Why a Digital Transformation might be the best thing for your company.
When you think about digital transformation it might be a little bit cloudy and unclear. In the more recent days digital transformation has been talked about on many different platforms. With the dynamic and growing environment of technology it is hard to understand it all and keep up with it all, for SMEs this is especially true.
How technology plays a part in your business var differently for every SME based on the mission and vision. By better understanding your business needs and goals this will lead to a more effective and impactful digital transformation.
Most companies prioritize technology focused projects rather than a digital transformative project. For example, during the pandemic most companies started to use Zoom and Teams to communicate with the team, work from home and share files effectively. This was used to do basic tasks such as: being able to meet, use video conferencing and be able to chat.
Updating Technology vs Digital transformation
Updating technology means improving your technology while digital transformation means you rethink the way you work and improve the processes around the way you work.
Updating Technology
Updating technology can be looked at as modernization. This means keeping afloat with the industry standards, for example moving towards emails and scanning vs having a fax machine in the office. These changes might be noteworthy but they do not alter the function or form of the business. In turn,the business might run more smoothly and efficiently but processes and operations stay the same. Usually with technological updates the technology is implemented fairly quickly then handed off to the users, then the users are on their own with the new technology.
This may look like a HR department using a bulletin board to post the new announcements and sending it through emails. With a technology upgrade they could use technology like Slack or MS Teams to send out this announcement quicker and reach everyone. It may look like moving to the cloud. The cloud allows for businesses to move data from legacy infrastructure to a cloud provider making it easier to find and organize the data.
Digital Transformation
Digital transformation is a process that helps integrate digital technologies into all of the business areas that helps to change how the business delivers values and how the company operates across the spectrum. This is important because it can add new value for the stakeholders, customers and employees, better efficiency and greater business agility.
To make a Digital Transformation successful it needs to filter through the whole team and every department. Every department needs to be ready and have an open mind to accept the changes that may be coming to the company. This digital transformation is not just a one and done solution, the transformation needs to be done in a way that is adaptive to the constantly changing technological environment.
The Covid-19 pandemic has accelerated many businesses into a digital mindset. In 2019, the IDC forecasted that the worldwide spending on digital transformation will reach $2.3 trillion (USD) in 2023, but then in November 2021, they updated the prediction to $2.8 trillion by 2025. (IDC,2021)
A digital transformation may look like using MS Teams as a full HR tool instead of just to communicate. This can include downloading an extension into MS Teams to manage time off requests, sign ins and sign outs and communicate when shifts may be altered. This will allow for information to be communicated to the whole team to get everyone on the same page. By installing this extension, the project team could introduce “How To” videos to show how to use these new features so that there is no confusion as to how to operate.
Digital transformations are important and should be only done when needed because they change the processes that people may be used to already and this in turn might change organizational cultures.
Focusing on just updating technology can cause a gap which leads to missed opportunities to be transformative and improve other op
erations, marketing and sales. While digital transformation can help fill these gaps and create new opportunities for the company.
When you think you’re ready for a digital transformation, feel free to book a Readiness Assessment with us.
How can CDAP help?
CDAP can help overhaul your organizational processes and cultural needs because it builds a plan for a digital transformation. This can help your company get ready for growth and changes in your business environment. By applying for the CDAP program your business gets access to a $15,000 grant which allows you to build this Digital Adoption plan and move forward to a digital transformation.
