by Margaret Dawson | Jul 3, 2019 | Digital Transformation
Prague, June 2019. The auditorium is packed. And the spotlights are so bright, I can only see faces in the first couple of rows. I focus on a couple of smiling men in the front. I’m here to talk about digital transformation from a different perspective. I can tell the message is resonating: “we can’t focus on technology alone but need to think about the human connection in digital transformation.”
Even though I can’t see everyone, I feel their positive energy and their eyes on me. I hear their laughter. We have connected.
To be honest, I wasn’t sure it would work. This is a technology conference with hundreds of IT solution providers, managed services companies, and software vendors. But throughout the event, people stopped me and said “thank you for not talking about products and for sharing your thoughts on the human connection instead.”
This story is an evolution of the digital transformation journey that I’ve been discussing with customers for a couple of years. In talking to organizations all over the world, I learn first hand that technology decisions and architectural considerations are huge challenges. However, a bigger block to making the much needed transformation is people.
Margaret keynoting at the Red Hat Partner Conference in Prague.
If you missed Part 1 of my blog on Digital Transformation, I encourage you to pause and read it here. For those who read part one already, Let’s pick up our discussion with Human Connection number five:
5. Focus on the user experience
When I worked at Amazon in the early 2000’s, my office consisted of the standard door desk on 4 x 4’s, a chair, and a bookshelf. No standing desks or special ergonomic chairs. Employee ergonomics was not the focus; the customer experience was. In everything we did, employees were challenged to ask ourselves, “would this help the customer experience?” If the answer was no, then priorities were redirected.
This may be an extreme example. However, it’s not an accident that Amazon introduces so many user innovations. From its earliest days, Amazon led the e-commerce industry with user-focused capabilities and creating a human connection in a digital environment. Innovations such as predictive analytics, one-click buying, and personal recommendations that we take for granted today. Amazon maintained this discipline and market leadership when it introduced Amazon Web Services. AWS focuses on giving developers a fast, easy experience and access to the tools they need. Its focus on the user continues with its Alexa personal assistant service and Amazon Go, the futuristic supermarket where customers can grab products and leave without ever pulling out their wallet.
Unfortunately, many technology companies do the opposite of Amazon. They start with the cool technology and slap on the user experience as almost an afterthought. And then, when the product is not as successful as they hoped, engineers and product managers start adding more ease of use, point and click widgets, and help buttons.
The cost of poor user experience is high
The cost of not starting with user experience? According to CareerFoundry, who manage a Web UX design (user experience) school, the cost is high. Its research estimates that bad user experience costs e-commerce companies $1.4 trillion. Yes, trillion! For IT projects in general, the research estimates a loss of $150 billion due to abandoned projects.
As we focus on the human connection part of digital transformation, user experience takes the front seat and is a top priority. We start with the user. What are they trying to do? What is the pain we are hopefully solving?
This is no different than the best practices around Web UX design. The goal is to deliver the content a user is seeking with the fewest number of clicks. More than two clicks or 10 seconds, and the user aborts its search on your site.
Modern UX is moving beyond traditional interfaces to incorporate artificial intelligence, giving users the feeling they are interfacing with a human being rather than a digital thing. One of these AI movements is called “Conversational Design”, where products and websites incorporate the way humans talk to each other. With this, UX becomes more personal and personalized.
6. Create cross-organizational teams and processes
Teamwork is an overused term. The reality is that few organizations either inspire or reward true teamwork across departments or even within a division. However, digital transformation requires collaboration and a shared vision of success across and within teams.
In fact, this closer collaboration is not just nice to have. Your employees want to have better connections and teamwork with their colleagues. The Slack Future of Work Study found that team relationships and connections are vital to transformational success. According to the research, 91% of workers want to feel closer to their work colleagues, and 85% of workers want to feel more connected with their remote colleagues.
Reach out to other teams to break down silos
For any project or initiative, it’s easy to invite the same people to help. But why not reach out across the organization and include people who you rarely or never work with?
