Transformation Management

In the good old days, the biggest risk for companies came from rivals selling virtually the same product or service, in a slightly cheaper or better way. That kind of competition could be dealt with by improving or expanding the current range. Or by getting to market more efficiently and imaginatively. But the world has moved on, and today’s competition is often invisible until it’s too late for established firms to respond in a way that has impact.

It's been less than five years since most companies started talking about transformation. While academics and other experts have been talking about disruption and transformation for decades, most leaders paid little if any attention to the early warnings because they were running companies that had been doing the same thing over and over for many years, and they were successful at that. So disruption wouldn't apply to them. Or so they thought!

As the years have gone by, an increasing number of companies have closed down, and the poster-boy disruptors like Amazon, Uber and Apple have served as free education to leaders that finally began to sit up and take notice of what's actually happening to the economy they compete in. And these leaders have either read or been told that "you don't need to be victims of disruption if you transform your business".

But before that happened, aside from software firms, there was one segment of industry which jumped onto the digital bandwagon early and that was the advertising industry. And the firms that operated in that space quickly re-labelled themselves Digital agencies.

Doing what they do best, they've blinded many managers and leaders with the notion that digital transformation is all about e-commerce and mobile apps. Many of these victims hold key roles in some very prominent firms.

Next on the digital bandwagon were the traditional IT system integrators that have now re-labelled many of their IT offerings as digital.

The outcome is that a huge number of people have been deluded into thinking that this is the meaning of digital transformation.

In the last two years, digital transformation has really gone viral and everyone is suddenly involved in it. Or are they?

Transformation is about creating a new future, without the constraints of the past. You rethink the business, innovate with empathy, and use the technology, people, processes, and value proposition required to transform the business.

But right now, there are countless companies informing their workforces and stakeholders that they're undergoing transformation using digital when in fact they're simply undergoing a bit of change with some new technology. 

The difference is that change fixes the past, while transformation creates a new future. Which means that many firms immersed in change initiatives right now are under the illusion that they're undergoing transformation.

A line once appeared in SAP’s Business Transformation Journal which stated: “When a snake sheds its skin it changes; when a caterpillar becomes a butterfly, it transforms”. 

And George Westerman of MIT articulated this point well when he said; “When digital transformation is done right, it’s like a caterpillar turning into a butterfly, but when done wrong, all you have is a really fast caterpillar.”

While enough people have latched on to the notion of transformation, too many don't know the real meaning of it. They're deluded by marketing material that reels them into the clutches of marketing departments, all with the aim of selling more of what fuels the current digital sugar coating epidemic that's causing thousands of firms to fall further behind in their industry.

Instead of focusing on legitimate transformation and re-thinking their business, too many and caught up tinkering in the sweet and colourful world of digital sugar coating.

So what should companies be doing?

Well, they should be re-thinking their business model. And the basic principle of re-thinking your business model is the same for a small company as it is for a large company. It's not easy. But neither is it rocket science.

Let me give you two examples.

For twenty years, my core business as an independent consultant was helping large companies with their transformation and change efforts. I generally helped one or two companies at any one time. And I did very well from that as a career.

With affordable digital tools becoming available, I then re-thought my own business model and I began to sell my knowledge online. So instead of charging hefty fees to help just one or two clients at a time, I launched an online platform and now hundreds of people pay for my expertise, but at a more affordable price. It's all done online, 24 hours a day, with customers in almost every country around the world.

It was a slow start but in just over two years, my new business model began to financially outperform my old business model.

My mission as a consultant used to be to help people in one or two companies manage and lead transformation. By shifting my business model, my mission has changed to helping thousands of people manage and lead transformation.

And none of that would have been possible without re-thinking how I do business and exploiting affordable digital technology to translate my new strategy into reality.

That's my own little story of self-disruption, and it's completely changed my life after spending more than two decades in business where I used an old and orthodox business model of exchanging my time for money.

At the other end of scale let's consider a company like Netflix.

After launching in 1997, Netflix was doing well in the DVD-by-Mail market and by February 2007 they had delivered their billionth DVD.

But along came streaming video and Netflix began to struggle as customers abandoned what was fast becoming an antiquated offering for something far more convenient and cost-effective. With close to 150 million subscribers, the company is now the world's biggest online subscription video service.

