We so often see Digital Transformation peddled by tech vendors and consultants. (Sold by companies that have not digitally transformed themselves, but that's another blog for another day).
Digital Transformation is not moving to the Cloud, or a new CRM system, tech is a component, for sure. But the opportunity that digital affords us is new ways of working. New efficiencies and effectiveness. The holy grail in business of doing more for less.
Take the horse and cart, it had an input and and output, but it was the way that it was used that made it successful. There was also an etiquette (set of rules and processes in the way they worked). In the days of horses and carts in London, we too had a pollution problem with the "output".
Enter the car, this has an input and and output, and it's used differently. We have to train people to use a car, you cannot get out of a horse and cart and drive a car. You cannot watch a webinar and then drive a car. Cars have certain efficiencies over the horse and cart, for example speed of travel, and distance. Also you can carry more weight and more people, for example in lorries and busses. Cars have a different set of processes to horses and carts.
The same with digital transformation.
This requires an investment in people and process.
Take Sales Navigator, probably the best lead generation tool in the market, you should be able easily to pay for itself, time and again. But we get called into organisations where they haven't invested in training people in the tool (to use that driving analogy, that would be the driving test), companies have also not invested in explaining to people the etiquette of using the tool (to use that driving analogy that would be driving lessons and we have something in the UK called the Highway Code). The Highway Code is the rules and regulations, what a stop sign means vs give way for example.
Sales transformation is just one area in isolation, as soon as you transform sales, you will need to start transforming Marketing, Human Resources, Customer Services, Finance, Procurement etc.
(The good news being that the additional revenues you get from your Digital Sales transformation you can reinvest in the business).
Digital will also change, I've seen massive changes in the Sales Transformation market even since 2015. You will have people that will leave and people that will join. Tools will come and go. Digital will change. Which means that digital transformation does not stop, it's for life!
You can’t buy digital transformation from a vendor, and you won’t find it on a stock keeping unit (SKU). So, if someone shows up with a quote and says you can achieve digital transformation for $100,000 or $1 million, tread carefully.
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