Let’s say you are a bank, and your team is charged with building a new application to enable customers to take digital photos of checks and deposit them via this mobile app. You will immediately bring together your business team colleagues and your developers. But how about also inviting a couple tellers from one of your bank branches, an IT Operations colleague from the data center, someone from legal, a data scientist and a data privacy expert. You get the idea.
I believe vendors and partners can help broker these cross-silo initiatives and conversations. As an outsider, you are often able to see and work with different parts of an organization that people within the company don’t know. Use these relationships to help drive closer teamwork. The benefit for you is more business and more successful projects.
Some vendors have services designed to do this, such as Red Hat’s Open Innovation Labs. Using DevOps and Agile processes, the labs residency program brings together business, technical and other people from across an organization to solve a specific problem or kick off a major project.
7. Reward people and teams who take risks
Change is scary, and one big reason is because it requires taking risks, and potentially, failing. Digital leaders encourage a fail fast culture, where individuals and teams are not just encouraged to take risks, but are rewarded for doing so.
According to McKinsey’s research, respondents at successful digital organizations are more than twice as likely as their peers elsewhere to strongly agree that employees are rewarded for taking risks. And they are nearly three times likelier to say their organizations reward employees for generating new ideas.
Digital disruption does not happen by standing still or encouraging small moves. It takes big bets. This means leadership must also be willing to stand up for employees who try new ideas and push the boundaries. Digital leaders go “all in” on the transformation, because taking risks is less riskier than doing nothing or making incremental changes.
It all goes back to culture. You can’t take the risks needed to disrupt and transform unless yo’uve created a culture that makes it safe to do so. But how do we create or promote a culture of smart risk taking?
Gordon Tredgold, the Founder and CEO of Leadership Principles, suggests there are 5 ways to encourage smart risk taking:
- Model risk taking behavior
- Define smart risks and set limits
- Create a safe environment for taking risks
- Identify your best risk takers and unleash them
- Reward smart failures
8. Develop your people for the future
In the research I conducted in 2018, we found that the lack of skill set and training were the top blockers to achieving digital transformation. Technology and digital processes are changing so quickly, it’s hard to keep up. This is creating a digital skills gap in organizations across industries and around the world.
The cost of this gap is high. Not just to companies but to entire economies.
Accenture estimates the digital skills gap could cost the United Kingdom £141 billion in GDP (Gross Domestic Product) growth. For all the G20 countries combined, the risk of not filling the digital skills gap could cost more than US$11.5 trillion in GDP growth over the next ten years.
Rather than hoping to hire people with the skills and talent you need, I encourage organizations to develop the people you have. Take your loyal employees who already fit your culture and believe in your vision and invest in them. If you don’t have an internal training organization, work with partners and vendors to deliver the training required.
There are both hard and soft skills needed for digital transformation. For example, you may need to help your existing IT staff or developers learn new programming languages and tools. Your existing analytics team may need training on the latest data science technologies and processes.
On the soft skills side, it’s important to provide managers with new ways to empower their teams, manage risk, and lead with transparency. Everyone may need to learn more agile and collaborative ways of working together.
Diversity & Inclusion Helps with Skills Gap
In addition to teaching next-generation skills, it’s important to enable everyone to participate in the digital transformation. This means improving your diversity and inclusion. D&I is no longer just the right thing to do for humanity. It also is proven to have a direct positive business impact and financial return.
For example, inclusive and diverse teams are often smarter, faster and more productive, according to research conducted by Forbes and Cloverpop. The research found inclusive teams make better business decisions 87% of the time, and deliver better results 60% of the time. In addition, these diverse teams are twice as fast to make decisions with half as many meetings required to do so.
The Center for Talent Innovation, which drives ground-breaking research on talent and its impact, validates these findings. “Diversity and inclusion must go hand-in-hand to drive business results,” says Laura Sherbin, the center’s CFO and director of research.
Human Connection for Double Bottom-Line Results
Technology is still needed for a successful digital transformation. However, technology must be combined with human connection. In other words, it’s not just the “what” you use to transform, but the “how” and the “why” of your transformation. The human elements require hard work across your culture, your hiring, your people development, your leadership, and your communication.
