Digital Transformation

The old axiom "without a vision the people perish" comes into play here. While it's tempting to start implementing a new technology in a company simply because it's new and everyone else is making changes, the truth is that the timing might not be ideal or we may need to be more strategic about a new technology and how it matches your culture. By setting business goals, we insulate the business and the current processes. Keep in mind that a business goal might be completely different from a technology goal. That is why it is important to separate the two.

Many companies know there is a risk with digital transformation. It's a similar risk when a company rolls out a major new internal application or releases a product. The issue that sometimes occurs with digital transformation is that companies analyze and discuss risks but they fail to document and track those risks over a set period of time. One example of this is with 5G cellular service. As we look to 2020 and beyond, 5G has the potential for the most transformation in companies, yet is also a technology that presents many risks in terms of availability, which products can use 5G the best, and unknown costs. We help our clients with understanding and documenting those risks so they can be mitigated over time.

Once we have analyzed the technology and documented the risks, it's time to run a pilot test with the technology (rather than rolling it out to every segment of your business and every employee). With a transformative technology like chatbots, it might mean testing the technology with one small department or one business process, such as product support. It might even mean a smaller pilot test internally or with only one portion of the support process. Running pilot tests helps work out the bugs but more importantly helps to see how the new technology will impact your business and culture.

During the pilot phase of our digital transformation strategy, we frequently ask for feedback. This part of our strategy needs to be more than a simple focus group or analyzing one set of data from a test. The most effective way to ask for feedback might involve conducting a survey, holding multiple focus groups analyzing the data from each pilot, or doing all of those activities multiple times. The most effective strategy will involve analyzing everything we can about a pilot and seeking feedback long before implementing the new technology at scale.

Once we have analyzed the pilot tests and followed all of the other steps, then it's time finally to implement that technology, possibly with one department or group. At this stage, it's best to fully embrace the technology ad not attempt to do a partial roll-out or one that only impacts a small segment of the company, as though we are still doing a pilot test. The lessons we learn during our analysis and pilot tests help us to ensure that the technology is rolled out successfully.

As part of any digital transformation strategy, it's important to keep analyzing the rollout. It's easy to make a major change in technology such as implementing Bitcoin as a transaction medium or using artificial intelligence as part of customer support, but then to assume those technologies have worked and everyone is pleased with the results, that's a whole different story! That is why we prepare a post-production plan to help monitor the impact and progress of the newly deployed technology. More often than not, when companies analyze a new technology they've implemented, they realize there is more to be done and other changes need to be made. That's where we provide the necessary support needed to continually improve and evolve alongside the enhancements in technology.