Different organizations face different challenges and demands. As such, digital transformation varies from one company to the next. However, there are common themes that technology leaders should embrace as they look for digital transformation solutions. Examples of the most common aspects include workforce enablement, culture and leadership, customer experience, digital technology integration, and operational agility among others.

Culture and Digital Transformation

Of late, the roles of IT have significantly changed with CEOs increasingly calling for other leaders to look for better ways to generate revenue. Traditionally, the top priority for a CIO is to improve the business process. But in this digital transformative era, they aim at developing new innovative products.

IT is now focusing on driving business innovation instead of emphasizing cost saving. To embrace this change, organizations must rethink the impacts and roles of IT in everyday operations. The majority of startups today are not beginning with huge software packages as a way of incorporating innovation. After all, they are not trying to run data centers or servers. These are things that can be outsourced.

Implementing massive changes is a people issue that falls on every stakeholder. The initiative should reshape job titles, workgroups, and business processes. If the stakeholders feel that their jobs are at risk, then the IT team may feel the pushback. As such, soft skills will be in high demand.

Leading a digital revolution starts with empathy which in turn builds trust. If workers don’t get enough support in the transformative phase, they may not get fully onboard. Leaders must get everyone to know why they are doing what they are doing.

Elements of Digital Transformation

Technology is the main drive and is more of dropping outmoded processes than adopting newer techniques. If an enterprise wants to move with the rapid digital pace, it has to increase efficiency. This means adopting agile principles across all departments. Such principles should bring speed and minimize technical debts. There are key elements that IT leaders must be aware of:

• Consultancy to create new digital partnerships
• The rapid adoption of digital models e.g. cross-functional teams
• Expansion of public cloud adoption
• New success metrics
• Merger and acquisition in IT outsourcing
• Better utilization of machine learning and AI

There is a need for a way to quantify the ROI to prove the efficacy of digital transformation solutions. With projects running across different business boundaries, quantifying success is fundamental to the continued investment. Simply implementing new tech is not enough. The inventions must be tied to performance indicators on business process effectiveness and customer insights.