Alan Gershenfeld, the founder and president of E-Line Media and one of the authors of Designing Reality, has coined the phrase: “Double Bottom-Line Company.” This defines an organization that is committed to both positive financial returns AND meaning social impact.
I want to believe that the future of capitalism supports this idea of making money and changing the world, for the better.
Why can’t we all strive to be double-bottom-line companies? This is the ultimate human connection to our digital transformation.
Note: This is the final post in a 3 part series on The Human Factors in Digital Transformation, by Margaret Dawson. Read part 1 here, and part 2 here. Please comment, share, and follow @snortoutloud and @seattledawson on Twitter and Instagram. Interested in guest blogging for SNOL? We’d love to hear from you. Please contact us with your suggested topic.
by Margaret Dawson | Jun 26, 2019 | Digital Transformation
My first post on the Human Factors in Digital Transformation discussed how technology alone cannot achieve digital transformation. Digital leaders focus on an additional critical factor – the human connection. I’ve identfied eight human factors that can help us successfully transform our organizations. In this part 2 of the 3 post series, we dive deeper into the first four human factors.
- Establishing a clear vision
- Setting and measuring shared, courageous goals
- Embracing open culture
- Making it personal
1. Establish a clear vision
It is often said to start with the end in mind. With digital transformation, this is absolutely true. Everyone in the organization needs to understand, and ideally agree with, the destination.
Digital leaders first define and declare the vision.
“Without a clear digital vision, companies can’t design a coherent, executable business strategy,” says Jeanne Ross, a principal research scientist at the MIT Sloan Center for Information Systems Research.
For example, Barclays Bank set a vision of becoming the digital bank of the future. BMW, already known for its superior engineering, declared it is a technology company. Its vision further states that technology is becoming human.
We are seeing strong digital visions even in industries often slow to adopt new technologies, like healthcare. One organization leading the way to digital health is USC Center for Body Computing in Southern California. It set a vision for how to create a better future of virtual patient care. That vision is becoming a digital reality with its Virtual Care Clinic.
These visions are not just words at these organizations. They are driving the priorities, investments, and decisions made by every team and employee.
Why is vision so important?
Humans want to believe in amazing things. We want to be part of something bigger than ourselves. To work for great organizations and people.
A vision that declares a future more amazing than the current state does that. It also brings everyone in the company closer together.
To transform any organization takes teamwork. A vision becomes the rallying cry and unifying concept – that cuts across roles and jobs.
Not long ago, I met with a group of government ministry CIOs. Each of the ministries is pursuing a digital agenda. Yet, it was clear to me that their pursuits were not collaborative or consistent. I asked the CIOs if they had a shared vision for their digital transformation. They responded with a group blank stare.
Not only did they not have a shared vision, they saw the other ministries as competition for resources and attention.
I challenged them with a question. “What incredible achievements could you accomplish together if you worked toward a single, shared goal for the government’s digital future?” To their credit, they nodded. It’s yet to be seen if they will accept that challenge. That will take hard work and a level of collaboration and humility they may or may not be able to achieve.
Visions are simple, aspirational statements
Another example from a completely different industry. Recently, I was chatting with the CEO of a pizza franchise. Its vision and mission are simple: “Be Awesome.” That’s it.
This is also part of their digital transformation vision. For example, their mobile application can’t just be okay. Its user experience must Be Awesome. The franchise marketing portal can’t be half baked. It, too, must Be Awesome.
Across the board, employees are encouraged to ask each other and their leaders, “is this awesome?” Might sound silly, but it’s working. The company has risen to become a top west coast pizza franchise.
Visions can evolve over time
Digital leaders set a clear vision, but also know when that vision needs to evolve based on the company’s direction and the market.
Case in point: Amazon.
When Amazon first started, CEO Jeff Bezos set a vision of being the world’s greatest bookstore. It then evolved in the early 2000’s to be the place to discover and buy anything. The vision evolved again to being the leading e-commerce platform, as Amazon moved from being its own online store to being the platform for a global marketplace.
