7 Symptoms your Digital Transformation has become too much about Tech and not enough about People

There are so many technologies out there now, that it’s all too easy to get caught up in the digital hype. Placing the technology at the heart of transformation though, is a sure-fire way to send your business to an early grave.

Why? I’ll give you one good reason: your customers and employees need to come first. Business is about people. The moment you start to obsess and become too engrossed in the technology is the moment your digital transformation project starts to fail. We’re helping businesses to step off the transformation treadmill for a moment; refocus and realise what’s important.

Here are the 7 symptoms your digital transformation has become too much about tech and not enough about people.

1. You Haven’t Even Diagnosed Workplace Modernisation

Workplace Modernisation is a business movement that helps keep digital transformation projects focused by taking into account the wider solution and whether it addresses your business goals and problems.

It’s something that is bigger than just digital, that is all about engineering the right culture, business change process and customer (and employee) experiences that are underpinned; not made by technology.

For example, the Workplace Modernisation ethos would look at a business experiencing productivity and engagement problems and identify what is causing them first. It would then have a look at the contact centre. Then as part of the recommended solution, might incorporate Conversational AI to help take away menial work from employees, enabling them to focus on higher value, more interesting areas of their job. The digital transformation project may also recommend contact centre gamification to help maximise productivity and ensure employees meet their targets.

Like digital transformation, it’s here to stay and is a vital way of thinking that ultimately helps you to put your customers and employees first.

2. Your Change Leader has Turned into a Loose Cannon

We often forget, digital transformation is not delivered by one person. It’s very similar to a surgical operation in this respect… it’s a team effort. 

Yes, of course there is a change leader (the lead surgeon) acting as someone in charge but digital transformation done right is delivered by the whole company (the other doctors, nurses, anaesthesiologists and scrub techs).

Depending on the company, the designated change leader might be the digital transformation officer, CEO or managing director. There’s a lot of arguments for putting someone who isn’t a digital expert in charge of your digital transformation - obviously we don’t recommend the same logic for the operating theatre! Their judgement is less likely to become clouded by the technology options and they are more likely keep in mind the Workplace Modernisation business movement.

It’s easy for change leaders to turn into loose cannons. Whether they intend to, or do so through default due to lack of input from the rest of the business. Steps need to be taken to ensure this doesn’t happen by eliminating bias in decision making, HiPPO’s (Highest Paid Person’s Opinion) and taking the steps to prevent a Nightmare on Scope Street (AKA Scope Creep).

3. Your Business Starts Implementing Technology it Doesn’t Need

This is what happens when you don’t consider Workplace Modernisation, you’ll start acquiring more impressive sounding technologies than you can comprehend, yet will they make a difference to anything? No. After the placebo effect and high buzz implementing new tech gives wears off, you’ll be in pretty much the same place as you started.

Stop and see the wood for the trees. The solution needs to start with your business challenges and goals. Not the technology that is going to underpin it. As we’ve said before the technology comes towards the end of this journey.

4. The Projects are Lacking in Support from your Colleagues

Digital transformation projects need people to jump on board and support them to be successful. Until you have followers, you’re just another lone nut with ideas.

Before you even commence your Workplace Modernisation thinking in the lead up to digital transformation project planning; you need to ask yourself: is my business ready for change? If the answer is no, we can guarantee you that your employees will resist the change you’re proposing, so much so that the plan will not even make it past the 2nd iteration stage.

It’s true, before your business goals and problems, transformation will always start first with culture. It’s the one thing that has the power to completely stop transformation projects in their tracks or accelerate them beyond your wildest dreams.

5. Short-Sighted Digital Transformation Cures

We agree sometimes, there needs to be a quick win in the realms of digital transformation. The world moves fast and so your business needs to move faster to remain competitive. But, we believe in less haste, more speed when it comes to digital transformation.

If you must implement a quick fix, it needs to be something of value and something that can be built on in the future. This prevents you from taking a piece-meal approach. We’re not saying you need an all in one monolithic solution, quite the opposite, just a platform that is flexible and allows for expansion.

Our ecosystem b-connected for example is a suite of applications that are plug in and go. Depending on your transformation schedule you can start by just dipping your toe in with a plug in and go gamification solution for the contact centre, or go all out and automate entire business processes. The choice is yours.

6. Too Much at Once (Unattainable Cures)

Although you should not set your sights on investments that are too short-sighted, neither should your project become too long-sighted. Digital transformation projects that extend beyond 5 years are too far in the future. Did that make you feel queasy? Probably a symptom that you’ve set your sights on an unattainable cure!

Transformational technologies should be adaptable, flexible, quick and easy to implement. A technology solution that is holding up your digital transformation project and making it long-sighted has none of these qualities.

7. Lack of Rollout Strategy

You know your project has become too much about technology when you’ve not even thought about how it will be rolled out across the company. Bad or lack of rollout strategies set new solutions up for failure. How can you be sure everyone is following the right precautions and processes, has received training and is even actually using it without a rollout programme? You can’t! To make matters worse, rollout strategies are not just there for employees, but your customers too. If you’re employees don’t have a clue what they should be doing with a new piece of tech, it will all reflect back to your customers.

If you don’t carefully consider this symptom, all your hard work will be for nothing and someone else will become a market leader using the piece of technology you implemented because they had a carefully considered rollout strategy.

Know the Symptoms: time to bring it back to People ‘n’ Business

If your business transformation projects are displaying one, or even all of the symptoms above, it’s time to take things back to basics.