You’re about to embark on a project that will change your technical landscape and bring your organisation up to speed. But, you know that roughly 70% of these endeavours fail. What will it take to ensure a successful digital transformation?
Do you have the right tech stack? Possibly. Chances are you’ve had business analysts work with technical teams to determine requirements. You’ve spoken to associates about the pros and cons of each technical alternative. And you’re acutely aware of the disruption a move from your legacy system might cause. So, from a technical standpoint, you’re on a roll.
Yet, technical projects rarely fail because of technology. They fail when:
- Organisations approach transformation as one linear delivery instead of taking an iterative approach
- Change isn’t rooted in actual business needs and, therefore, the solution doesn’t provide business value
- There’s a lack of buy-in and change communication
When transformation succeeds, it has the potential to:
- Enable productivity and connection, automating repetitive tasks to make way for high-value interaction
- Allow mobilisation of resources
- Increase technical cost efficiencies and ROI
- Boost the business’s ability to scale and win customers, as well as foster customer loyalty
- Increase employee satisfaction and staff retention
- Improve reputational standing and mitigate risk
According to Tech Target, there are six elements your organisation needs to consider to realise a successful digital transformation. Here’s our take on what these mean in terms of talent.
1. Mindset
Your leaders need to set the tone, continually sharing the vision and encouraging advocacy at all levels of the organisation. Depending on your leadership teams’ skill set, you may need support from strategic planners and communicators. If the leadership team isn’t working towards a singular vision, now’s the time to get talent in who can facilitate alignment.
2. Culture
When it comes to digital transformation, you’re not just looking at a new toolset. You’re proposing a completely different model of interacting with each other and the customer. There will be resistance. A good change manager will know how to harness this energy and turn it into advocacy. Hire someone into your team who has successfully demonstrated this competency and brought people along on a journey through significant change.
3. Talent
This point is fairly straightforward. Talk to your recruitment partner about a gaps analysis. We spend our days helping organisations like yours build high performing teams. Per the previous point, don’t underestimate the value of hiring change agents who can work with your subject matter experts to realise beneficial outcomes. When determining if someone is suitable for a change role, an initial qualifier will be how they communicate their achievements. For example, is the candidate requirement and deliverable focused or outcome and impact focused? Successful digital transformations require people geared towards the latter.
4. Goals
You have a strategic plan. So, any transformational project will tie into your overarching organisational goals. But, to transform successfully, you need to break these goals down. As a recruitment agency that believes the future of tech is human, we advocate for a human-centred approach. Your employees and customers are the fundamental drivers of business success, so consider their needs first. A good user experience specialist or service designer can facilitate design thinking and goal setting. Your program manager or, if working agile, anyone on the technical team can write user stories. Don’t jump to the design phase until someone with the right skill set has identified benchmarks, defined key metrics and set measurement intervals. Your leaders need this information to communicate progress.
5. Tech
Ok. So, this one is actually about the stack. But that doesn’t mean it’s all in the hands of technical leaders. Get input from a cross-functional team to ensure any solution is sustainable. Ask these functional experts to consider how different system features align with user stories. Also, make sure you have people on your team, either on a permanent or contract basis, who can advise on security and compliance implications of the new toolset. Sign up early adopters and change champions who can give new users support through training, documentation and help forums. These people are already on your team! But don’t wait until the end of the project to identify them or develop training materials.
6. Fail fast
In what seems like a massive contradiction, it really is ok to fail fast (and small). Failing in this sense is more about learning. It’s not about short-terminism or quitting projects before they’re finished. It definitely doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have an upfront planning stage. At its core, the term ‘fail fast’ just means ‘be iterative’ and ensure there’s always a feedback mechanism. If you allow your team to navigate learning loops from discovery to design and delivery, you’re less likely to have to do a full pivot when you’ve already sunk hundreds of thousands of dollars. Working iteratively might seem easy, but it’s different to how many of us are used to working. Thus, you may want to hire someone with skills and experience in this area to provide a sound framework.
If you’re about to embark on a digital transformation project, talk to us about getting the right talent on board to make it a success.
