Digital Transformation Strategy and Technology Webinar Recap

Mark Troester, Vice President of Solutions Marketing, Digital Transformation, Progress, discusses some of the commonly asked questions about Digital Transformation and breaks them down into three themes.

This week, I co-hosted a webinar titled “Crafting Strategy and Technology for Digital Transformation.” During the presentation, we discussed the challenges and methods organizations should implement to execute a successful digital transformation strategy.

The audience submitted a range of questions that address the typical discussions I have with organizations. The questions offered me a great opportunity to break them out into three key themes.

Understanding What Is Key for Digital Transformation

Much like other buzz word terms in the technology space, digital transformation means a lot of things to a lot of people. Having conversations about the topic usually leads to the expression of different points of view or even disagreements on what a transformative effort really entails. This is exactly why crafting a digital transformation strategy is so difficult.

Without key leadership driving a strategy and culture at an organization, a successful digital transformation strategy will not get off the ground. How leaders drive this strategy and alignment on the key approaches is critical to achieving new revenue opportunities, customer satisfaction and avoiding disruption.

Change Creates Apprehension

Many of the questions submitted started with “What is the best…” or “What is the correct...” strategy or technology. This was lightly addressed on the call, but there is no one-and-done formula that will address a company’s pain points and respond to disruption indefinitely. There are too many outside factors and influences that are constantly changing. Instead, organizations should develop a light-weight framework that drives toward a business outcome. This strategy should be unique to the dynamic of your organization and industry, while enabling you to take small steps toward driving near-term business outcomes.

Waiting to execute while crafting a significant five-year plan only allows time for others to disrupt the market, or for you to miss out on achieving business objectives.

Settle on One Outcome

Our discussion about “either/or” on the call generated a lot of questions. Many believe that organizational dynamics or vast technology complexity dictates that they choose a specific focus area for their digital transformation efforts. Should we focus on finding the right internal technology? Should we rebuild our customer journey? How can we improve the employee experience when our customer experience is broken?

Don’t be forced into settling. Select a process solution, technology or methodology to accomplish business results without compromise. As both Carl and I discussed, digital transformation strategies need to be comprehensive, but they should also be agile and reflect your individual business needs. Any process, technology or methodology that prevents this isn’t a true transformative solution.