This experience as a platform and the infrastructure behind it led to its vision and success around Amazon Web Services, which is now the leading public cloud service.
2. Set and measure shared, courageous goals
Of course, words alone don’t lead to success. A digital vision must be accompanied with a plan to achieve that vision across all areas of the organization. The business strategy, technology strategy, human resources strategy, and investments across all of it must align with the vision.
Digital transformation is not business as usual. Thus, the accompanying metrics should not be either. It requires transformational ways of thinking, doing, and measuring success.
According to McKinsey’s roadmap for digital transformation, there must be clear, ambitious targets. In other words, stretch goals that everyone is working towards.
“Without targets, people who find it hard to accept that the old ways of doing things were massively inefficient might be content to sign up for a 10 percent improvement in cycle time, for example. When 100 percent is possible,” the McKinsey report validates.
The metrics that matter in digital transformation are not specific to IT or any one division. These are metrics that matter to the business overall. Everyone should be driving to key performance indicators that align with the shared vision of success.
“CIOs need to shift from using operational efficiency metrics to measures that executive decision makers care about,” says Paul Proctor, a distinguished VP and analyst at Gartner. Proctor further advises having 5 to 7 metrics that are leading indicators of where you want to go, not where you are today.
As one of my former bosses at Microsoft loved to say, “Show me where the puck is going, not where it’s been!”
Stretch your organization to new heights
Digital leaders push the boundaries, reach those goals, and then push further again.
There is a lot of advice out there on what to measure. Simply, you should measure areas that show clear progress in your digital transformation. Hint – it’s not operational efficiencies or cost reduction.
It is all about the digital experience.
Therefore, develop and measure indicators that show an improved customer experience or inspire customer delight. For example, customer stickiness or retention. Revenue growth, especially long-term contracts. Employee retention and growth, especially in key areas like application development. Partnerships. Rate of innovation. You get the idea.
Many organizations are turning to a tech industry standard for measuring results known as OKRs (objectives key results). OKRs were first introduced by Andy Grove, then CEO of Intel Corporation. However, OKRs are used today by many firms, including digital natives like Google.
In fact, Larry Page, the CEO of Alphabet and co-founder of Google, says, “OKRs have helped lead us to 10x growth, many times over. They’ve helped make our crazily bold mission of ‘organizing the world’s information’ perhaps even achievable.”
Set bold and courageous goals
Again, digital transformation is going beyond what you’ve done before. Google could have easily grown by average rates. But it did not. The organization set incredible, bold, and perhaps unimaginable goals. And then surpassed those goals.
This is why I added the word “courageous”. It takes such incredible courage to truly transform and grow an organization. To take it to a new place that perhaps was not even imaginable a few months or years prior.
Don’t set metrics that tell your employees you are okay with mediocrity. Establish goals everyone sees as being truly transformative. And then reward everyone and celebrate when you reach them.
3. Embrace open culture
A vision and accompanying metrics alone do not guarantee success. Everyone at the company, across all roles, geographies, and levels must believe in and executive against them. Here is where culture comes in.
The biggest challenge I see as companies embark on a digital transformation is in the needed cultural changes.
Top-down mandates don’t work. Digital leaders evolve their cultures to be more open, transparent, and meritocratic.
In fact, companies who declare a vision but don’t change their internal culture will fail. Their employees will not see the value of the vision, because they aren’t part of it.
Take General Electric. They declared a clear vision of becoming the digital-industrial company and invested heavily in robotics and the Internet of Things (IoT). GE set metrics of success for this multi-billion-dollar digital strategy under the new arm of GE Digital.
Unfortunately, since establishing this vision and strategy, GE has struggled to fulfill its dreams. This inability to fulfill the vision or hit its targets resulted in multiple refocuses and massive layoffs.
Some analysts believe GE underestimated the challenges of developing next-generation software to drive industrial IoT. I believe that to be true. However, I would suggest they missed a more important element. Cultural change. The company remained a mostly hierarchical, top-down organization.