But what would have happened if Co-Founder Reed Hastings was too tied to his old business model? - Even if it had enabled them to sell a billion DVDs. Where would they be now if they hung on to that old business model and instead of creating a new future for themselves by re-inventing their business?

In March 2019, Apple announced Apple TV+, and of course, it remains to be seen how successful that is.

Now, some might argue that Apple has the technical expertise to do something like that. But the reality is that they do what any other successful company is doing these days, including the likes of Facebook and Google. They acquire new talent with the skills that will help them create a new future for themselves.

Almost every company is capable of acquiring new talent with new skills - if they want to create a new future for themselves as badly as the tech giants want it. Facebook doesn't just rely on its old talent to keep transforming its business. Mark Zuckerberg is constantly buying start-ups to acquire their talent, and so are other forward-thinking firms.

As I said a few minutes ago, the principle of re-thinking your business model is the same for a small company as it is for a large company. What differs is the scale and complexity of turning strategy into reality. But the principle of being bold enough to re-think your business model and let go of your old beliefs is the same.

Established firms needn’t be victims of disruption if they seize the opportunity to explore how new business models can be enabled and inspired by the integration of new technologies

But they first need to ensure they know the difference between change and transformation. And the difference between digital sugar coating and legitimate business transformation.

But they need to do that in time. Because the longer they suffer loss in market share, the less capable they'll be to invest in transformation, and the more likely they are to go to an early grave. Which is where 75 percent of today's S&P 500 companies are predicted to go in the next decade.

Already I've watched well-paid VPs and CEOs get ousted from their posts because they were deluded by what transformation means and what's required to get transformation done right. And plenty more well-paid professionals will follow suit - if they fail to upgrade their own transformation capabilities as managers and leaders.

While most companies now claim they're on a journey of transformation, the truth is that many aren't. They're on a digital sugar coating trip, which is sometimes colourful enough to delude even the most senior executives into thinking they're becoming fit to do business in the new digital economy.

While incremental adjustments can provide benefits and, in many cases, are a vital first step for a digital transformation, if these initiatives don’t lead to more fundamental shifts to the core business - which are core to the overall strategy - the benefits will be too insignificant to prevent them from becoming obsolete in the not too distant future.

Companies need to be open to radical reinvention to find new, significant, and sustainable sources of revenue for themselves. If I'm brutally honest, the CEOs that don't facilitate that re-invention are being irresponsible, and their days will be numbered. 

Too many companies have a strategy that looks very much like it has for the previous five years. They have a CIO with the usual technology projects underway, they have a Chief Marketing Officer with a new web site and some social media channels, HR wanting to change culture, and back-office functions like finance trying to get on with life with minimum disruption that new systems cause them.

Product owners are busy making old products slightly faster and cheaper - perhaps accompanied in some way by a mobile app - and sold on the marketing department's new web site. Woo hoo!

All this is nice. It's cute. It's fun. But this is not a digital reinvention. Because reinvention requires a complete rethink of the business itself. If you disagree, let's talk about this in ten years from now and see what happened between now and then.

A company’s heart is the value proposition of its business, which should be core to strategy. And its soul is its people, processes, and technology. These business organs are so vital to a company's well-being that any transformation that fails to tend to them will ultimately allow the health of the company to decline and join the growing number that heading to an early grave.

The folk at McKinsey suggest there are four basic stages of disruption that companies are going through these days.

Stage one is the early stage of disruption when established companies barely feel any impact on their business. Loss of market share is often put down to other factors, but none associated with disruption. 

So they continue to respond in old traditional ways. What worked three years ago, or with another company five years ago, etc. But they don't make any bold moves. They hang on to what worked well in the past and just squeeze harder on that. They are well and truly enshroud in old orthodox thinking. And justifying why they couldn't possibly be disrupted.

The process of reframing these governing beliefs - that many struggle to let go of - involves identifying an industry’s foremost notion about value creation and then turning it on its head to find new ways to create value.

In stage two, a new industry the trend becomes quite apparent. New business models have been validated on a small scale - often by start-ups run by young people who have little if any experience in an industry. It's critical that established companies commit to nurturing new initiatives so that they can establish a place in what their industry is morphing into.

