For a long time, Digital Transformation existed as a futuristic organizational fantasy but quickly transformed into a reality as the pandemic took over the world.
Digital transformation is a lucid term as it can mean different things for different organizations. That’s why you will always find it coupled with the word ‘strategy’. Loosely put, digital transformation refers to a company’s metamorphosis into a more automated operational infrastructure.
This can mean a company adopting e-commerce, employing effective software, enhancing the IT infrastructure, migrating bookkeeping services to an automated format via SaaS tools, etc..
Companies providing digital transformation services enable this transition in the most cost-effective and resource-efficient ways, making business more efficient and foolproof for any organization.
However, digital transformation is mostly an umbrella term. What it means for an accounting firm will be completely different in comparison to an enterprise. Even within similar organizations, digital transformation and its impact can differ largely based on the size of the organization.
As seamless as it sounds, digitalization especially when done on a large scale, can be a two-edged sword. While it can exponentially save a company’s expenses by automating and accelerating the processes, it can also become a financial blunder when digitalization is done without a strategy.
The fundamental benefit of digitalization is better profits with lesser efforts. Companies sometimes do get overboard with the idea of absolute automation or rapid digitalization and then struggle for their investment to be returned.
Digital transformation can only be implemented strategically and never instinctively. Building a generic one-for-all strategy for digital transformation for organizations will always fall short of expectations and results.
However, there are a few things that can roughly become a good framework for a successful transformation.
Let the transformation be based on data
Collecting data about the company goals, revenue, expectations, digitalization expense, expected returns, and much more is extremely important. A company’s journey through digital transformation has to be based on facts, not assumptions. Data relating to the pain points, the number of hours taken to resolve an issue or carry out a task, etc can really make digitalization more effective.
Hire an expert to execute it
An entrepreneur, or even a business owner, may have ideas of the level and pace of digitalization that they desire for the business. However, they will need an expert to extract accurate and predictive data to arrive at an effective strategy. Digitalization will require transforming and automating many departments based on their priority and expense.
One process at a time
Digital transformation is more like digital evolution. An organization will not become digitally efficient overnight. What do they need to automate on priority? What areas take the most effort and highest investment? For a company that stores sensitive data, protecting itself from a data breach might be of the highest priority.
So they could assign an AI-based tool that can detect IT vulnerabilities and instantaneously provide patching. Similarly, for some companies, it could be their bookkeeping processes, billing processes, or even the hiring processes.
Understanding the key pain areas of an organization will give you a roadmap to its digital transformation.
Having a collaborative approach
The most beautiful thing about digital transformation has the potential to become the scariest factor too. When a company goes through a digital experience, it has to be open to involving more people in the fabric of businesS, who will collectively make it happen, Someone might provide you with a SaaS that can monitor your staff performance and productivity, or an AI-backed tool for you billing process, etc.
With a digital transformation, the three things that organizations aim to achieve are to save time, save money and enhance efficiency. Digitalization is a bridge between company revenue and customer experience.
It is not only the private and financially blooming organizations that are opting for a digital transformation. Even government processes (public sector) including registring and taking appointments for vaccinations, applying for a driver’s license, exam assessments, and much more have already transformed to the digital space.