Use an open decision-making process
A company on the opposite end of the spectrum is Red Hat (full disclosure that I currently work at Red Hat).
The organization decided to develop a new vision or what it calls their “Why” statement a couple of years ago. Much of this was inspired by Simon Sinek’s “Start with Why” book and concept. While Sinek is not specifically talking about digital transformation, the concept still applies.
To get to their why statement, Red Hat undertook a several-month process involving literally thousands of its employees. A process it calls the Open Decision Framework (ODF).
First, employees shared their personal stories of why they work at Red Hat or why they love Red Hat and open source. Using a machine learning algorithm, they analyzed all of these personal stores to find patterns or common words and phrases. A cross-organizational advisory committee then put together several proposals. Those were narrowed down by a company-wide vote. More work was done to fine tune, and then a final company-wide vote was held again.
The resulting Red Hat why is: Open Unlocks the World’s Potential
Could the CEO or a small group of leaders come up with something close to this on their own? Maybe. But a mandated why statement does not have the impact of one co-created, socialized, and agreed to by the entire organization.
While it took months to finalize, in the end, everyone felt part of the process. This means they believed it and lived it.
Borrow from open source communities
Red Hat’s “Why” statement brings together the company’s focus on the open source development model and its open organizational culture. To work at Red Hat means not only believing in the business mission but in the open culture and the open source “way”.
Digital leaders also embrace open principles.
If you looked inside most digital disruptors, they behave differently. Great ideas can come from anywhere in the organization. Developers are coveted and given freedom to build amazing software. Individuals and teams feel empowered to pursue new ideas.
If this sounds a lot like open source communities, it’s because it is. Digital leaders look at their organization more like a community of individuals, all contributing to something bigger than themselves. Anyone can participate, lead, and suggest a change or improvement.
By embracing open source values, leaders can successfully create “a rebooted, redesigned, reinvented organization, suitable for the decentralized, empowered, digital age,” says Jim Whitehurst, Red Hat CEO and author of The Open Organization.
In open organizations, the CEO and leaders throughout the company become coaches, cheerleaders, and evangelists of the vision. Not dictators.
Be an engaged, compassionate leader
When I meet with customers, I am increasingly asked about our culture. Enterprises and governments worldwide want to understand how to be an open organization.
The technology decisions, while daunting, are an easier change compared to the cultural shift organizations must undertake to truly become digital leaders. It starts with the leaders themselves letting go of the structure and ladder that brought them to leadership.
“The big task for management is, therefore, to create a culture and leadership style to support autonomy, empowerment, and active engagement,” says Kai Grunwitz, Senior Vice President, EMEA at NTT Security.
The one way digital leaders must behave differently than most open source communities is by using compassion. Open source projects are not known for their inclusiveness or empathy, and don’t usually care whether everyone is keeping up with the race.
Open organizations combine the best of a meritocratic process with a compassionate culture.
4. Make it personal
One of the downsides of the digital era is we don’t have enough face time. We believe video conferences provide the same benefits as face-to-face meetings. Often, we assume emails are communicating our true meaning. Or at least think people open and read our emails. How often to you send messages via text about topics that should be a personal conversation, where you look someone in the eye?
To succeed at a company-wide digital transformation, you can’t rely on digital communication alone. Ironic, right?
This takes face time. And a lot of it. Especially by the leadership.
Get out there. If you’re a worldwide organization, then hit the road. Travel around the world. Communicate the vision. Answer the hard questions. Listen. And then listen some more. Show how you are changing based on the feedback you receive.
Everyone must be on board this journey, from literally your board of directors to the custodian. They all have a role to play.
In fact, your CEO and leadership must do more than sign up for the transformation and metrics accompanying it. They must evangelize.
“It’s not enough just to have CEO sponsorship. It needs to be provocative, disruptive, ambitious, and often uncomfortable sponsorship to be successful,” says McKinsey in their roadmap to digital transformation report.
Cultural and Digital Transformation take TRUST
One key reason for making face time is building trust. As humans, we need to see someone. Shake their hand. See them in person. All of this helps us trust the other person.
