What is this digital thing?

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Everyone talks about digital, but most mean different things. Some people understand it; others fake it till they make it. You can sense when it’s present, but may find it difficult to quantify what constitutes it. I was recently re-reading Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and relecting on the way the author builds up a definition of quality, and think something similar now needs to be now attempted for digital. My attempt is not as exhaustive or comprehensive as the book I refer to, but a first pass that needs to be expounded upon by other experts.

Let us first attempt to understand what digital is not. And how it is different.

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Digital is not (just) digitization, though often people use these terms interchangeably. Digitization is the process of creating digitized stores and flows for documents and approvals / updates. It may result in productivity / efficiency gains and cost savings but will leave you wanting more. Digital may involve digitization, but is much more. It is a complete reimagining of business, a new paradigm. It has a transformational element to it. It seeks to reframe a process before digitizing it.

Digital is not the same as online selling or digital marketing. They are important segments of the digital economy. However, digital goes beyond just these and pervades the entire chain from a customer conducting search to seeking more information about the products and offerings to buying to paying and even on to customer service and repeat purchases. Digital is not confined to the enterprise; it extends beyond, seamlessly connecting the enterprise and its devices to other devices, communication networks and systems.

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Digital is not (just) a channel. A digital enterprise is not uni-channel or multi-channel, but omni channel. There are two implications – the first is that the customer is serviced by the channel that is the most effective for that customer, and the second is that there is seamless transfer of a customer from one channel to another (instead of the customer having to restart the process in a new channel). And it is not necessary for an enterprise to have a presence in all channels – it just needs to ensure the chosen channels provide it a distinct competitive source of revenue and profits.

Digital is not just technology and its implementation. It involves strategy and organizational transformation. It is the embedding of digital concepts into the fabric of the organization, instead of being a stand-alone delivery mechanism. In a sense, digital becomes partner to business instead of being a service provider to business.

Digital also pervades in different ways. Gone are the long big-bang implementation cycles and the endless maintenance and numerous upgrades that cause you to stop production work and implement a change. Gone also is the need to alter a business process to adapt to technology and the need for retraining staff to use the new / upgraded systems. Instead the focus is more on human-centric interfaces.

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These are a few high-level thoughts I penned down based on my experiences in the field. What is your understanding of digital? And what it is not? Read the next article for more (So then what is a digital business? | LinkedIn)