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A Necessary Disruption
Digital transformation is imperative for all businesses, from the small to the enterprise. That message comes through loud and clear from seemingly every keynote, panel discussion, article, or study related to how businesses can remain competitive and relevant as the world becomes increasingly digital. What’s not clear to many business leaders is what digital transformation means. Is it just a catchy way to say moving to the cloud? What are the specific steps we need to take? Do we need to design new jobs to help us create a framework for digital transformation, or hire a consulting service? What parts of our business strategy need to change? Is it really worth it?
Digital transformation is the integration of digital technology into all areas of a business, fundamentally changing how you operate and deliver value to customers. It’s also a cultural change that requires organizations to continually challenge the status quo, experiment, and get comfortable with failure.
Digital transformation marks a radical rethinking of how an organization uses technology, people, and processes to fundamentally change business performance, says George Westerman, MIT principal research scientist and author of Leading Digital: Turning Technology into Business Transformation.
Digital transformation, which Westerman says should be led by the CEO, requires cross-departmental collaboration in pairing business-focused philosophies with rapid application development models.
Such sweeping changes are typically undertaken in pursuit of new business models and new revenue streams, driven by changes in customer expectations around products and services.
“Customer expectations are far exceeding what you can really do,” says Westerman. “That means a fundamental rethinking about what we do with technology in organizations.”