To put your organization through a major transformation takes trust – across the organization, but especially, of the leadership.
“In a climate that combines uncertainty with aggressive innovation and the need to learn or relearn a new trend, trust is one of the only stable principles we can count on,” says Daniel Newman, principal analyst of Futurum Research and CEO of Broadsuite Media Group.
Note: This is the 2nd post in a 3 part series on The Human Factors in Digital Transformation, by Margaret Dawson. Read part 1 here, and part 3 here. Please comment, share, and follow @snortoutloud and @seattledawson on Twitter and Instagram. Interested in guest blogging for SNOL? We’d love to hear from you. Please contact us with your suggested topic.
by Margaret Dawson | Jun 19, 2019 | Digital Transformation
Digital transformation is no longer an option.
Every organization knows it must become a digital leader to survive and thrive.
This is why businesses and governments are throwing trillions of dollars at new technologies. Organizations must build and deliver exciting new software applications. They must continuously innovate, move quickly, adapt, and stay ahead of the never-ending onslaught of digital data, experiences, and channels.
Users are demanding this. Everyone expects an easy, digital-native experience, whether ordering pizza or automating entire network infrastructure.
Accordingly, we’ve seen the massive rise of cloud computing, open source technologies, data analytics, artificial intelligence, and many other innovations. However, well over half of all new software or IT projects still fail. For example, a 2017 study found British businesses wasted £37 billion a year on failed agile IT projects.
The root cause could be many things, but I believe one reason for so much failure and lost budgets is leaders are thinking about technology in a vacuum.
Technology alone does not solve digital transformation. It doesn’t address the fundamental issues that block or drive transformational success, and the most critical dependency. That is people.
In fact, there are three key elements that technology cannot resolve: Trust, Instinct and Cultural Adaptation. These are human capabilities that even the best AI cannot replicate.
As we transform, focusing only on the technological aspects and not the human connection, we ultimately lead to failure. Human connection is the killer application for digital transformation.
We are experiencing the squirrel effect
However, it’s so much easier to assume a new mobile app, cloud platform, or software product can quickly solve our competitive woes. Which is why I constantly see leaders fall into the technology sinkhole, or as I like to call it, the squirrel effect.
Organizations declare a “public cloud first” initiative without ever establishing a clear, comprehensive cloud strategy.
Moving an application to the public cloud may sound simple. However, no application lives alone. It has many inter-dependencies from other applications, infrastructure, business processes, and data stores, as just some examples.
Applications also have human dependencies. For example: How many users does that application touch, and how do users access it? What is the user experience? How do they authenticate? What are the data security or privacy requirements? Can you maintain required access control policies? These are just some questions I pose.
Public cloud, or any infrastructure, may still be the right answer. However, organizations need to establish a standard set of criteria, capabilities, and analysis for anything moving to cloud.
And yet, CIOs and leaders everywhere flipped to cloud first “strategies” faster than you can hit a one-click order of a new Kindle book on Amazon.com.
The same is happening today with containers. If only we can put all of our applications on a container platform, and give developers containers to spin up and build new apps, all of our digital transformation woes will be solved!
Connect digital change with cultural change
Research is consistently showing the impact of people skills, or lack thereof, on digital transformation success. There is a growing digital skills gap around the world.
What’s more, the people cultural aspect is increasingly proving to be the biggest blocker to digital transformation. Boston Consulting Group states culture clash issues are becoming a huge obstacle: “It’s not a digital transformation without a digital culture.”
In fact, a strong culture valuing trust and openness is key to any transformation, digital or otherwise.
I love how Daniel Newman, principal analyst of Futurum Research phrases it:
“Culture is the operating system of the entire organization. It is time you let culture drive digital transformation from start to finish.”
Great advice!
One of the most common cultural blockers I see is around command and control leadership, typical in hierarchical organizations. Digital Transformation cannot be a dictate from on high. The CEO needs to set a vision, but everyone must believe in the change and why the change is happening.
People need to connect to the change and feel they can have an impact. Or that their job is safe amid the change.