They need to ensure that new initiatives have autonomy from the core business - regardless of any competition between them. But with disruption’s impact still not big enough to significantly dampen earnings, old-timers aren't motivated and they stay stuck in denial.

The illusion that digital sugar coating is enough is one that many leaders are being deluded by, and their so-called digital transformation action is focused more on creating a better version of the past, than building a new future.

Stage three is when the future has arrived and new business models have shown themselves to be more superior than the old and trusted models of years gone by. At this stage of disruption, established firms are forced to prioritise transformation and changes in senior executives place because the previous lot were stuck in the past. Now it's shift resources to the new self-competing ventures it hopefully launched in stage two. 

As company performance starts to suffer, budgets shrink and companies naturally have to cut back even further on new initiatives while focusing on their old core business which is suffering badly. Politics plays out as key leaders point to where profits came from in years gone by, and transformation suffers more setback.

In stage four, disruption has reached a point when companies have no choice but to accept the new reality they had been warned about in stages one, two and three. Their industry has fundamentally changed and they finally realise that their old business model has finally run out of steam. The problem is, there's little time or money left to undertake a transformation that can recover revenue quickly enough.

It's a bit like not eating healthy and taking regular exercise. A lot of people don't care until they fall ill in their fifties or sixties, by which time they might have run out of time to turn their lives around.

The reality is, most industries are still in stages one, two, and three. That’s why the early experiences of media, music, and travel companies can prove so valuable. 

The key - regardless of the size of your business - is to act before you have to, and ensure that action consists of legitimate transformation.

PMI Ascent - Digital Business Transformation Management Course

When the past is a proxy for the future, business leaders can look backwards to forecast the future and build a strategy. But what happens when the past is no longer a proxy for the future?

Rod Collins highlights some of the innovative tools and practices used by a new breed of business leader.

PMI Ascent - Digital Business Transformation Management Course

How has the transformation of business using digital technologies become such a common topic inside so many organisations so quickly?

Well, actually it took a while for transformation to go mainstream - as an aspiration at least. 

Read The Transcript

For decades we saw thousands of companies attempt to implement new technology with little if any consideration for the business and the outcomes were very messy, with failed ERP projects and programmes being high on the list of culprits.

Thankfully a lot of lessons learned have been shared since then and although there are still a lot of struggling technology initiatives out there, at least now there are plenty of people who know what it takes to be more successful - even if some companies still try their luck without them.

Over the last decade we've seen mobile, social, and cloud technologies breeze through the consumer sector and we now live in a very different world as a result.

Most companies have invested in these technologies, but to a large extent, many have simply implemented new technology but continued to run their business in the same old way.

To use ERP as an example that will resonate with a lot of people, many organisations spent tens and even hundreds of millions buying ERP solutions from the likes of SAP and Oracle, but instead of seizing the opportunity to use the technology to adopt new ways of working, managers and leaders insisted that those systems accommodated existing business processes.

To a large extent, this happened because these efforts weren't led by the business. They were IT system-led and there was a complete breakdown in both communication and collaboration. Well, a similar pattern is unfolding with the implementation of cloud, analytics and IoT, etc. 

But the economic situation is different from how it was a decade ago. Because significantly more companies are being started, and new business and operating models are threatening to make traditional operating and business models look as appealing as a Nokia 5110 against the latest iPhone. 

Those old enough to remember will know that many things that were important to us in the past are now irrelevant because we don't need them. And that made the offerings of many companies irrelevant - along with the supply chains that those companies relied upon.

So, most companies at least now accept that they need to use digital to transform their business. And while some - like Ocado and Netflix have enjoyed huge success from doing so, most companies have repeated the old ERP mistake. Meaning, they've implemented new technology, created some KPIs, thrown in some change management for good measure, but changed nothing fundamental about their operating or business models.

And of course, they label this as digital transformation because there's now a naive assumption that the words digital and transformation should be joined at the hip when anything is being done with modern-day technology.

So, while five years ago the challenge was to get companies to accept that disruption is something real and that transformation is a prerequisite for survival, now the challenge is to get companies to understand the difference between transformation and change. Because while transformation creates a new future, change only creates a better version of the past.

Fortunately, there's a growing number of professionals available to help companies understand all of this. To guide and advise leaders who know about their business and technology, but who aren't transformation experts.

