How do we find answers to knowing what measures give us for success in any digital transformation? Are today’s measures relevant to tomorrow, are they still based on our legacy system of measurement, when a business was operating in a stable, predictable environment?
Yes, we can measure success in our progress but these are in both multiple and equally personal ways.
Each organization is unique. Never has this become crystal clear that when you face your own transformation journey. You can learn from others, you can adapt but you need to clearly understand where you are in your own evolution and capacity to undertake change as it is simply your journey.
This digitally transforming has not been as well recognized as it is today when we attempt to make any transition, from the old ways of doing business to the new one; that is highly connected, collaborative and based on our growing reliance on technology and ‘everything’ digital. It can become life-changing, changes the scope and opportunities within the business and it is highly individual.
Each business makes a judgment, on speed, scale, and scope of their digital transformation.
How they evolve, in new growth, in their changing business model, in their innovation, in their capabilities to manage the “spread” of activities required to transform. How do they upgrade or re-orientate their people, their customer-facing activity for example?
The world is moving at different speeds, technology is being implemented in unique ways. We are all making and leaving our digital footprint, each very differently depending on our own situations. Judgment becomes personal, relative to your own situation.
We need to measure in those “measured steps” what you need to determine as a transformation journey. Of course, once we have our ideas, we can begin to find ways to measure.
We should always calibrate but we need to seek our own pathway
It is not a bad thing that we must calibrate this against others, in seeing the outcomes feeding back from our customers and markets but it is a journey that you can undertake as you and only you, have the best grasp of what is needed or required. It is your journey.
Can we look out and give it a ‘hard’ quantification in five or say ten years? Does digital transformation have any easy answers? We can take some broader measures as a business is still driven by growth, growth in revenue, in product mix, in-country development, in market share. Or equally how the perception of the company is beginning to change and how the market ‘sees you’ as different and adapting to volatile conditions. You hear the word “exponential” often and that seems a high validation point today.
