Intro to Business Transformation

Introduction

With the rapid pace of business change in today's world, Business Transformation is a critical component to success but what exactly is Business Transformation??

I am going to describe it in this article.?

I will also elaborate steps to Business Process & Organizational and Technology Change.?

My name is P. K. Saxena.?

I am the CTO of Sofcon Systems India Pvt. Ltd.?

Sofcon Systems India is having 27+ years of experience in the field of Automation Solutions and now has started helping their clients in their migration path to Industry 4.0.?

Guide of this journey is Eric Kimberling, who is CEO of Third Stage Consulting Company, an independent consulting firm that helps clients throughout the world with their Business Transformation journeys.?

Organizations are forced in many ways to change very quickly in today's day and age. ?

Macroeconomic events, Societal changes, Pandemics, Market changes, all these different things are driving change and forcing organizations to change. ?

There are also opportunistic changes and opportunities available to organizations. ?

Regardless of what is driving your organization to change, it is safe to say that if you are not changing, you are probably dying.?

Most organizations are faced with a decision and a necessary plan to ensure that they go through a Business Transformation in a way that helps enable the business and help them grow in the future. ?

What I want to elaborate in this article is what exactly is Business Transformation and how can you apply that concept to your Organization?

Strategy and Business Model

Any organization that is faced with change and a potential Business Transformation, needs to first think about their strategy.?

Business Model is your strategy. ?

Business Model is what is going to help you realize the business growth and potential of the market. ?

There are two different types of strategies that organizations follow. ?

One is a sort of opportunistic growth centered strategy and Business Model is to go along with that. ?

Other, as I mentioned before, is organizations that are being forced to change the market, and that is forcing you to react and go through a Business Transformation in a more reactive way. ?

Whether it is reactive or proactive you need to ensure that you have a Business Transformation Strategy and also you have a Business Model that supports it. ?

For example many organizations find that they are not as profitable as they could be. ?

Moving to a Strategy or Business Model that focuses on standard operations and common operating procedures throughout the organization might be one aspect of your Business Model or it could be more Customer-Centric. ?

How do we better service our customers??

How do we provide the information they need??

How do we provide the products or faster service they need??

How do we sell more??

How do we ensure that we have a positive employee experience? ?

These are all different components of a Business Model that can help you through your Business Transformation. ?

By the way those are just a few examples. ?

There are plenty of others but in general you want to look at what is your overall strategy? ?

What is your Business Model??

It should be the foundation for your Business Transformation Strategy.?

Operating Model

Once we have a clear strategy and Business Model at a high level then we need to dig deeper and start to define our Operating Model. ?

In the future state how are we going to enable a better customer experience??

How are we going to drive some of these cost efficiencies that we may have identified as part of our strategy going forward? ?

That Operating Model is probably going to leverage some of the strengths you have today.?

It is also going to mitigate some of the weaknesses you have.?

It is also ideally going to take advantage of some best practices and things that you have not considered yet that are not necessarily improvements.

They do not necessarily fix anything that is broken but they provide you opportunities for growth or for new markets or for better customer experiences.?

For your customers to help, you have a better Operating Model to support that. ?

To cut short long story, the key here is to ensure that you have an Operating Model that is aligned with your overall strategy and Business Model and that you have defined your current state and where you want to head and what you want your Business Transformation to accomplish from an Operating Model and Business Process and Operations perspective.

Organizational Strategy

The next thing to think about as part of your Business Transformation is the People side of the equation. ?

We dealt about the Process side of the equation. ?

Now we are going to discuss about people. ?

So here is where we look at the organization itself.?

How is the organization designed? ?

What is the culture of the organization? ?

What are the strengths and weaknesses within those two dimensions of your business? ?

Another component or another dimension is the whole talent management side of things. ?

Do we have the right people??

Do we have the right skill sets? ?

What are the skills that we have today versus the skills we need tomorrow to support that Operating Model??

And that strategy and Business Model that we discussed about earlier so that whole organizational assessment that whole piece of the organization or the people side of the equation is a critical part of a Business Transformation. ?

Typically it begins with an organizational assessment so when we get involved with clients that are going through a Business Transformation for example we will go in and do a two-prong approach to identifying the organization today where the pitfalls and opportunities are and what the plan going forward should be and that assessment tool is focused on understanding the culture today versus what the needs are in the future. ?

It is also focused on some of the strengths and weaknesses of the organization as well and ensuring that we have identified potential ways to improve the organization going forward so in summary it is very important to recognize that the Organizational Strategy is one of the most important parts of any Business Transformation.