These people are transformation management professionals, and as with any other profession, they've chosen to take the practice of transformation seriously.

Think about this …

While most of us know a little about finance, organisations want certified finance professionals with experience managing that part of the business.

While most of us know a little about technology, the CIO wants certified subject matter experts with experience taking care of their infrastructure.

While most of us know a little about social media, the Chief Marketing Officer wants certified subject matter experts with experience managing their social media channels.

Because while we all know a little about a lot of things, most of us are only a professional expert at a few. And often we don't know what we don't know about areas in which we don't practice on a day to day basis.

And the same applies to transformation management. Because while many people talk about digital and transformation, an increasing number of companies are beginning to realise that they need authentic transformation managers with experience to help them transform both legitimately and successfully.

If you happen to be a transformation professional, you likely want to work with companies that have a CEO who has the desire and resources to undertake legitimate transformation. And you probably don't want to be somewhere with a leadership team that is firmly stuck in the past.

Consider the scenario where you're already in a transformation management role with a forward-thinking innovative company, and of course, you'll need to perform at your best - as a transformation professional - in that role.

You know you're going to face your fair share of transformation challenges because they come with the territory. Because no one charged with managing or leading transformation will escape the hurdles that transformation puts in front of them. But how we clear those hurdles in the way an athlete does on a track, is what separates the skilled transformation practitioner from the one that keeps falling at every hurdle. Not because of lack of passion, effort or a desire to succeed - but because of lack of experience and knowledge.

Let's face it, most large firms are bursting with operational expertise, but this is made up from an entirely different set of skills found in a transformation management professional. And in the way that firms are diligent when it comes to hiring for key finance, IT or HR roles, leaders shouldn't make the false assumption that anyone can become an overnight transformation master.

Transformation management responsibilities need a safe pair of hands, and so it's vital that people charged with leading transformation are equipped with the expertise they need to perform at their best and deliver what leaders expect.

If you're someone with the desire, knowledge and experience to play a key role in transformation, you also need the right company for that aspiration to become a reality. The truth is, some older companies are being led by antiquated leaders who aren't equipped to lead their company towards digital economy success. And while some of them eventually get removed by the Chairman of the board, others will steer their companies into bankruptcy.

If you're working at that kind of company, but you have ambitions to undertake a meaningful transformation role, you should take things into your own hands and move on. This is where you need to think and act like a leader, creating a vision for where you want your career to be, then building and executing a plan to get yourself to where you want to be.

Because if you don't, and you allow yourself to get stuck with an antiquated organisation, you'll gradually lose touch with the outside world, get held back by old mindsets and ways of working, and you'll never get to practice transformation management.

Your field of vision will narrow, and your focus will be on internal priorities, and less on the world outside your firm's walls. You'll read about transformation, but you won't get involved in it because you're constrained by an antiquated organisation.

As in many of the best professions, three things you need to succeed as a transformation manager are knowledge, experience and certification. Let me say a little about each of them - starting with knowledge.

New knowledge is vital to orchestrating successful transformation, and no one, regardless of their role in an organisation, can afford to rely entirely on what they learned from the frameworks, best practices and operational models of the past.

Technology and business now need to be tightly integrated, digital needs to be at the very core of new business models, and technology and innovation are vital to achieving transformation. Competitive intelligence, business value creation and so much more, is all part of the transformation challenge. So new knowledge is vital for anyone with ambitions of leading transformation which creates new competitive advantage.

The challenge for transformation professionals is to be selective about what they learn and to know how to put new knowledge to practical use in the real world. Reading the latest book or blog post is one thing but putting its content to work is where many struggle. 

So, by selecting a framework such as THRIVE or BTM², transformation management practitioners can acquire a solid 360-degree view of transformation so they're equipped to help envisage, enable and orchestrate legitimate transformation.

The next thing you need as a transformation professional is experience.

While new ways of working and thinking are core to successful transformation, the ability to operate in complex and political environments can only be acquired through experience. So blending real-world experience with new knowledge is essential for anyone wanting to be successful in transformation management.

If you've never worked inside a large corporation or undertaken a real transformation management role, the chances of suddenly being asked to advise a multi-national CEO on transformation are slim. But in the way that all organisations need to begin their transformation journey somewhere, transformation management professionals need to do the same. 