Another cultural barrier is siloed behavior. Often, teams refuse or just don’t know how to break out of their siloes or swim lanes. Digital transformation requires collaboration and breaking down boundaries, as data, insights, applications, and processes need to flow seamlessly throughout an organization.
Digital Leaders Build Trust
Transformation also takes trust. Trust in your leadership, in each other, and in the process. And trust in your brand.
Kai Grunwitz, Senior Vice President, EMEA at NTT Security, created what he calls the three main pillars of successful digital leadership. The first pillar is: Trust!
You must also trust your “gut”. Digital transformation success requires using and trusting your human instinct.
Think back to a time when you made a decision purely based on data. For example, in a hiring process, where a candidate looked perfect on LinkedIn and in his resume. However, when you met this person face to face and looked them in the eye, your gut and instinct told you something did not feel right. But you ignored it. And what happened? Chances are it was an expensive hiring mistake.
In my experience, every time I have relied ONLY on data and not also taken into account my human instincts, I have failed or misjudged. In the example above, I’ve hired people who turned out to be bad cultural fits. Competency is rarely the issue. It’s a human thing.
The same is true for startups trying to get funding. A startup can look perfect on paper, or its product can seem revolutionary. However, entrepreneurs must still make the trek to Sand Hill Road to do a personal pitch. I once flew to Boulder for a 30-minute meeting, because a leading VC was willing to meet with me. It made a difference.
Adding human connection to your transformation
If this is true, then why are people-related areas the last place we invest, change, or even anticipate?
Because It’s hard.
Anyone who has ever led teams or organizations knows the people factor in leading is much harder than the operational or financial factors. Dealing with the myriad of human idiosyncrasies feels like a superpower few of us possess.
Therefore, the needed cultural changes, employee training, diversity and inclusion initiatives, and organizational development strategies are ignored or put on the back burner. It’s so much easier to believe that technology can solve all of our woes. If only Alexa could manage our people!
It’s important to note that most leaders, especially in technology, are not equipped, incentivized, or measured on these areas. True digital leaders understand this human factor. They are systematic in how they incorporate cultural change and dynamics. They invest in retaining their top talent, not only developers but all critical roles.
8 Human Factors to Digitally Transform
I have created what I call the eight human factors to successful digital transformation. I outline them here and then dig into each one in additional posts.
2. Set and measure shared goals
3. Embrace open culture
4. Make it personal
6. Create cross-organizational teams and processes
7. Reward people and teams who take risks
8. Develop your people for the future
Combine the digital and physical
Our reality is now digital, and it is interwoven into every part of our lives.
For example, we use online dating to meet our future soul mate. Organizations leverage web conferencing to hold virtual meetings across distributed teams. Families Skype or Facetime to narrow the miles between loved ones. We use Facebook and other social media to stay in touch with friends from our many lives, past and present. Once a completely manual process, we now sign electronic documents to buy our dream house.
However, each of these has a physical or human element attached. We do respond to digital signals, but it can’t replace human emotional response. We still need physical, human connection. A digital handshake does not provide the same confidence as a physical handshake.
The two must coexist, so we are able to leverage the latest technologies and, at the same time, address our fundamental human need for connection.
The lesson is that neither digital or physical should be used alone.
Leverage technology to drive speed, agility, and digital leadership. And use that innovation to enable you to spend more time focusing on people relationships. Because that is truly transformative.
Note: This is the first post in a 3 part series on The Human Factors in Digital Transformation, by Margaret Dawson. Read part 2 here, and part 3 here.
by Margaret Dawson | May 1, 2019 | Digital Transformation, Women Empowerment
It’s so easy for us to point fingers at men. If only there wasn’t sexism in the world. If only men would support women leaders more. But are women empowering women?
I absolutely agree there needs to be change in the world by everyone. I just find it hard to blame only the men. There is so much women can do for other women that we more times than not, we simply do not. Even though research now suggests women who support other women are more successful!
