Any digital transformation in a sizeable company will be complex, and thus understanding how one decision affects another is the key role of the leader – one that is very hard to delegate. Besides systems thinking, the type of leaders to look for are those with three important qualities. 

First, the leader would have to design and morph the organisation, balancing co-ordination and depth, to provide the breadth of coverage to ensure co-ordination across units, but also the expertise to solve the problems that require technical depth. 

Second, the leader would have to possess the ability to spark innovation. 

And third, we need to find balanced leaders who can successfully navigate the complexities inherent in large digital transformation projects. 

Finally, a balanced leader would create an open environment that creates a powerful feedback loop for him/her to reflect and self-correct. It isn’t about being right all the time; it’s about adapting the approach as the situation evolves and ensuring decision making gets better over time.

Refer to page 289 of Driving Digital Transformation for more information on each of these areas. Regular hardcopies on sale now at amazon.sg. Autographed hardcopies in the store.

Co-ordination vs Depth

Many digital transformation initiatives involve the use of digital capabilities to dramatically improve customer experience. This requires a lot of co-ordination of activity across the entire customer journey to ensure a frictionless, consistent, high-quality experience.

Breadth units rely heavily on methodology like design thinking, Agile- at-scale and Lean Six Sigma, project management, change management, etc., to bridge across other units. At the same time, some areas need depth to be developed.

So persist in greater involvement across meetings, because staff can’t be motivated if they don’t understand the impact of their work on the overall outcome. And because you will have many streams of work running in parallel, only by bringing everyone together can they see how their actions drive the overall performance of your transformation.

These meetings are also an opportunity to communicate your thoughts, to inspire the team, to get them to ask why, so that you can pique their curiosity, and challenge them to come up with better ways to improve the overall performance.