Businesses across the globe are grappling with the implementation of exciting and revolutionary new technologies with the promise that the integration of such technologies will drive greater productivity, efficiency, and sustainability. Top of the list are technologies like blockchain, machine learning and artificial Intelligence.
Where to Start?
This age old nugget has often been the domain of consultants and experts… but there are some Guiding Principles to help us mere mortals approach digital transformation.
“Guiding Principles” are a philosophy that guides an organization’s beliefs and values, creating a company culture where everyone understands what’s important. Let’s take a peek at what these actually look like.
1. Digital Transformation is a journey
Digital transformation is not a goal, but rather an ongoing process that involves understanding how technology impacts brand-consumer relationships and developing capabilities to respond to opportunities.
2. It’s about culture not technology
Consider that that organisational culture deficiencies, including functional silos, fear of risk, and difficulty forming a single customer view, are major barriers to company success in the digital age.
3. Business outcomes should guide the journey
Organisations should establish a clear business objective, start small, focus on one area, and demonstrate the value of digital transformation before expanding to other areas. Focus on flexibility, cost reduction, and quality improvement through digital solutions. Its really about incremental progress.
4. Create a culture of continuous change
Culture significantly impacts digital effectiveness, emphasizing the importance of continuous improvement and adaptability in the face of rapid workplace changes.
Wrapping up this post
In my post last week I differentiated Digital Transformation from IT Transformation.
Gartner estimates that over 70% of transformation initiatives fail and Forbes reports that 84% of Digital Transformation efforts fail. Pretty lukewarm results for sure…
Digital Transformation efforts usually focus on implementing Digital practices, such as Agile, Lean, or DevOps; or implementing Digital Technologies such as Public Cloud, Big Data, Blockchain, AI, or ML – Predictive Analysis. Additionally, many organisations incorrectly think of a Digital Transformation as integrating Digital Technologies. This is merely an IT transformation with the goal of optimising IT performance for business or organisational needs and outcomes. Important?… certainly, but this is only part of the process of Digital Transformation…