Digital transformation is shaping many of the strategies across enterprises for improving productivity, reducing costs, and organizing business processes, all with a focus on optimizing the customer experience. Companies recognize that remaining competitive comes down to engaging with customers for a personalized experience, and a digital transformation strategy will help them get there.
Until it doesn’t. All the promises of sales growth and dramatic cost savings often fall short of expectations when an enterprise’s digital strategy becomes clouded and then either stalls out or fails altogether. How can an organization avoid a disappointing digital transformation? Here are the key steps to success:
Know the why behind digital transformation. If an enterprise hasn’t clearly defined the why of its digital transformation, or if there is a failure to communicate it effectively across the organization, the strategy will likely fail. If the staff has the perception that they’re implementing technology simply to save money or grow revenue, there will be some major dragging of feet.
Instead, have a clear understanding of what digital transformation will do for the enterprise and get buy-in from staff. Digital transformation is about improving the customer experience and ensuring the company stays competitive.
Know how the enterprise is going to get there. A clear path for digital transformation doesn’t mean that it won’t ever change along the way, but it does help the team stay focused. Otherwise, line of business managers competing for resources can derail the strategy as they hear about new cloud solutions and push for their department to receive earliest attention.
Knowing how the enterprise is going to get there includes knowing what kind of transformation will yield the most momentum for the organization. The priority may be to roll out a better experience for customers, but the enterprise may need to get better control over the data first in order to know what will help predict customer buying patterns and the types of offerings that need to be prioritized to serve customers’ needs.
Likewise, there could be an operations department asking for Internet of Things (IoT) devices that monitor inventory or provide feedback on production efficiency, but IT knows that the network can’t handle the expected congestion. They’ll need to find a way to segment out IoT traffic before they deploy the devices.
Know when the enterprise has arrived. A good digital transformation strategy requires measurable goals on a set timeline. As an enterprise achieves milestones along the way, the company must be sure to celebrate the improved productivity or cost savings captured with these efforts. This also goes a long way to secure buy-in from the team for the long haul. Digital transformation can take years, so breaking it into shorter-term goals can help the team keep focused.
Successful digital transformation begins with understanding the why and the how, and it also starts with the right technology partner. Contact us at TeleConsult to help ensure your clients experience a digital transformation that meets their goals.
If you think hackers are only interested in heavyweights like Target and eBay, think again. Healthcare data is a prime target for cybercriminals looking to access information. One of the threats facing the healthcare industry (and others) is ransomware, which to many is ranked among the greatest threats out there. It’s estimated that there are around 4,000 ransomware attacks daily, and the reason so many are directed at healthcare facilities is because of the way they handle their files — just about everything a hacker wants can be found, which makes this industry a target for ransom.
When security specialists run tests on a network protected by a next-generation firewall, they often discover weaknesses that all but invite hackers into the network to do a little digging. These tests are conducted using a sort of hacker’s playbook that contains a variety of known methods that hackers use to access a network and the vulnerable data traveling through it.
Digital transformation is a priority for every industry, with enterprises recognizing the need to transition to the cloud to remain competitive. From the user experience to processing data, legacy systems simply can’t keep up with the kinds of benefits that the cloud offers.
Whenever company data needs to be transferred from one place to another, a series of questions should be answered, particularly in cloud-based migrations.