Digital Transformation

Why centralisation is a power game

Centralisation is a power game. Treat it as a strategy for learning, and it might be more useful.

How does your web team work?

We’ve all experimented with various forms. When content management systems were new, devolved teams were all the rage. Give this wonderful tool to everyone in the company, and they’ll each edit their own little bit of the site.

What a wonderful site that was…

Why effective user centric design always leads to business transformation

Many companies pay lip service to user centric design, but the harsh truth is that without business transformation, most will fail to satisfy their users.

The web has made life hard for a lot of businesses. There was a time (before the web) when consumers had limited options. If a company gave their customers poor service it was hard to find an alternative.

Even bad mouthing the company to friends and colleagues only had a limited impact.

Four key takeouts from our Digital Transformation Roundtable in New York

20 senior execs from a wide range of industries as diverse as broadcast television, pharmaceutical, publishing and financial services gathered in New York last November as Econsultancy hosted another Digital Transformation roundtable.

Ever since IBM’s seminal 2011 study ‘From Stretched to Strengthened – Insights from the Global Chief Marketing Officer Study’, CMOs have been reporting a concern that they are underprepared for digital – shorthand for changes in consumer behavior, an explosion in the volume of data, the proliferation of channels and device choices and the effects of social media. 

According to a recent Econsultancy study, only 23% of the Fortune 500 could consider themselves to be in any way whatsoever shielded from the effects of digital.

It was suggested that those who might fall into that category are generally companies that dig things out of the ground and process them, but perhaps even they will see soon their industry disrupted by digital technologies. 

Everyone who attended on the day agreed that true Digital Transformation is a heavy lift and there is often a greatly delayed gratification from the process.

Nearly all of the organizations represented at the roundtable had experienced significant disruption to their business models from digital.

The attendees told us afterwards that the most valuable part of the day was hearing from their peers in other businesses, learning what had worked for them, what hadn’t and how they had overcome the challenges they faced.

Four keys rose to the top of the discussion…