Digital Transformation DiscussionBy Stage Four, along the journey of Digital Transformation, we begin to see the hard work of change agents’ take shape. The attention of the C-suite has been captured; executives have agreed to come up with a strategic plan to implement digital transformation across their organization.
Stage Four is aptly named, “Strategic”.
In our last post, we covered Stage Three along the six-stage journey, where momentum started to build around the sea change known as digital transformation.
In Stage Four, we see leadership’s acceptance of technology as purposeful as it’s implemented to drive goals. Oftentimes, the acceptance and emergence of digital transformation is evidenced in a new role that’s created — Chief Digital Officer or Chief Experience / Customer Officer. And it’s accompanied by a multi-year digital strategy road map that’s focused on the customer experience.
The City of New York’s New Chief Digital Officer
Sree Sreenivasan, recently named the City of New York’s Chief Digital Officer, once served as Columbia University’s first CDO, then as The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s first CDO. His new position with the City of New York will officially begin in October.
Like many change agents, Sreenivasan is passionate about using technology to create better connections with consumers along the customer journey. Referring to his future role, Sreenivasan stated,
“It’s a real honor for me to serve as the CDO of the world’s greatest city. There are so many opportunities to extend the Mayor’s Digital Playbook, collaborate closely across various sectors and help bring more startups here. I will draw on what I’ve learned working in four critical NYC industries: education, media, arts and culture, and nonprofits.”
Change agents, like Sreenivasan, are the catalysts that bring organizations toward and into the journey of digital transformation.
“To move our city’s digital ecosystem into the 21st century, we need to ensure our city’s resources are at the fingertips of every New Yorker. With Sree Sreenivasan’s wealth of experience, I am confident that he will work to promote transparency, access, and progressive values with our digital tools, helping spread access across the five boroughs,” said Mayor Bill de Blasio.
Referring to his time at The Met, Sreenivasan stated that the museum’s CTO, CMO, and Head of Visitor Services all worked together to see digital transformation rolled out collaboratively across the organization. “You can’t just have one person doing it all; it has to evolve as something that multiple people are invested in to show its value,” he said.
In This Fourth Stage, Executives See The Customer Experience as Central to Obtaining Business Goals
Perhaps most importantly, during stage four, executives see the importance of the customer experience. And change agents are encouraged as they begin to see the fruit of their labor. They have achieved their goal of earning mind share around the importance of digital evolution to support the customer experience, and sponsorship and attention from top executives has been garnered. Organizations start to use technology purposefully to connect with buyer personas along their customer journey, and to drive business goals forward.
The organization clarifies a road map so that all of the departments in the organization are on the same page; HR brings in new skilled labor to execute on the new plan, and finance improves investments in necessary digital infrastructure.
Manifestations of the Fourth Stage of Digital Transformation
As you will see below, there are six key areas where change in this stage begins to develop across an organization.
“The entire organization is recognizing the need for change, and efforts are more ambitious and formally recognized.” – Six Stages of Digital Transformation – Altimeter
- Data & Analytics – Silos are becoming a thing of the past, and leadership begins to track the organization’s new digital efforts, allowing them to understand the financial impact and to set goals. In addition, executives see the value in and are taking a greater interest in the customer experience feedback reported via data and analytics; they are willing to invest more to understand it on a deeper level.
- Customer Experience – The customer experience has not been perfected yet, but the organization continues to make adjustments and to solve issues in order to move the customer experience from a funnel to more of a dynamic interaction between the company and its customers. Leadership is exploring newways to expand the customer experience to more channels (i.e., new social media platforms, mobile, etc.). And a long-term customer experience road map is beginning to be developed.
- Governance & Leadership – Change agents start to be seen as an asset and are asked to contribute when executives are discussing outcomes, value and strategies. The digital transformation work group, for example, is tasked with scaling and modifying to wider spread the net of digital transformation in the organization. Top leadership may even decide that it is time to appoint a Chief Digital Officer, or a similar position with a different title. The entire organization is recognizing that there is a need for digital transformation.
- People and Operations – At this stage, momentum has picked up and is palpable as digital customer experience efforts become more collaborative. There are (at least) informal pilots that span every area in the organization — from HR to manufacturing to marketing and product development. The silos that still exist are being integrated into one another to achieve a singular vision for the entire organization. There’s an overall focus that operations and people have — with more formalized plans and specified roles that contribute to making the customer experience a priority.
- Technology Integration – During this phase, getting a singular view of the customer is the main characteristic of technology integration. This means integrating CRM software, customer experience tools and other technology together. This type of integration clarifies the view of the customer and allows the organization to improve the customer experience at every single touch point. In addition to the basic tools being integrated, the big-picture road maps for technology and digital transformation are also combined.
- Digital Literacy – The organization finally begins to see how valuable digital literacy can truly be. The tech-savvy members of the workforce are recruited to train others, including executives. This training in digital literacy is not only seen as a benefit, but as necessary, and may even be mandated for any employees working on any aspect of the customer journey experience. While training continues to be taken care of from the inside, HR begins to learn how to recruit talent with digital expertise.
Stages 5 & 6, Coming Soon
Please stay tuned for stages five and six along the digital transformation journey.
We’d love to know where your company is in the digital transformation journey — just beginning, in full force, not started yet? Please let us know in the comments below.
