Digital transformation is a systematic, fundamental change in how an organization delivers value to its customers. This can be achieved by an enterprise moving away from legacy technology through the adoption of next-generation data, analytics, machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies. With the start of the new quarter, check out our top 5 tips for digital transformation success in fiscal year 2022 - 2023.

Focus on the customer.

A customer-obsessed, customer-centric culture is a critical part of your digital transformation. It's all about your customers or clients, their experience, and their emotions about your business.

A Customer Experience (CX) strategy can help you build a strong foundation for digital transformation success. But how do you create a customer-obsessed culture that empowers employees to live it every day? One way is through CX initiatives like Journey Maps and Voice of the Customer programs. These tools help turn insights into action by providing you with information on how customers interact with your business, both digitally and offline—and identify areas for improvement in their experience across all touchpoints in their journey with your organization. When employees understand what matters most to customers, they'll be motivated to provide great experiences across the board—from voice mail greetings on the phone line all the way through post-sale support on social media channels.

Don't underestimate the power of your people.

People are the most important asset in any organization. They are the ones that make the change happen, they will be working with new technologies, and they will also be working with your customers.

A lot of organizations underestimate how much effort is required to get people to adopt new processes or technologies, and this can lead to poor results for digital transformation initiatives. It’s important for organizations to understand how people can help drive change within an organization before attempting a digital transformation project.

Start by taking an objective review of your capabilities (use our Digital Product Grader), current org chart, and business structure. Determine where there are areas of improvement, and elect change-makers within the organization to lead change. This is important: ultimately, each area of change should be the responsibility of a single individual. Sure, it will take the work of many people to actually happen, but there should be a single point of accountability across the organization. Change starts with a single person, from a single department, choosing to lead responsibly.

Prepare for constant disruption.

In the digital transformation journey, you need to be prepared for constant disruption. Digital technologies and platforms are constantly evolving and changing. New digital services are being launched by startups every day, which makes it difficult to keep up with all of them. As a result, many organizations struggle with staying relevant in this fast-paced environment.

To help you prepare for this challenge, here are five habits to help you stay on top of constant disruption:

• Establish a strong vision that’s shared across your organization (check out our process for this)
• Identify new technologies that can improve your business processes or customer experiences
• Look at how other companies are using these technologies to solve problems similar to yours (e.g., if you have an ecommerce site that sells handmade goods online, look at how Etsy does it)
• Figure out which specific steps will take you closer toward achieving your goals (e.g., integrating machine learning into inventory management software)

Put in place a continued process of digital transformation.

As you begin your digital transformation journey, it’s important to have a process in place that can help you through the process. The best processes are flexible enough to change as needed, repeatable and transparent, and measurable.

The purpose of an effective digital transformation process is to ensure that all necessary steps are completed by the right team members at the right time with minimal errors or rework. A good digital transformation process includes continued iterations that scale as your organization does, and as technology advances. Take time each quarter to review new technology in the marketplace, and review your five habits for staying on top of constant disruption.

Where is there room for change? How are other companies managing the changing environment? Can we do it better?

Scale your investments.

The last step of your digital transformation is to scale your investments and put them into practice. This means hiring the right people, finding the best tools and building processes for success, investing in technology that will help you reach your goals, and making sure everyone is on board with the vision.

Before you start scaling up, be sure that everyone involved understands their roles—and what they're expected to contribute. If something doesn't seem like it's going according to plan or taking as long as it should, make sure there aren't any communication gaps between departments or teams.

The first step toward scaling up is identifying which areas will require focus during this time: marketing? Human resources? Operations? Once those areas are chosen, people need clear direction on how they'll fit into this new future state of affairs at work so they can plan accordingly (this includes learning about any new tools or technologies).

Digital transformation doesn't have to be scary.

As you go about your digital transformation efforts, it doesn't need to be scary -- it just has to start. As you begin, keep our five tips in mind.

• Focus on the customer.
• Don't underestimate the power of your people.
• Prepare for constant disruption
• Put in place continued process for digital transformation.
• Scale your investments.

What are your next steps?

The truth is that digital transformation isn’t a one-time event; it’s a continual process. In order to keep up with the pace of innovation and market shifts, organizations need to be in a constant state of flux, improving themselves and their processes again and again. If you're not sure how to start, let's talk. Our consultancy specializes in providing the talent and the digital assets you need to make your organization thrive continually.

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