People: the start & end of every (digital) transformation journey

Digital business transformation is getting loads of buzz and attention these days. And for the right reasons. Digital has become so pervasive that it has become a true force multiplier for enabling new and better ways to fulfil customer needs. Whether in the form of optimizing existing business processes, transforming customer engagement and experience, or disrupting entire industries with new business and value creation models.

It is tempting to look at technology first to drive a digital-to-the-core transformation agenda and list all digital solutions and applications that could be bolted on top of or on the side of the current business. However, this would just result in fragmenting the effort without a clear cohesive transformation vision and without a clear change management plan to infuse digital in the core DNA of the company. While digital is clearly the connecting tissue, it’s people who are the defining factor for transformation success.

Every transformation initiative starts with people, i.e. the customers your company serves. Ultimately digital technology is a means to an end: better understanding what your customers want and envisioning a better, cheaper, faster way of delivering what they want. Customer centric thinking is what will provide vision and direction to your transformation strategy, starting with leveraging digital (eg. data analytics, social listening etc.) to develop stronger customer empathy in understanding the what and why of customer behavior. And taking these insights to redesign the end-to-end customer experience across their lifecycle in researching, discovering, purchasing and using your product or service. Deploying digital solutions to radically enhance the experience, from the core product/service proposition, to the personalized and 2-way engagement with customers before, during and after the purchase or activation of your product/service. Creating a seamless omni-channel brand experience across all touch points …

And every successful transformation ‘ends’ with people (although transformation is never ending), in that it can’t be done without mobilizing your entire company by evolving the company culture, skills, structure and processes to infuse digital in your core DNA. It starts with internally selling the digital transformation vision and benefits, through intense communication and listening. And it takes a comprehensive change management approach to create a culture of customer-centric innovation and experimentation, and rebuild the company structure and processes to enable the agility and transparency required to prosper in a digital-first world. Attracting and developing digital talent, deploying (digital) tools for learning and collaboration, and empowering your people with data and insights to continuously improve the customer experience. Transformation by the people (your employees, contractors, partners) for the people (your customers, users).