4 Tips For Developing Your Company’s Digital Transformation Roadmap
Before embarking on the digital transformation journey, it would be helpful for companies to have a digital transformation roadmap at hand to guide their way. Digital transformation affects the entire business architecture, processes, and even the members of the organization. Hence, the journey must be intricately planned in order for resources and costs to be optimized accordingly.
This digital transformation roadmap may seem different for each business and industry in general. However, there are some considerations that companies can take into account regardless of the nature of their business. Let’s look into some tips for developing a winning digital transformation roadmap for your company.
4 tips for developing a digital transformation roadmap for your company
1. Set a clear destination for your digital transformation roadmap
A roadmap that has no destination cannot supply sufficient direction. If the end vision is not clearly defined, the plan would be all over the place. Short-term goals may be at place but because there is no overarching goal or vision, the results may simply be minor improvements.
To set an effective digital transformation roadmap, it is important to have a clearly defined destination with concrete goals and objectives. Without knowing the clear vision of the transformation, any discussions about revolution may end up leading nowhere. Once the baseline has been identified, the short-term, mid-term, and long-term goals can be laid in for your company to cater to the digital gap.
Goals can be laid down once you’ve conducted an elaborate assessment of the company’s current state and gaps.
2. Start with core functions and processes
Ideally, digital transformation should start with the core processes and then slowly proceed to other functional areas. The entire journey would not be accomplished in one single time. Hence, it is important to start somewhere that is especially relevant and important to the company’s overall operations.
This is applicable for the onboarding team as well. Further training and education may be necessary for the team especially since not everyone has the same level of knowledge and expertise. However, it is important to start with the core and top-level team — the board — and then flow through other levels of management down until the very bottom. Once everyone has a sufficient foundation, more technologies can be further introduced.
3. Find the right companions for the journey
For some companies, the digital transformation may require development expertise in order to meet the digital transformation goals. In such cases, the needed talent may not always be present in the existing team. Hence, companies may have the option to either build an in-house team from scratch or outsource their development instead.
Both in-house development and outsourced development have their pros and cons. The former involves building an in-house team from scratch. Hence, the company may need to recruit staff to fill in for necessary skill sets. Outsourced development, on the other hand, involves partnering with a specialized agency and entrusting the software, mobile app, or web development into their hands. This type of partnership is typically tied with a contract. With this, the development needs, tools, equipment, and staff would all be under the care of the partnered agency.
In choosing to go for either in-house development or outsourced development, companies have to consider their current resources, their current team and skill set, their ability to provide the necessary tools and equipment, their ability to troubleshoot when unforeseen problems occur, and other factors.
4. Consider and cultivate your internal culture
Nurturing a culture that upholds innovation and creativity would help the entire team go through the digital transformation effectively. Strict conservatism would hinder the process and may even drag the company down. Hence, in developing the digital transformation roadmap, it is important to take into account the people in the team and the culture that is upheld by the organization.
Regardless of the type of culture, the flow of influence starts from the top to the bottom. Hence, the management team and leaders are key to the type of culture that is cultivated. Those at the top have to be consistent in showing the entire organization the importance and advantages of the digital transformation journey. They are the key proponents of innovation and change.
To nurture this culture, having open communication channels or further employee training may be necessary. Teams can also be encouraged to try and test different technologies. Employees can also be granted the liberty to present their inquiries and ideas as well as share their thoughts and feedback.
A strategic digital transformation roadmap is key to successfully traversing the journey. When devising the digital transformation roadmap, it is important to take into consideration not just the technologies and processes but also the team and culture as well. After all, success is not factored by a single component; there are certain ingredients to mix in and things that need to be executed in order to achieve the digital transformation goals.
Let us journey with you in your digital transformation project!
Information Sources:
https://enterprisersproject.com/article/2021/6/digital-transformation-how-keep-pace-with-customers
https://www.invonto.com/insights/digital-transformation-strategy/
