What does a Chief Digital Officer do?
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A Chief Digital Officer (CDO) does more than simply create a digital strategy for an organization. Their role is also to ensure the strategy aligns with core business vision and objectives as supported by a digital road-map which takes the organization from today into the future. More importantly however, the CDO makes this plan actionable and is responsible for execution amongst many other things.
Responsibilities
As part of the executive team, a CDO ensures that the plan has been validated by both stakeholders and the Board, and that it aligns digital technologies used by the organization to the overall mission. They are responsible for maintaining a top-down view of the people, systems and infrastructure required to deliver on the plan and implementing appropriate governance for seeing it through. More specifically, depending on the organisation, the CDO is responsible for:
- Development of a Digital Strategy which is based on the team's vision, the organization's internal and external capabilities and the business objectives. Ensuring that the digital strategy is in line with the current and future goals of the organisation and its stakeholders.
- Validating the Strategy and Roadmap with stakeholders, the Board, and sometimes customers.
- Communicating the Strategy and Roadmap to the wider organisation.
- Development of governance and policy documentation for the management of digital expenditures and projects.
- Monitoring and updating the company's Strategy according to current and anticipated operational or environmental changes.
- Evaluating and optimising the company's utilisation of systems, equipment and infrastructure. In addition to providing feedback to management on the performance of these systems.
- Managing the requirements-for and design-of current and future digital landscapes (software, integrations, networks and infrastructure) which align to the company's objectives.
- Ensuring that systems are designed with sufficient redundancy and scaling to match required business models, operations, and systems up-time requirements.
- Supporting the identification and development of business models which leverage new digital technologies and platforms which improve growth and process efficiencies. Turning off off legacy systems and managing migrations to new ways of working.
- Ensuring the business has a clearly documented customer journey (internal and external) which is supported by effective systems and processes which lean on modern technologies.
- Scoping new developments or projects which are required to deliver innovation for the organisation and ensuring progress is managed through effective project management and governance.
- Having oversight of the ownership of intellectual property rights, and implementing appropriate systems and controls for management of information security and policies for the protection of company and customer data.
- Reviewing the cyber security posture of the organisation with input from specialist capabilities to understand gaps in current solutions.
One area that many organizations find themselves missing out on the benefits of digital technologies stems from the general misunderstanding of the role of IT within the organisation. Without top-down leadership, organisation's often find themselves continually investing in systems and infrastructure which don't stack up from an ROI perspective but seem to be a necessary evil. Much of this stems from not having a core Digital Strategy to refer to, or a lack of governance across IT project expenditure. Often you might hear of a business which invests 'heavily' in SAP, Salesforce or Dynamics 365, with ongoing investments racking up big bills each year. Without a clear strategy and governance, value is being created, but not at the same rate as the amount invested. Decisions aren't filtered and projects seem to extend indefinitely as feature bloat creeps in. Unsurprisingly organisations find themselves spending more and more on their digital ecosystem each year, despite the fact that their business hasn't grown significantly.
Digital Transformation = Big Problems = Requires Action
Organisations face a massive challenge when it comes to implementing digital transformations with self-reporting of the reason for poor uptake or failed transformations including any one of the following reasons;
- Lack of Vision, Inaccurate / Poorly defined objectives
- Poor understanding of the customer
- Insufficient data to support strategy
- Unclear roles and responsibilities
- Cultural barriers / Organisational resistance
- Solution / Technology bias
- Inflexible technology stack
- Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt
- Lack of momentum
The CDO's responsibility is to support the business to identify key actions and critical success factors that will drive the transformation, and ensure there are sufficient resources, capability and resolve applied to them. Supporting this one might refer to the seven decisions that matter in a digital transformation (McKinsey). Those are;
- Where the business should go
- Who will lead the effort
- How to sell the vision to key stakeholders
- Where to position the firm inside a digital ecosystem
- How to make decisions during the transformation
- How to allocate funds rapidly and dynamically
- What to do and when
Each decision needs to be thought through, not in isolation but as part of a team. It's no surprise that Kotter also writes about the 8 steps required to effect any kind of change in an organisation which involves creating a climate for change, engaging and enabling the organisation, and implementing and sustaining change momentum.
Setting the Stage - 'Our Vision'
Vision setting isn't something that the CDO does on his/her own but rather is a team effort that gives substantial consideration to the market trends and the opportunities there are to better serve customers through digitally enabled and improved offerings. At a minimum workshops on the company's digital vision, should be carried out with customer advocates and executive staff to develop an appreciation of what is desirable, viable and feasible, and most importantly, those outcomes which will lead to sustained growth for the business over various planning horizons. Initial workshops led by the CDO may focus on identifying the business' customer value proposition which may be translated back into a technology road-map comprised of activities for digital enablement. Workshops may include customer journey mapping and internal systems and process mapping to identify areas where digital technologies can improve or automate core service functions. Solutions may be proposed that combine multiple technologies to achieve a desirable customer experience, and may make existing systems obsolete. Finance and procurement teams may be involved in supporting the establishment of cost and resource estimates for each stage of the transformation and the vendors required.
