways of working while others are still pretending nothing has changed. In my role exploring how agentic AI can create value and meet the user’s new baseline of expectations, I spend much less time trying to convince skeptics and instead work with the people who want to move fastest. At Knowit Experience, the winning strategy has been to start with small projects and prove value quickly – that’s what makes it spread, even to the skeptics, because results speak for themselves. Action and personality beat discipline when knowledge and craft are democratized!
Business Area Connectivity: Camilla Maricic Head of Knowit Connectivity South, helping R&D organizations navigate through technology
– Coming from finance into technology leadership, I’ve spent much of my career standing uncomfortably close to the gaps — between what engineers want to build, what businesses think they need, and what regulation will inevitably question later. In Connectivity and R&D‑heavy organizations, these gaps widen quickly when AI enters the picture, often exposing technical debt, unclear ownership, and decision‑making that avoids the hard trade‑offs. What has shaped me most is realizing that many organizations are not short on competence, but on the ability to truly listen across disciplines before choices become locked in. My role today is less about translating technology and more about provoking the right conversations early — especially when speed, compliance, and long‑term architecture seemingly pull in different directions. Progress, in my experience, starts when we stop protecting our silos and instead take collective responsibility for the consequences of what we build.
Business Area Products: Emilia Holmeby, Scrum Master and developer, focused on bridging gaps and creating flow across teams
– As a consultant within a large global organization, I often see how misalignment between design, architecture, and development slows progress. In my role as a Scrum Master, I focus on creating clarity, aligning people, and enabling early collaboration across teams. By collaborating earlier, testing ideas together and shaping solutions jointly instead of working in silos, we reduce feedback loops, avoid rework, and improve both speed and quality.
In my experience, real progress comes not from perfect processes, but from bringing perspectives together early and staying close to the problem as a team. This becomes even more important in a product-oriented context, where cross-functional collaboration and long-term ownership are key to building sustainable solutions.
A pattern started to emerge as I listened across perspectives, expanding how I think about expertise and progress. Across disciplines, persistent gaps are not about competence, yet they are about time, perspective, and the spaces we either create or neglect for shared understanding. They show up as unasked questions, unchallenged assumptions, or uneven momentum, and become clear when we choose curiosity over certainty and collaboration over speed. Again and again, the same thing shows up: the real value sits in the in-betweens, where perspectives meet and something new can take shape.
Breaking silos and mastering the potential of an expertise means seeing these moments not as friction, but as signals, i.e., opportunities to slow down, listen, and reframe problems together. It is surprising how often progress begins when someone dares to question what others take for granted. In those moments, which tend to be early conversations, gaps turn into opportunities for shared understanding rather than friction, and that’soften where the most meaningful progress starts. Bridging perspectives is not just translation but shared responsibility for what we build and the willingness to step outside our lanes to build it better, together. Because in the end, it is in those in-between spaces that ideas ignite, collaboration becomes real, and the future is created.