Digital Transformation: Building a Strategic Business Case

March 2, 2016

Why we do what we do at all?

The first step is a series of briefings by the Digital Transformation Leader or Sponsor that outline the need for change within the organization.
Unlike process improvement, transformational change is not just ‘How can we do what we do better/cheaper/faster?’ It’s about asking a more fundamental question: ‘Why we do what we do, at all?’

Leaders should be able to answer:

What is digital transformational change?
What could be achieved?
What is the likely impact?
What is in it for me?

Review corporate digital strategy

Is there an up-to-date digital strategy?
Does the digital strategy still meet leader’s aspirations?
Does the digital strategy meet the external demands on the business?
To what extent is the current business aligned to this digital strategy?
Where are the greatest gaps between the current business and the digital strategy?
Are current change initiatives aligned to this digital strategy?

Key drivers for digital

Identify key drivers for change, due to digital transformation.
The internal change drivers may include:

Improving customer satisfaction
Efficiency savings
An increase in demand for products and services
Opportunities and issues with the current business

The external change drivers may include:

Political, Economic, Social, Technological, Environmental

Potential areas for change & customer experience

Identify potential areas for change:

Keep the scope of transformation as wide as possible
Break the boundaries between current services, functions or organization units
Think outside the current customer base and current service or product offerings

Understand customer experience

Identify expectations of key customer groups and their measures of success

Strategic outcomes of digital transformation

Strategic outcomes express the leader’s ambition for change to digital

The key inputs into defining strategic outcomes are the:

Business drivers and
Customer experience drivers

Identify strategic imperatives for digital

Leaders need to determine and agree upon the priorities
‘Must Haves’ of business should be identified and expressed as business area imperative. These are business areas that MUST be changed if the defined customer experience and business drivers are to be met
‘Must Dos’ – the most important business processes that each business area must focus upon should be identified and express as process imperatives. These will be business processes that MUST be changed and improved

Assess ambition for change. Ambition for change will be shaped by: Drivers for change. Customer experience. Business area and process imperatives.

Determine strategic outcomes of digital.
Define strategic outcomes.
At a high level, define the effect of transformational change on:

Customers:Perception of excellence by customers
Employees: Customer facing culture
Efficiency: Highly efficient operation

Assess capabilities: Identify gaps between key capabilities that exist now and what will need to be in place in the future in terms of business processes, organization structure, people, facilities, technology etc. Is the gap that needs to be addressed by the digital transformational change program.

Develop strategic business case for digital transformation

A high level business case which articulates the strategic need and strategic outcomes and determines the strategic benefits versus indicative costs

Outline digital transformational scope: initial scope for digital transformation can be determined from early exploration of potential areas for change
Keep scope as broad as possible to enable truly digital transformational thinking during visioning

Strategic benefit is the ultimate difference the digital transformation will make to customers, the organization, employees and stakeholders