Digital Strategy / Technology Roadmap
Once an initial vision of the company's digital future has been established, the CDO can begin to work with the digital transformation team to develop a digital strategy and technology roadmap which sets out the short, medium and long term plans for digital enablement. The roadmap will be a living document that as new technologies emerge over time, will be amended and updated. The technology roadmap will provide the broad brush strokes of the company's digital transformation plan and will be a high level view of the activities that will be undertaken to meet the digital objectives. The roadmap will give the business a picture of where they are headed and the benefits that will be realized. The technology roadmap won't necessarily be about new technology acquisitions, but will certainly identify areas where existing technologies can be re-used and/or improved. The roadmap may identify areas where a new technology may be required for an optimum customer experience.
The roadmap will be a point of discussion in executive management workshops to ensure alignment and support of the digital agenda. This strategy document will provide the CDO and the digital transformation project team a framework for those activities to be undertaken to achieve the digital objectives. The strategy document will have enough detail to make it clear how the vision will be realized, but will not go into technical detail. This document is a single source of truth for the digital transformation plan.
Digital Transformation Plan
A Digital Transformation Plan will form a key part of the CDO's overall digital strategy. The Digital Transformation Plan will be based on the outcomes of strategy workshops and will be the blueprint for the organisation's digital transformation. It should include a strategic overview of what the CDO intends to achieve in the coming one to three years, which will be broken down into various planning horizons.
It is important that the CDO's Digital Transformation Plan takes into account the changes that will need to be made to support the implementation of the strategy. For example, if the organisation is going to have a web based business model, then it is likely that new staff will be required to support the business. The CDO should be aware of the need to hire these staff and have an implementation plan in place.
The CDO needs to ensure that the Digital Transformation Plan is driven by business needs rather than technology needs. The CDO should also be able to demonstrate how the digital transformation will contribute to the business goals and objectives, and how the plan aligns with the business strategy. This includes the need to make sure that the plan is realistic and achievable in the timeframe given. Moreover, the Digital Transformation Plan is a living document that may be updated as the Digital Strategy evolves.
Business Cases
Most companies will require a business case to justify expenditure on transformation projects. The business case is a high level document that will be used to support the development of detailed project plans that are required for approval and support of projects within the digital transformation plan. A business case will give the executive management team an idea of the benefits that will be realized from the initiatives and will be a document used to communicate the benefits of the digital agenda to the business.
Project Management
The CDO may responsible for the oversight of the project management team who will be responsible for the delivery of the various projects. The project management team may be comprised of internal staff or external service providers. The CDO will be responsible for the establishment of the project management governance structure, and for the establishment of the project management processes, methods, tools and templates. The CDO will be responsible for ensuring that the project management team has the necessary authority and resources to deliver the projects on time and on budget.
The project management methodology should be tailored to the type of project being undertaken. For example, a major ERP software implementation may require a formal set of Agile techniques to be used. It is important to resource a project management team that is adequately trained and provide the necessary tools to support successful management of outcomes.
Change Management
Digital transformations take time and can involve significant change. As such the CDO needs to consider the requirement for change management in the successful adoption of any new technologies. The CDO will need to ensure that there is a proper change management framework in place that covers both the change from legacy systems, and the change from traditional ways of working to new ways of working.
It is important to consider the emotional impact of change. It is easy to become blinkered in the adoption of new technologies, but it is vital to consider the people impacted. It is not simply the users of the technology that need to be considered, but the wider organisation too. For example, if the solution being implemented is to enable customers to transact with the business online, then there will be a need to train existing staff in using the new technology and the impact on the customer service team of having less face time with customers.
Communication is a critical component of the change management processes. The CDO should therefore consider the development of a communications strategy and plan for those activities required to solicit, foster and reward support from the organisation and it's staff.
But wait.. is there more?
You've already seen above that there's a lot to think about when embarking on a digital transformation project, something that firmly sits within the core responsibilities of the Chief Digital Office. Just as there's many moving parts to such a big program its also important to recognise that even in Business As Usual times, there's plenty for the CDO to be doing. Technology is a differentiation for almost all businesses, not just in the selection but also in the use and adaption of those technologies to provide improvements over what is currently available in the market. A CDO's role continues to evolve with the technologies and the requirements of a business; constantly answering the question "what will give us the competitive advantage?" and positioning the company through deliberate actions and deployment of the right resources to capitalise on those opportunities.
Next Steps
I don't propose to be an expert on this topic, and recognise that everyone's experience is different. So let me put this question to you: Is there something I've neglected or overlooked?
In short, I hope this article inspires and is useful to whomever reads it, and my great thanks to who ever shares it! It's only by sharing our collective knowledge that we all can advance the fields we work in.
As with all my articles, I encourage you to leave a comment ?? , and engage in a healthy discussion about your own experiences! And finally, Thank you for visiting!