Digital Modernization vs. Digital Transformation
In a past article, What Does ‘Digital Transformation’ Really Mean, I set out to define this jargon filled term, and what it means for businesses today.
At a high level, digital transformation is the adoption of new, advanced, digital technology, processes, people, and culture, to transform your business. But it’s more than simply choosing digital technology and using it to change how your business operates. That I would call “Digital Modernization.”Both have their purposes in organizations, but I advise you not to confuse the two.
Digital Modernization is the practice of upgrading or adopting new technology systems, platforms and software solutions to meet the needs of today’s organizations. Digital Modernization is often undertaken by the CIO and will drive some tangential benefits to the organization, including more up-time, faster fixes, increased response times, improved end-user experience, etc.
However, Digital Modernization is largely undertaken to make the operations and infrastructure of the organization itself better off in the long-run. This includes benefits like reduced headcount, less reliance on legacy systems that are expensive to run, hard to maintain, and almost impossible to find employees to support.
Digital Transformation requires viewing the business through a holistic lens of the business, factoring all variables — or what we call the 4Ps, representing People, Process, Policy and Platform. On its own, this requires the inclusion of a new core set of values that thrives on change, and recognition that a strategic roadmap is required. These roadmaps can only be successful when they’re based on the greatest impact aligned to your overall corporate goals to grow revenue.
K2 Digital helps firms do both Digital Modernization and Digital Transformation, and we have found that not all organizations need to do Digital Transformation, and sometimes organizations just need a bit of Digital Modernization to get them to where they want / need to be. As such, we have created an assessment tool that helps organizations understand where they stand on the ‘Digital Maturity Model”.
About the Author:
Please do not hesitate to contact me at Lawrence.Tepperman@gmail.com or on LinkedIn
Lawrence Tepperman is a serial entrepreneur, having successfully grew and exited two startups, 80/20 Solutions and K2 Digital, and is now Proprietor & President of Berkeley Payment Solutions Inc.