Digital change is the process of transforming your business processes, products, services, and culture to leverage the opportunities and challenges of digital technologies. It can help you improve efficiency, customer satisfaction, innovation, and competitiveness. But how do you manage digital change in your company? Here are some tips to guide you.
The first step is to understand where you are and where you want to go. You need to evaluate your digital maturity, your strengths and weaknesses, your goals and objectives, and your gaps and risks. You can use frameworks, tools, and surveys to help you with this analysis. For example, you can use the Digital Transformation Canvas to map out your vision, value proposition, capabilities, resources, and metrics.
Digital Transformation is almost a misnomer. Large scale system changes require as much or more often more attention to people than systems! It’s critical to have a clear understanding of the goals, and leverage those as a key aspect of Change Management. People are far more willing to support (or at least tolerate) change if they buy in to the goals. In fact, with clear positive goals you’ll unlock innovation, advocacy and support. Pro tip: goals should almost never be 100% tied to money!
The next step is to define your digital strategy, which is the plan of action to achieve your digital goals. Your digital strategy should align with your overall business strategy and address the needs and expectations of your customers, employees, partners, and stakeholders. You should also consider the external factors that affect your industry, such as competitors, regulations, trends, and technologies. Your digital strategy should include clear priorities, initiatives, timelines, and budgets.
The third step is to build your digital team, which is the group of people who will execute your digital strategy. Your digital team should have the right skills, roles, and responsibilities to deliver value and results. You may need to hire new talent, train existing staff, or outsource some tasks. You should also foster a culture of collaboration, communication, and learning among your digital team and across your organization.
The fourth step is to implement your digital projects, which are the specific actions and activities that will make your digital strategy a reality. You should use agile and iterative methods to design, develop, test, and launch your digital solutions. You should also monitor and measure your progress and performance using data and feedback. You should be ready to adapt and improve your digital projects based on changing needs and conditions.
The fifth step is to manage your digital risks, which are the potential threats and challenges that can hinder or harm your digital change. You should identify, assess, and mitigate your digital risks using best practices and tools. Some common digital risks include cyberattacks, data breaches, compliance issues, technical failures, user resistance, and cultural barriers. You should also have a contingency plan and a crisis management plan in case of emergencies.
The last step is to sustain your digital change, which is the ongoing process of maintaining and enhancing your digital capabilities and outcomes. You should keep up with the latest trends and technologies and update your digital strategy accordingly. You should also encourage a culture of innovation and experimentation and reward your digital team for their achievements. You should also seek feedback and input from your customers, employees, partners, and stakeholders and use them to improve your digital value proposition.
Allowing your team to have a safe space to fail will be critical for your Digital journey. The tone on the top needs to drive the change, which includes promoting an environment that allows for curiosity and empowerment. It should also include access to the different tools and promote the collaboration on those tools, that can lead to new innovations that can be used across the organization. Don’t limit the transformation to just a portion of the organization and expand it to everyone, however drive the change in a controlled manner that allows your leadership team to monitor the success of the adoption from all levels of the organization. The comments in this response are mine and not a reflection of my current employer.