How to Get Your Transformation Unstuck
Following the opportunity to participate in the "Inside Analysis with Eric Kavanagh " radio program last year, I wrote this article as a recap of some of the key points we discussed.?To hear the full broadcast of the show and interview, please visit -?https://insideanalysis.libsyn.com/how-to-get-your-digital-transformation-unstuck.?
It happens all the time. Projects get stuck for various reasons. Sometimes it's technology; a lot of times it's not. In this article we’ll explore how a project can get stuck and, most importantly, how to get it moving again.
PAST TO PRESENT
Businesses that are trying to evolve and move to the digital age still oftentimes think in terms of brick and mortar. They carryover best practices for growing the bottom line from the offline into the online world.
To further muddy the waters, the platform economy is rapidly evolving as consumers and businesses are at the precipice of embracing emerging technologies like Web3 and the metaverse. Although these technologies are not consequential in our daily lives today, they are expected to proliferate every B2B and B2C transaction in the next three to five years. Coupled with the introduction of new currencies and ways to pay, every one-to-one and business interaction is increasingly more complicated.
Unfortunately, the growing chasm between external forces rapidly driving technology forward and companies clinging to antiquated on-prem technologies stymies digital transformation.
So how do we translate what we’ve learned offline into the digital world, prepare for what’s ahead, and successfully lead effective digital transformation?
THE FUTURE OF TRANSFORMATION – SETTING THE FOUNDATION
Every business leader must be cognizant of the dramatic speed of change that we're seeing today. Business models get upended very quickly. As a result, it’s important to understand the utility of transformative technologies and then decide what to invest in and how to prioritize those investments.
To get started, invest in core operational efficiencies. Investments in the cloud and application migrations from legacy systems to cloud data platforms is foundational. The cloud in and of itself is revolutionizing IT infrastructures and has enabled digital transformation in many ways.
Low-Code and No-Code
In the early days of the Internet, everything had to be coded by developers. Now there are low-code, no-code platforms to allow business users without a computer science degree, prior knowledge, or coding background to address their own development needs.
AI, Machine Learning & IoT
Years ago, only the Fortune 2000 could unlock the benefits of machine learning (ML), artificial intelligence (AI), and the Internet of Things (IoT). Now, these technologies are becoming commoditized, platformized, and made accessible to every business.
Blockchain
Fintech has leveraged blockchain not just to streamline processes but to collapse them. Six to eight years ago, moving money across international borders was a complex process that took days, sometimes a week, to accomplish. With blockchain, these transactions can be completed in hours. Also, in consumer banking, neobanks and microbanks can be stood up fully formed in days versus months powered by blockchain.
If you're working in a business that has any kind of transaction or commerce, make sure you're investing in, or at least investigating, moving towards blockchain technologies.
With cloud as a foundational technology, you have a flexible and scalable business model. It's cost effective, manageable and reduces risk. Thanks to cloud-based models, anybody can pivot or build by starting small and scaling quickly without making a huge investment.
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Digital Transformation Enablement
Let’s look back at 2020. We witnessed several companies suddenly lose business in March, while others had more than they'd ever had before. Then, external factors shifted, and immediately growth receded. To manage these extreme spikes in market behavior, enterprises need architectures that can handle massive upticks and utilization, and then be able to scale back to save costs.
We always talk about scaling up and scaling out in the cloud when demand peaks but scaling back down is half the challenge. If you're relying entirely on an on-prem environment, you have to design for the highest peak level of activity. However, that means you can't scale back down easily. Over time, that becomes expensive in terms of total cost of ownership.
Flexibility is a major benefit of cloud. The ability to provision additional resources when you need them and then return to a regular state of business is fundamental. To do that, create a capacity plan now. What does a peak look like for your business? What does that peak look like from a cost perspective? If you plan for peaks now, you can control costs during a spike and ramp back down when necessary.
THE FUTURE OF TRANSFORMATION – GETTING THERE
As a next step, the key is to focus on your competitive advantage and differentiators.
During the pandemic, dynamics suddenly changed so companies were forced to adapt. In-person dining became curbside pickup; retail stores turned into mobile ordering platforms. In moments like these, businesses must understand and focus on: 1. What they do well; 2. What they do better than their competitors. The intersection of their answers should guide them on the path of proactively updating their infrastructure in anticipation of change or opportunity. That's what digital transformation is all about—being proactive and agile for when intersection points hit inflection points.
A good example can be found at Aflac. The bread and butter of their brand is white glove service for their policyholders. For example, when a group policy is sold to a large company, an army of agents would go out and meet face-to-face, one-on-one with employees to explain the policy options and sign each person up individually. Then the pandemic happened.
How could they deliver that same personalized experience without actually being in person?
The innovation team was able to generate account landing pages, develop personalized welcome videos from each agent, leverage online conferencing technology to recreate the one-on-one experience between agents and policy holders, and even reproduce live policy signing. It was important to Aflac to preserve the essence of their brand and deliver that experience, not only as a tenant of the pandemic but as preparation for the future.
As we move towards Web3, where people are going to be moving further away from in-person interactions to digital ones, online exchanges must be more frictionless.
HOW TO GET YOUR DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION UNSTUCK
Perhaps your foundational infrastructure is in place, and you’ve made meaningful steps on your digital transformation journey, but your initiatives are stuck. What now?
When we talk about digital transformation, many leaders focus on technology. Based on that assumption, a stuck transformation is believed to be a technology problem. But when you get right down to it, technology is just a tool to enable people to achieve business objectives. Ultimately, digital transformation is a culture transformation with people at the center.
With this in mind, when your digital transformation initiatives are stuck, look to your people as your best resources for getting unstuck:
With a well-developed team bought in on the strategy, take your culture transformation further by enacting a shift in mindset and a change of vocabulary. The long-time industry term “requirements” should be swapped out for “outcomes.” Business and technology leaders – and their teams – should focus on desired business outcomes instead of just expressing requirements. Ask yourself and your team:
Let the technical people worry about how to map out requirements from your desired business outcomes and deliver technically. Instead, think through your ideal end state and concentrate on what you're aiming to achieve.
Ultimately, transformation is delivered by people for people. So, have a scalable and agile foundation, then get your digital transformation journey unstuck with strategies that are people focused first.
Great points, Cory. We often build within the box we have or know without building for the outcomes we desire.