The “Gap Zone” IT Operations Handled by Students and SaaS
Recently, two interesting news stories were reported. One is an initiative by Toyama Prefecture to advance digital transformation (DX) in the prefectural government by leveraging the power of students. They involve students in tasks like election administration and document organization to drive digitization. The other is the start of integration between “Canary Cloud,” a real-estate-specific SaaS, and “KaiKura,” an AI communication integration platform. This aims to further streamline real estate operations by connecting different SaaS platforms.
At first glance, these two stories seem unrelated. However, from the perspective of business leaders or CTOs, they can be seen as showing different approaches to the same core challenge. That is, how to fill and create value from “operations for which appropriate IT resources do not exist within the organization.” Utilizing students is the external procurement of “human resources,” while SaaS integration is the external connection of “functional resources.” Both are movements exploring new methods of sourcing and configuring IT resources that go beyond a self-reliant approach.
A Third Path: Neither “Personal Dependence” Nor “Complete Outsourcing”
In many companies, especially SMEs and local governments, IT-related tasks often become typical “gap zones.” Management thinks about strategy, and the IT department (if one exists) focuses on the stable operation of core systems. In between, the operation of SaaS tools introduced individually by each department, data integration, and the processing of standardized tasks not fully digitized are left hanging. This is the on-the-ground reality created by the “split in IT’s objective function” pointed out in a previous editorial.
Traditionally, there were two main ways to fill this gap. One was to rely “personally” on an enthusiastic person on the front lines, making the continuity of the task dependent on that individual’s capacity and tenure. The other was to “completely outsource” it to an external vendor, leading to ballooning costs and a growing disconnect from management. Toyama’s student-led DX and open SaaS integrations suggest the possibility of a “third path” beyond this dichotomy.
External human resources like students bring fresh perspectives and digital-native skills without the fixed costs of permanent employment. On the other hand, API integration between SaaS platforms opens a path to “combining” the optimal functions provided by multiple vendors to build your own business workflows, without large-scale in-house development or expensive custom orders to a single vendor. Underlying both is a shift in mindset from ownership (Own) to utilization (Use) and connection (Connect).
How Student Power Illuminates the Gap Between “Business IT” and “Management IT”
In the Toyama case, the “election administration” and “document organization” handled by students are extremely important tasks, yet they are rarely positioned as core “Business IT” (IT directly linked to growth) for the prefecture. Nor are they “Management IT” (IT for stable operations) like core systems. This is precisely the type of operation that doesn’t neatly fit into any IT category, resulting in digitization being postponed and continued reliance on manual work.
The significance of deploying student resources goes beyond just being “inexpensive labor.” Unburdened by organizational constraints or precedent, they can pose fundamental questions like “Why is this task necessary?” or “Is this document truly needed?” potentially triggering a review of the operation itself (BPRE: Business Process Re-engineering). This is an effect less likely to occur when an external vendor simply “systematizes as instructed.” The implication for business leaders is the effectiveness of a strategic approach: before lamenting the IT talent shortage, identify the “operations awaiting digitization” buried within, and by having external, fresh human resources “solve” them, simultaneously aim to optimize the operations themselves.
The Democratization of “Executive IT” Enabled by SaaS Integration
Meanwhile, movements like the integration between Canary Cloud and KaiKura fill the gap zone in another dimension. Property management and customer communication are inherently part of a unified business flow. However, when optimal SaaS tools specialized for each are introduced separately, data becomes siloed, and inefficiencies arise as staff toggle between multiple screens. This is the “more SaaS you have, the less you see the whole picture” problem.
The traditional solutions to this problem were to introduce an expensive, all-in-one integrated package or to develop in-house. However, as the ecosystem of SaaS platforms openly connecting via APIs matures, business leaders gain an option previously available only to large corporations: “selecting the best components (SaaS) and combining them to build the optimal business engine for your company.” By connecting components like Canary Cloud (property management) and KaiKura (AI communication), a higher level of “Executive IT” (IT for decision-making and reproducibility) that seamlessly connects inquiries to contract management becomes achievable even for small-to-medium-sized real estate businesses.
The Fundamental Question for Leaders: “Own” or “Connect”?
From these examples, a fundamental question emerges for today’s leaders when thinking about IT resources. It is the question of “Should we ‘own’ the IT capabilities our company lacks, or should we ‘connect’ to them?”
“Owning” all IT capabilities as full-time employees is no longer realistic for many companies, given costs, hiring difficulties, and the risk of skill obsolescence. So, do we “completely outsource” everything to a vendor (where ownership lies with the vendor and connections are closed)? That breeds dependency and impairs business agility.
The new model suggested by student-led DX and SaaS integration might be called “virtual ownership through connection.” You “connect” to students and their skills on a project basis. You “connect” to the specific, excellent functions of each SaaS via APIs. The leader’s role is to become the architect who strategically “connects” these external resources and positions them within the company’s value-creation flow.
Practical Steps: Identifying Gap Zones and Creating a Resource Map
So, where should business leaders or CTOs begin? First, visualize your organization’s “IT operation gap zones.” Examine your operations from the following perspectives:
- Non-digitized routine tasks: Are there operations managed with Excel or paper, requiring manual aggregation or transcription? (Candidates to be “solved” by students or outsourcing partners.)
- Siloed SaaS operations: Are there tasks where SaaS tools conveniently introduced by individual departments don’t integrate data with other departments’ systems, causing duplicate data entry? (Candidates for automation via SaaS integration.)
- Person-dependent data analysis/reporting: Are there management reports that only specific individuals know how to create? (Candidates for standardization via BI tool/data integration or external resources.)
Next, create an “External Resource Map” to fill these gaps. For human resources, consider local universities, vocational schools, side-job platforms, or task-specific contractors. For functional resources, consider the public API features of your existing SaaS tools, other integrable SaaS platforms (including via tools like Zapier or Make), and cloud services. Using this map, you can start thinking strategically about “which gap to solve by connecting to which resource.”
From “IT Talent” to “IT Resource Orchestration Capability”
The lament of “We don’t have enough IT talent” is often a mindset constrained by the old framework of “wanting to own all IT capabilities as full-time employees.” Toyama’s student-led DX and the evolving SaaS integration ecosystem send a clear signal to move beyond that framework.
What future management requires is not hoarding excellent engineers, but rather the ability to discover, evaluate, and strategically connect/orchestrate the diverse human and functional resources that exist externally into the company’s business workflows. It is a role akin to a “conductor,” organizing human resources like students and freelancers and functional resources like countless API-connected SaaS platforms in line with business objectives.
This “IT Resource Orchestration Capability” is the essential new competency for today’s business leaders and CTOs to prevent the split in IT’s objective function, organically connect Business IT, Executive IT, and Management IT, and simultaneously achieve business reproducibility and agility. The first step begins by examining your organization’s “gap zones” and exploring the possibilities of “connection” to fill them.
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