?Technology Strategy

Today's Business Transformations typically entails some sort of Technology enablement. ?

In other words it requires some sort of new Technology to enable the Business Process improvements or the overall Business Transformation that you are trying to accomplish. ?

In fact it is pretty rare that we see Business Transformations that happen without some sort of technological stream within that so once we have addressed the people and process aspects of our Business Transformation now we need to define what is that Technology strategy? ?

What are the systems we have in place today that are supporting our business and then working well??

Where are the gaps??

Where are the deficiencies? ?

What are the systems out there in the marketplace that might help us enable a Business Transformation? ?

For example when it comes to just improving systems you already have it may be that you go to look at potential ERP or Enterprise Resource Planning technologies things that can tie together your financials, your inventory management, your?HR and all the different operations within your business. ?

That is an example of a type of technology. ?

That is enterprise wide that can help you be more efficient, help you transform your business in a way that addresses some of the weaknesses and inefficiencies of your organization.?

But in addition to ERP there is other types of systems out there too. ?

There is Customer Relationship Management which focuses on your sales, sales automation and customer service business processes.?

You have HCM or Human Capital Management which is HR technology meant to help you with recruiting and the whole higher to fire process within your organization. ?

You also have BI or Business Intelligence software, Supply Chain Management automation & lots of different technologies out there which can help you automate your business & improve your business. ?

Then there is also emerging technologies as well which in some cases are built into some of the technologies I just mentioned. ?

But in other cases there might be standalone technologies that you can deploy as part of your Business Transformation. ?

Things like Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, those are two examples of emerging technologies that can be game changers for organizations. ?

Whatever type of technology you might consider or might be applicable to you it is very important that as part of your Business Transformation you define what systems you have today and what systems or technology landscape you envision in the future to best help you support that people, process and strategy component of your overall Business Transformation.?

Preparing your Business Transformation Road-map

Once you have identified these four major threads I have discussed about which were Strategy, Operating Model, Organizational Model and Technology Strategy now you need to put it all together in a Business Transformation road-map or plan. ?

All these changes are not going to happen overnight.?

It took you long however it is taking you long now to get to where you are as an organization.?

You are not going to change those things overnight but you can have a clear plan for incrementally how you are going to change those things over time.?

Usually that Business Transformation plan and road-map will include all the different threads I have discussed about.?

It may include some other things as well. ?

Those are the major work streams or activities that you want to ensure that you include in your overall transformation. ?

It is important here to note that you do not want technology to necessarily drive your entire Business Transformation.?

A lot of organizations think that if they go buy the hot new technology that is out there that is going to help them transform their business or at least give them a vision for how to change their business.?

While it may enable your business it should not be the driver.?

Which should be the driver of how you transform your business is your overall strategy, what you are trying to accomplish as an organization as well as the operational strategy and the people strategy that we have already discussed about. ?

So regardless of what the priorities are and what exactly you decide to do you want to make sure you have an overall Business Transformation road-map. ?

Then ultimately you treat that like any other project within your organization, with a clear project plan, with milestones, with a project manager and with outside consulting support where you might need it. ?

And by the way organizations like Sofcon Systems India team under the guidance of Third Stage consulting can help you with that sort of transformation. ?

Third Stage consulting firm have helped lots of organizations through their Business Transformations but regardless of that you want to make sure that you have a clear Business Transformation plan and road-map to help you go forward. ?

Now for more information on this whole concept of Business Transformation road-map and just understanding what some of the best practices are behind Business Transformations, I encourage you to check out some of the downloads included below.?

These are links to a number of different resources, white papers, blogs, videos etc. ?

I encourage you to check that out to help you in your Business Transformation journey.?

I hope you found this information useful.?

By Digital Prabhat

Resources:

1. Eric Kimberling- Intro to Business Transformation

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????????????????????? ?Third Stage Consulting Group

????????????????????? ?https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=reJKX9oUGus

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???????????????????????? 2.?2021 Digital Transformation Report:

????????????????????????? ?https://resource.thirdstage-consulting.com

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????????????????????????? 3.?Top 10 ERP Systems Ranking:

??????????????????????????? https://www.thirdstage-consulting.com

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?????????????????????????? 4.Top 10 ERP Systems For Small Businesses:

????????????????????????? ?https://www.thirdstage-consulting.com

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????????????????????????? 5.Top 10 CRM Systems:

???????????????????????????? ? https://www.thirdstage-consulting.com

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?????????????????????????? 6.Guide To Organizational Change Management:

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