With a bit of initiative, there are ways you can accelerate your progress if you're prepared to do more than just turn up for work each day and do what's expected of you. 

Start helping people without them asking for your help, and start creating your own rich content about transformation online. 

In a world where everyone from McKinsey and Harvard to teenage YouTubers and Instagram stars know the power of online content, you must understand how your own content will determine how others think of you as a transformation expert. 

Online content is one of the most fundamental digital advantages any professional or company should be investing their time in these days.

You need to be a content creator and a giver of value to stand out from the crowd these days. Because even a 10-year-old can be a content clicker and commentator, which is no longer enough to stand out.

Similarly, sending out hundreds of CVs is now as ineffective and old-fashion as the antiquated business models that will take many companies to an early grave.

So if you're looking for new opportunities as a transformation professional, think like a digital economy leader and let go of what worked well in the past. You need to leverage the power of digital yourself and demonstrate your expertise online.

And the third success factor in the transformation management profession is certification.

A growing number of career fields require professional certification, from finance and HR through to IT and Project Management. If you don't have the appropriate certification, chances are you'll be left to fill the less-well paid roles with companies that either don't have the budgets to pay for the best people, or that operate with low standards.

While transformation management certification isn't obligatory, a professional certificate that validates your knowledge of transformation and assures hiring managers in exactly the same way they seek assurance from other types of certification, such as PMP.

Professional certifications remain one of the most effective mechanisms to assess the knowledge and skills needed to perform a specific role. And as even more people now exaggerate their knowledge and experience online, hiring managers turn to certification as a means to better decision making. While certification offers no guarantee of a great hire, it certainly increases the odds.

After all, would you want a certified surgeon to operate on your nearest and dearest? Or one that claims to know what to do but who doesn't have the right certification?

Certification can also improve your earning potential and a number of studies show that those with relevant credentials earn higher salaries than those who don't. Oracle University, for example, compared the average salary of individuals who held Oracle certifications versus those who didn't and found that certified professionals earn 13.7 percent more than their non-certified colleagues.

The most successful transformation professionals don't wait for their managers to help them. The high performers take the initiative and take things into their own hands. 

They take steps to acquire new knowledge about a transformation framework such as THRIVE or BTM²

They take an online course to get certified in that body of knowledge.

And they take advantage of basic digital tools and techniques to become known as a transformation practitioner worth paying for.

They own their personal career transformation in the way a CEO owns their company's transformation.

PMI Ascent - Digital Business Transformation Management Course

In the early years after 2010 I remember writing about transformation and, aside from a small number of peers and the people I learned from, few were talking about the transformation of business. But now the words "digital" and "transformation" appear joined at the hip as together they've become an over-used and misused term. 

If you walked into ten organisations tomorrow that claim to have digital transformation underway and asked to see evidence of their innovation process, how their operating model is being re-engineered and what their new business model looks like, you'll discover that some of what's claimed to be transformation is rather fake.

Most companies take finance, HR and IT, and other core functions very seriously in terms of investment, processes and the trained people that are running those departments. But when you ask to see how innovation and transformation are being treated with similar importance, you'll discover that often they're not. Because investment in real innovation and real transformation is grossly undermined.

Of course, no one likes to be told that their organisation has fake transformation underway - or that they're not taking transformation seriously. Because the truth hurts doesn't it. The important question is, whether managers and leaders have the courage to face up to reality. To snap themselves out of any delusions they're under and steer their organisations into the world of legitimate transformation.

Instead of continuing to tinker with digital projects, deluding themselves that they're transforming their company when all they're doing is installing some new technology and making small changes to how things have been done in the past. 

Remember that change fixes the past, while transformation creates a new future. You might have already come across George Westerman's quote which suggests; “When digital transformation is done right, it’s like a caterpillar turning into a butterfly, but when done wrong, all you have is a really fast caterpillar.”

While some people recognise fake transformation when they see it, it takes courage to help the CEO and their leadership team understand the risks associated with allowing fake transformation to continue at the expense of legitimate transformation - which could create a new future for the company they're responsible for steering towards digital economy success.

So as some of the world has been sucked into fake news, now some companies have fallen prey to fake transformation, as they've become lost in the hype around the word digital and the meaning of business transformation.

