HAIFA, ISRAEL – A digital transformation strategy is a laid-out plan to integrate digital technology in different business sectors. That fundamentally changes how businesses operate and offer value to their customers. It is also a cultural change that calls for a continuous challenge of the status quo in an organization.
Its imperative for every business to have a digital transformation strategy, whether its small or medium. That’s one of the main keynotes in every panel discussion looking into ways for businesses to remain competitive and relevant in today’s digital world. However, many leaders still don’t understand what digital transformation means or whether they need to craft new jobs to create a digital transformation framework.
So, why does a digital transformation strategy matter?
A business can choose to embrace digital transformation for different reasons. However, survival is the most common reason why people decide to develop a business transformation strategy. According to business experts, Howard king, business operators, don’t embrace digital transformation by choice since it’s risky and expensive. However, they need to go through a transformation to evolve.
According to the vanguard CIO, John Marcante, corporations in the 1950s remained on the S&P 500 for over 60 years. However, things have changed due to technology, with companies being replaced biweekly. As such, enterprise leaders are expected to invest over $1.9 trillion in technologies and services, enabling digital transformation.
How to develop a digital transformation framework
While a digital transformation strategy will vary based on your organization’s specifics, there are several common themes in all frameworks. The most common elements cited in digital transformation strategies include customer experience, culture and leadership, operational agility, digital technology integration, and workforce enablement.
Follow the following simple steps to develop a digital transformation framework for your organization in a way that allows you to make the most effective changes.
- Analyze the culture
A solid digital transformation strategy starts by analyzing the company’s culture. That’s simply because your culture will dictate the effectiveness of your transformation. By analyzing your culture, you can also estimate how well the new technology will impact your company and how the workers and your customers will receive it.
- Set business goals
As the old idiom goes, “without a vision, people perish.” It can be tempting to implement new technology because everyone is making the change, but the timing must be ideal for it to work. You may also need to be more diligent and strategic to ensure the new technology matches the business culture. Setting business goals also helps to differentiate between technological goals and other processes.
- Document the risks
There’s always a risk in digital transformation. However, the main issue is that some companies discuss and analyze all the risks involved in adopting new technologies but fail to document them. As such, it becomes hard to track the risks over a specific duration of time.
- Run Pilot tests
After analyzing the new technology and documenting the risks, run pilot tests with the technology before rolling it out in all your business sectors. That may mean testing the tech in a small process or department, especially when adopting transformative tech like chatbots. Pilot tests also help you to point out any bugs and see how technology will influence your business operations and culture.
Conclusion
Overall, a digital transformation strategy is highly effective when technology is well-matched with your business culture. It’s also essential to analyze all the risks and set some business objectives to easily track the impact of the new technology in your business.
