“Digital transformation is imperative in today’s business market. With the rapid pace of technological change and disruption that is taking place, no industry will remain untouched. It is in this context, that many companies across the world are launching and driving digital transformation programs.” – Tendayi Viki
An exciting opportunity to future-proof your business, Digital Transformation (DT) looks to combine people, processes and digital tools to improve efficiency. But with a wealth of flexible and advanced IT solutions in the market to take your business to the next level, where do you start? And how do you navigate the pains of change?
If you’re currently relying on paper-based or clunky software systems, any form of DT is likely to cause disruption and pose challenges for your business. But it’s worth remembering that any short-term pain will be outweighed by the long-term benefits.
Guaranteeing those long-term gains starts with choosing the right digital solution for your business. Integrated Compliance Solutions’ cloud-based platform, Digital IMS+ offers a single source of truth for daily business operations, with capacity to build quality and improve performance across sales, customer support, marketing, administration and finance operations. But capitalising on those gains requires a careful and considered program of transformation that places your business at the core.
Our top 5 tips for surviving DT, increasing productivity and boosting value creation:
1. Digitise and streamline your workflow
The days of paper-based processes are numbered, especially for businesses wanting to boost their productivity (and let’s face it, that’s every business!). Put simply, maintaining manual processes is a waste of time and resources. Digital solutions exist to help you respond more efficiently to customers and streamline your workflow and business processes.
Start by reviewing the manual processes that would benefit most from digitisation. Your aim should be to digitise every business operation possible to improve efficiency. With just a few clicks, Digital IMS+ can create digital forms that capture your businesses most common data processes whilst preserving the safety and privacy of critical business information. Digital IMS+ can also restrict access to certain personnel, and control who can see records and other vital documentation.
2. Use technology to automate laborious manual tasks
Automation of manual tasks is perhaps one of the most significant benefits of DT. By pushing dull administrative tasks to artificial intelligence, your business can focus on more impactful areas of your work – like making your customers happy. Digital IMS+ has a range of predefined automation workflows to suit most business needs. Along with freeing-up people for more vital work, automating workflow can reduce human error, ensure greater security and speed-up processes.
3. Eliminate human barriers to Digital Transformation
Implementing changes to technologies that drive business is the key to success. But, technologies can only be positively leveraged if the transformation programs that accompany them, revolutionise people’s mindsets. Transformation often challenges people’s deep-rooted need for stability and almost natural imperviousness to change.
Balancing the constant progress and inertia of human existence is what sets good and great businesses apart, but for most employees, innovation within their organisation represents chaos. It’s important to remember however that the majority of employees appreciate and accept that change is inevitable.
4. Ensure Digital Transformation helps every department achieve its goals
There’s no getting away from the fact that DT will require a major shift in your organisational culture. Strategies should be designed to help each department meet their existing targets more efficiently. If your teams can see the benefits of DT to them day-to-day, they’ll be more likely to support its implementation. More importantly though, you’ll need to commit to training your people to use the new processes, so they become comfortable with change.
With this in mind, keeping the lines of communication open between management and team members should be a priority. Allowing employees to openly discuss their experiences with technology, express any fears or concerns, and present new ideas that can improve your DT strategy is critical to success.
Digital IMS+’s communication tools make capturing and actioning feedback easy, and ensures nothing falls through the cracks. The goal should be to ensure long-lasting change is supported, and that employees are motivated to master new technology with a forward-thinking mindset.
5. Benchmark your business against others in your industry
Don’t be afraid to take a look at how competitors have introduced DT strategies into their business and save yourself time and money by learning from their mistakes. Collecting information on competitors is like prospecting for gold – there’s a lot to sift through, but finding a genuine nugget can really benefit your business.
As well as keeping an eye on competitors, look to establish links with relevant industry bodies. It’s a move that will help you stay up to date with trending, industry-specific digital strategies, and give you a way to develop meaningful industry connections.
Making Digital Transformation work for your business
Taking your business technology to the next level isn’t for the faint hearted, but DT has the potential to:
- Improve the quality of your services
- Make you a customer magnet
- Reduce bottle-necks in processes
- Increase efficiencies
- Help your business move faster
- Boost your agility and ability to react swiftly to change
No longer just an “IT thing”, DT has business-wide impacts and the potential to change how you do business forever, and for the better. But if your DT does not affect every person and every department, you are not reaping the power it represents.
Taking a strategic approach to DT is the key to success, but remember to take all your employees with you. Business transformation experts, with proven industry experience, ICS has the knowledge and skills to take your business to the next level. If you’re ready to embark on your DT journey, call us today about how we can you help you navigate and plan for change.
About the Author
Kevin Raju, ICS Digital Strategy Consultant
Having worked with ICS since 2018, Kevin has a passion for the automation of business processes using cloud-based software platforms. He specialises in business development and removing bottlenecks in sales through streamlining and automating the sales process.