Achieving Digital Maturity

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Go digital or go home. In order to thrive in the Digital Age, companies must undertake Digital Transformation to not only support strategy and reach consumers, but also modernize and attain excellence in their internal operations and procedures.  Digital Maturity is rapidly becoming a requirement.

However, majority of firms are incapable of strategizing their move to Digital Maturity.  There are, however, businesses that are Digitally Mature or are rapidly evolving in this direction.  Research into the strategies of such firms suggests that Digitally Mature organizations employ the 5 techniques listed below to achieve leadership in this competition:

  1. Digital Organization
  2. Digital Strategy
  3. Digital Experimentation
  4. Digital Talent
  5. Digital Management

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These 5 key practices form the basis of Digital Maturity Strategy.  Let us go a bit more into a few of these recommended practices. 

Digital Organization

Conventional Organizational Structures comprising of functional silos are ineffective in markets that are dynamic and continually changing.  The introduction of cross-functional team structures is a result of a novel approach to organizational structures.  Customary command and control systems based on functional silos impede the market agility required by present conditions.

A study survey characterized firms' Digital Maturity as Early-stage, Developing, and Mature. Nearly 60% of early-stage respondents viewed their firms' management structure and procedures as a hindrance to engaging in Digital business successfully.  In Digitally Maturing organizations, on the other hand, 80% of respondents stated that their executives possessed the necessary knowledge and skills to lead the organization's Digital Strategy. 

Digital Strategy

Effective Digital Strategies are not limited to the application of technology to become more digital; rather, they are designed to find possibilities with the biggest commercial effect.

Consistently, research demonstrates that strategy is the most potent differentiator for Digitally Maturing firms.  Digital Strategies outline how the firm conducts business in light of the market shifts brought about by new Digital technology.

In a poll, 40% of the respondents stated that Digital Strategy and Innovation needed development in order for their organization to raise its level of Digital Maturity.  Digitally Mature organizations (80% of them) had or were expected to have a well-defined and cohesive Strategy, compared to 19 percent of Early-stage companies, according to the study.  According to the research, Digitally Mature firms are 2 times as likely to strategize for at least a 5 year period.

Successfully implementing Digital Strategy requires a focus on Organizational Change and the development of adaptability to rapidly changing Digital environments. 

Digital Experimentation

Almost every company engages in technological experimentation.  However, the scope and size of tests may not always provide results with enterprise-wide implications.  Digitally Mature organizations are able to expand Digital Experiments.

The key to effective experimentation is conceiving of trials for pressing business challenges that will drive enterprise-wide innovation, followed by the execution of smaller experiments that can be scaled up, if successful.

Early-stage corporations are 2.5 times less capable of undertaking small experiments and scaling Innovation enterprise-wide than Digitally Maturing enterprises.  The capability to scale up modest trials is bolstered by an attitude of openness toward failure and the capacity to learn from it.

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Digital Transformation is being embraced by organizations of all sizes across most industries.  In the Digital Age today, technology creates new opportunities and fundamentally transforms businesses in all aspects—operations, business models, strategies.  It not only enables the business, but also drives its growth and can be a source of Competitive Advantage. 

For many industries, COVID-19 has accelerated the timeline for Digital Transformation Programs by multiple years.  Digital Transformation has become a necessity.  Now, to survive in the Low Touch Economy—characterized by social distancing and a minimization of in-person activities—organizations must go digital.  This includes offering digital solutions for both employees (e.g. Remote Work, Virtual Teams, Enterprise Cloud, etc.) and customers (e.g. E-commerce, Social Media, Mobile Apps, etc.). 

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