Leaders need to clarify to their workforces, the difference between change and transformation, and the difference between digital sugar coating and digital transformation. They need to cleanse their company of ambiguity, then create and communicate a clear and legitimate transformation vision. Because if they don't, there's a risk that their companies will become increasingly vulnerable.

And for those that remain vulnerable, it'll only be a matter of time before new business models impact their industry, and customers opt for alternative products and services.

On the one hand, it's understandable that some leaders want to stick to what they know their company does well. After all, that’s what got them to where they are today. But in the same way we as individuals know we need to step outside of our comfort zone to become better people, companies also need to do the same - instead of getting stuck in the comfortable and complacent safety of their own comfort zone.

Because the digital economy won't be sympathetic to those who simply want to hang on to the past - regardless of their reputation and previous achievements. And an increasing number of business models that have been successful in the past, are becoming less relevant to the world we live in, and therefore less profitable for the companies that rely on them.

The problem for many companies is that when they're caught up in the day-to-day challenges and hopes of success, with their eye on the next quarter's profits, it's easy for leaders to lose sight of what could happen to their business model in the longer term if they fail to truly transform.

We only have to look at the media to see the consequences of fake transformation. In April 2019 the British retailer Debenhams went into administration and into the hands of its lenders. It's quite sad to see a company that was founded in London's West End in 1778 selling expensive fabrics, bonnets, gloves and parasols, become a victim of the new economy we live in.

But in 2018 Debenhams' leaders were boldly speaking of the transformation their company was undergoing. This is an example of fake transformation. It's almost like telling your family and friends that you're undergoing a personal transformation by going to the gym, when all you do is put your kit on, eat a protein bar and shake your arms and legs around.

You'll spend your money and time, and even fool your family and friends for a while, but eventually, it'll be clear that you were never really doing anything to transform yourself. And a similar delusion exists for many companies that talk about transformation.

It's where the fashionable use of the words "digital" and "transformation" results in nothing in the way of business success. And this delusion of transformation and failure to undergo legitimate transformation is what's seen a company that by 1950 had become the largest department store group in the UK, owning 84 companies and 110 stores - finally enter administration.

But if you read the press you'll see that just seven months before, Debenhams leaders were telling the world that they had redesigned strategy to reinvent the shopping experience for customers. Not to mention the so-called digital transformation consultants that were supposedly helping Debenhams write their digital economy success story.

Six months before going into administration the company's preliminary results and strategic update was headlined with "Transformation gaining traction in volatile markets, taking decisive action to strengthen base". The 33-page document continued its up-beat tone with statements such as; "we have seen the first positive signs of results in our Debenhams Redesigned strategy that show our transformation is gaining traction" and "new strategy designed to drive more choice and digital innovation".

Then an example of digital sugar coating with Debenhams statement; "Our 1.3m BeautyClub members and 0.5m beauty followers across Instagram and Facebook are highly engaged with social media and the Community will transform our relationship with customers and demonstrate digital leadership in the category."

Two years before going into administration, the company was announcing; "digitisation is key for Debenhams in its new strategy, as a mobile-first approach aims to broaden the reach both in the UK and internationally." This is exactly the kind of cliche talk that so many companies are being lulled into a false sense of transformation security by. Deluding themselves that they're transforming, when the reality is that they're not.

Regardless of who believed the Debenhams so-called transformation would achieve very much, despite the labels of "digital" and "transformation" all over it, the effort did nothing to secure the future of a British institution that had been in existence for over 240 years.

I've got no reason to pick on Debenhams - heck I enjoyed shopping there for years. But it serves as a good example in the here and now, of how fake transformation and digital sugar coating are very real, and how thousands of other companies are currently under a very similar delusion.

This is also an example of how brutal the digital economy can be, and that it couldn't care less about what any company has achieved in the past.

Then there was Britain's entire chain of Toys "R" Us stores which collapsed into administration in early 2018. A year earlier its leaders were announcing that they expected a positive impact on their marketing programs and an ability to connect with today’s consumers.

Toys "R" Us was another global brand - founded in 1948 - that sugar-coated itself with cool-sounding initiatives such as "experiential elements", technology initiatives and digital ads. And its “TRU Transformation” strategy was designed to address the known shift in shopper experience expectation. While all this made the workforce and stakeholders feel they were part of something transformational - something digital - all it achieved was a place on the growing list of digital economy victims.