I often say that until all women are intentionally supporting other women, we have no right to blame others. This is because we are often our own worst enemy. Women who do make it in business and leadership often don’t support women trying to move up the ladder. I have worked for women leaders who surround themselves with white men. Diversity and inclusion is not on their agenda.
Have you ever seen a woman directly criticize or play down another woman’s light? If you are like most women I’ve asked this question, your answer is, “yes”.
INTENTIONAL SUPPORT DRIVES REAL CHANGE
Why is it important that we intentionally support each other? Because it’s the only way we will see real change.
When have women changed history? When women from different places and backgrounds banded together and gave each other unconditional support. That is how women’s suffrage was won. That is how we started to get more equality in pay.
But as we all know, we aren’t there yet.
At a recent conference, a successful woman scientist disagreed with my stance, saying that the only way to achieve change is by convincing the men in charge to push through change. If we had waited for the patriarchal system to do the right thing, we would see very few of the improvements we do have today. Systems only change when they realize opposition will not give up and will not stop fighting for a greater good.
How do we provide intentional support?
EIGHT ACTIONS WE CAN START DOING NOW
- Declare intentional support: Women must intentionally support each other. Not just talk the talk, but truly walk the walk. The first way to give intentionally support is to say you will. Simple declarations made publicly often turn into action.
- Mentor and coach other women: I feel like this is just a moral obligation for all of us that are in any type of leadership position. Girls and other women look up to you for guidance. So give it!
- Hire & promote more women: Often, when I say this out-loud, I am greeted with a bit of a shock. Wait a minute, we can’t intentionally hire more women – that would be reverse sexism, wouldn’t it? Uh, no. Don’t apologize for intentionally seeking out and hiring more women. Just do it. We have a pipeline issue, and the only way it will change is by filling that pipeline with women.
- Level the playing field: Don’t wait for permission. I have often assumed leadership of new teams and find that some people, usually women, are strikingly underpaid for their level and position. The first thing I do is ensure that all my equal levels and performers are getting paid equitably. That is just one way we can level the playing field.
- Encourage our daughters (and sons!) to take risks: Way too often I have heard or seen parents giving their girls loving advice to not take the hard math class or not to do something too dangerous or not to stray too far from their social network. While I believe this is always done with best intentions, we need to push our children of all genders to stretch themselves, reach for the stars, and believe they can do anything they set their heart to.
- Be nice to that “different” girl: We all know who this is. For many of you, like for me, it was you. The girl that was awkward, or geeky, or smart, or just, different from the popular girls. This follows us into adulthood. And while many of us grew out of our awkward stage or learned to conform so we didn’t stand out, we often still isolate or even criticize those women who take a different path. What if we accepted them 100 percent and even intentionally helped them? What amazing things could they do?
- Call out bad behavior by men and women: So often, when sexist behavior or bullying does occur, no one says anything. We need to stand up for each other. The most frequent situation women always tell me about is in meetings, where they will be talked over or their ideas will be ignored until expressed again by a man. When you see bad behavior, call it out in a mature, calm way. But don’t just let it go.
- Shine your light on others: We all have an amazing ability to shine, but too often we shine our light on ourselves to get attention or validation. What if we focused on shining the spotlight on others? This involves intentionally calling out a woman or man when they achieve something good or amazing. Put yourself second. Find ways to congratulate and promote the good works of others.
THE HARD WORK IS WORTH IT
I realize I’m making this sound easy, and it’s not always. In fact, I have experienced incredible resistance to these simple acts. People will fight you. People will say you are being sexist by focusing on hiring, promoting, and giving raises to women. But I have never done these things for people who aren’t deserving.
This isn’t about rewarding people who aren’t qualified. This is about making it right and equal for everyone.It’s also about making sure we are not actually doing more harm than good for other women.
It is also hard work. It means taking time, and sometimes, a lot of time, working with those women who haven’t had an equal chance. Mentoring, coaching, encouraging, pushing, stretching them. And it’s worth it.
Every time you intentionally support another woman, you receive 100 times worth of light back. It’s just the way the universe works.
You can change lives, one woman at a time.
