At every IT-related seminar or event, we keep hearing about this new buzz word, ‘Digital Transformation’. But what does it really mean?
A quick search over the internet will provide you with various explanations, and more or less these definitions can be summed up as “the adaptation of digital technology to replace existing manual processes of a business with the main scope associated with improving efficiency”.
People working in the particular IT industry tend to better understand and appreciate the various opportunities they see across businesses and, in doing so, are perhaps adopting this phrase in order to practically any piece of software that exits.
By taking a payroll software solution as an example, one has to agree that using a software system will be much more efficient and much less prone to errors when compared in order to the manual calculation process.
Similarly, using a scheduling system to help book meetings or client appointments, or using a good accounting system to help keep ledgers in order, have proven to be more accurate and effective. However, such software has been around since the 1980s plus 1990s, so why is this term becoming prominent in this day and age?
The key to understanding this question is in order to split the particular term ‘Digital Transformation’ plus analyse each word separately. The ‘Digital’ part refers to the technologies element associated with the process, which is continuously evolving and improving. Today we talk about cloud-based computing, block chain, internet of things – IoT, mobile\remote devices, bots or robotic processing, and much more.
This means that whatever process we are digitising today, at some point or even another in the not-so-distant future, this will be surpassed by newer and better technologies, which will be much a lot more efficient. This cycle associated with newer software replacing older digital technology will never cease to exist.
Then we have the ‘Transformation’ part of the phrase. This is where the major risk of digitisation projects will be, plus most of the times will be the reason why such projects fail. Transformation is referring to the business change, the way we do things at present, which typically involves the particular human element.
People will be much more open to change if they can see a benefit for them too — Damon Debono
When we discuss transformation, we need to look at the business processes that are taking place, the day-to-day routine that will we are comfortable with, that has been done since ‘always’, to be questioned and possibly changed. You will need to ask questions like “Why do we possess to maintain three copies of this particular form? ” or “Why do all of us require our clients to sign multiple copies associated with the same form within a specific procedure? ”
The typical answer “We have always done it this way”, should be challenged and if required, processes need to change in order for a project to be successful. It will become much easier to replace existing procedures as they are with some software answer and stop at that, without bringing in the company changes that will finally result in the efficiency that one really seeks.
The human component of the transformation also needs to be addressed. People is going to be much a lot more available to modify when they may see an advantage for all of them too. To increase a project success rate, one must bring all the employees involved on board with the particular changes being introduced.
This particular should be done by providing them with the channels in order to voice plus explain their pain points at work, and what they would change to better their situation. It is also essential that they are provided with all the particular knowledge plus training needed on a new system becoming introduced and to highlight the benefits that they stand to gain once the project is complete.
Today’s hype to the term ‘Digital Transformation’ will be being driven by a combination of two things; multiple advances in numerous technologies in this particular point in time are usually providing the potential for digital solutions to be far more reaching than ever before; and then we have the particular after-effect of COVID, where we now have proof that remote working actually works plus digital solutions can end up being implemented to great effect.
Employees still deliver what is getting asked and expected of them, whether they are working from the office or home, and a change in order to our daily routine is possible to achieve in a short time whenever everyone involved is willing and in agreement on how to proceed.
The possibility of creating a central repository for your organisation, enabling your workers to research for documents and securely retrieve them from wherever they are, has made going paperless a lot easier than originally thought. Sending electronic communication, filling online forms and even obtaining digital signatures through your clients, is the tangible reality today.
There are different solutions available that suit all type of businesses; from self-employed professionals, to a small start-up organisation with a few employees, to an enterprise level organisation, plus that will certainly transform your business to become more competitive and efficient, and allow you to accomplish a better ROI in a shorter time.
However, this remains essential to address the changes that your business needs to undertake in order to transform and embrace the particular technology available today.
Damon Debono is a marketing executive at Avantech.
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