In the United States, jeans company Diesel USA filed for Chapter 11 protection in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in March 2019 and Italian luxury house Roberto Cavalli also filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in April 2019. 

And they're not the only ones losing sleep as more traditional companies hang on to old business models, because American producers of bedding have been living a nightmare of disruption. Much of the industry has been losing out to innovative start-ups like Casper, which completely undermine the tired old business models of traditional store-based mattress companies.

Of course, all the people involved in Debenhams, Toys "R" Us, and so many other companies mean well. They have good intentions, but often they don't know what they don't know, and they remain naive about transformation. The trouble is, the past success in business is no guarantee of success in the digital economy. Because while the world is now a very different place, many companies are still relying on business and operating models that were developed long before our digital economy was born.

Meanwhile, companies such as Netflix in America, Ocado in the UK and Bosche in Germany serve as great examples of what legitimate transformation really looks like.

So what companies do you know that informing their workforce and stakeholders how they are proud to be transforming their business and that they are leaders in their industry in using digital to do this? But in reality, are simply making faster caterpillars?

And who in your company has the courage to speak up and expose any digital sugar coating and fake transformation that could be putting the business at risk?

While some in your firm might be talking about emerging technologies, who are actually using them to reinvent the business model?

Because that's what will determine success in the digital economy. Not a pretty mobile app. Not a five percent reduction in costs. Not bean bags and flexible working time. Not a million Facebook likes. Not a fancy new logo. Not a ton of data. And certainly not another technology system.

Then there's the operating model, which also needs to be fit for running a very different kind of organisation. Because the one that was built 20 years ago or more is almost certainly incompatible with what's required to thrive in the digital economy.

So what's happening in your company to create new business models and to reinvent the operating model?

What safe pair of hands is responsible for managing that?

How is the workforce being engaged in those projects and programmes?

To what extent has the board made the CEO accountable for creating the new future their company needs?

Let me close by saying that while fast caterpillars might increase efficiencies, cut costs, and be necessary, there are often no butterflies being created and no sign of transformation taking place. And there are some dangerous downsides to being seduced into the transformation illusion while being caught up with digital sugar coating and fake transformation. Three of them include:

1. The fact that companies become so busy and preoccupied with creating fast caterpillars, that they stand still in the transformation stakes and increasingly vulnerable to the disruption that they can't see coming. 

2. Companies devote their limited time, effort and resources to creating fast caterpillars, because key “change” initiatives have become their priority. They have no time or resources to do anything else, other than create their fast caterpillars and maintain business-as-usual.

3. Companies are lulled into a false sense of security, because they have fallen prey to the digital transformation illusion. They might be doing extremely well creating with multiple digital solutions, but there's often no vision of a butterfly in sight.

Leaders need to remove any illusion their companies might be under about their transformation because no industry or company is immune from disruption. They need to remove all ambiguity that exists between transformation and change, then envision, enable and orchestrate legitimate business transformation.

They need to ask questions such as:

• How is our transformation going to disrupt the market or protect against disruption?
• Will our transformation eliminate our industry’s customer pain-points and complexity?
• Will is cut our prices by at least 70 percent and still enable us to make money?
• Will it make our dumb products and services smart?
• Will introduce a platform where buyers, sellers and innovators (including our competitors) can do business together?
• Will it transform our physical products and services into digital offerings?

And for every answer of “yes” you need to ask Why? When? and How?

If the CEO can't get the right answers to those questions, that's a good sign that their leadership team either needs help or some new blood.

There's nothing wrong at all with digital change projects because they bring about much needed small change, which is enabled by technology. They often save some cash and introduce improvements, so companies really need these projects. But don't mislead people into believing that all digital projects represent transformation.

PMI Ascent - Digital Business Transformation Management Course

There’s never been a need for organisational change management and a focus on the people side of change more than today, but a lot of organisations still struggle with it.

Karen Ferris is the author of several books about Organisational Change Management and she helps organisations thrive in the face of volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous change, providing new tools and approaches for a new age in organisational change management. Effectively, breaking the mould!

PMI Ascent - Digital Business Transformation Management Course