The concept of "digital transformation" is spoken all over the business world. Every brand, small or large, every business is planning to integrate one side of their business with digital. Some just dream, some are planning, some started, some years have completed this transition. Time is running out for brands that have not yet digitally transformed. So where to start in order to have a healthy transformation process?
Before we start thinking about the transformation process, let's talk a little bit about why we need digital.
Firms create and sell values throughout their lives and work to preserve them. This cycle repeats infinitely for the firm throughout its life cycle. Even if the cycle does not change, the instruments accompanying this cycle change over time. When more efficient machines are produced, companies renew their production processes, and when new shipping and marketing channels are accessible, companies update their processes. Even if tools and instruments change, the main logic of the firm's cycle never changes.
Take a filmmaker. As a business that creates and monetises value by producing movies, the cycle of filmmakers has been stable from the beginning. With the developing camera technologies and broadcasting possibilities, only the tools are changing. Thirty years ago, when a filmmaker decided to make a new movie, he had only commercial experience and market research. Today, streaming platforms like Netflix can give you estimates of how much to watch before the movie is made yet. Because they have a huge pool of viewing data.
It has fundamentally changed the way digital firms create, sell, and defend value. In this respect, it would be a mistake to see digital as an ordinary technological development. This scale of change probably didn't happen even in the industrial revolution. Now you have to integrate all your processes with digital while generating, selling and defending value. Otherwise, your competitors using this advantage will make you commercially difficult.
Digital transformation can be an important answer to many of the questions your company faces today, such as:
- How can we be different in the marketplace?
- How can we increase our profitability and find new ways to grow?
- How can we expand our company into new markets?
- How can we reach the new generation Y generation?
- The bottom line: How can we be competitive in our industry?
According to a survey conducted by Jabil in 2018, only 8% of respondents think their companies have completed their digital transformation. 31% say they are working on the conversion, another 31% say they are still in the planning stage.
Regardless of your situation, there is a lot of work to be done in digital transformation. It's not too late to get started, either. If you haven't started this digital transformation journey yet, you won't find a better time than today. Below, we have listed six important steps for those who want to start their digital transformation journey.
Six Steps You Should Take for Digital Transformation
They say that starting is half of finishing. Probably this journey will not end. As digital evolves, it will continue to update business models, sales and marketing channels. You can complete your basic processes at first and then continue your journey with small updates. Then we start;
1. Determine What Digital Means to You
Digital is important to you, but where? In the first step, you should understand the innovations brought by digital to your business, according to your industry. Things will extend beyond the transition to E-Invoice and opening a site. It is a digital problem solving tool. Your problems will also be unique to you. Is there a way to solve the unique problems of your business and your industry with digital and stand out from your competitors?
Therefore, it is essential that you diagnose the challenges facing your company and determine which digital solutions are suitable for your company to achieve its goals. The first step in the process is to conduct an audit of the challenges facing your company.
2.Determine How To Go Digital
Once you have identified the main challenges of your industry and company, it's time to plan your digital transformation journey. At this stage, you will come across many alternatives. There will be many alternatives from cloud-based systems to digital integrated business processes. Below are a few sample strategies.
- Redesigning products and experiences with a digital component
- Creating digital ecosystems
- Monetize the data you have
- Bringing Your Business Processes to Online with Software
- Building a strong IT infrastructure
You can choose one or more of the above titles as part of your own strategy. The important thing is to make your industry and products more accessible and efficient for your customers.
3.Include Your Managers in Transformation
It is very important that you generalize digital transformation to make it an internally accepted culture. Inform people about processes and planning to get people involved. It is certain that you will have an easier process with the participation of your employees.
People are not always too warm to innovations. Change always tends to cause anxiety in people. The source of anxiety here is in fact uncertainty rather than innovation. If you regularly inform people about the process, the steps of the process and the expected results, their chances of being a participant will increase.
4. Find Working Partners to Accompany Your Transformation Journey
The biggest challenge companies face in digital transformation is not having the internal expertise to take the initiative. It will make sense at this point to get support to partner with your company's digital transformation.
Participants in the Digital Transformation Survey share that they expect partners to support them on this journey in the following ways:
- Offering skills to help them transform
- Providing consultancy services to help them integrate digital technology
- Helping them navigate the digital innovation environment
- Sharing successful approaches and best practices
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5. Prepare Your Staff for Transformation
Do not hesitate to inform your team about the processes. When you make a decision on digital transformation, hold a large meeting with your team and tell them about your goals and processes. People will be afraid of being extras in a change they are not involved in.
The most transparent change is the one that will receive the most support. If you keep informing people about the processes regularly, those who are cold-minded will start to warm up to the process.
6.Start Your Digital Transformation
After completing all the steps, all that's left is to start. More companies will take positions in digital transformation in the future. If you are one of those who say "nothing will happen to us", let's meet again the day your opponent takes the first step.