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Customer-centricity is important, equally so is focus on employees
Digital Radar 2020 shows that getting the most from technology has grown tougher. The report finds growing adoption of digital initiatives across industries and regions. But as companies advance, they have hit a "digital ceiling." There's a level at which all the easy benefits of technology implementations have been achieved.
In December 2019, Infosys Knowledge Institute conducted a worldwide study and surveyed over 1,000 senior management executives globally, at companies with over US $1 billion in annual revenue to understand why, despite rapid adoption of digital initiatives, many companies hit a digital maturity ceiling.
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.
– George Westerman, MIT Center for Digital Business
Against a Digital Ceiling
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The Digital Maturity Index rates enterprises on tech initiatives
Digital Radar 2020 measured companies on our Digital Maturity Index to compare year-on-year progress toward digital maturity. We created the Digital Maturity Index for Digital Radar 2019, identifying 22 initiatives that signaled digital maturity. We repeated the methodology and approach for the current survey to establish a valid comparison. The majority of companies this year fall into the Explorers cluster, and toward the top edge of that range.
Comparing clusters on their digital transformation journeys
Earlier we had found that as enterprises progress from Watchers to Explorers to Visionaries, they operate a progressively larger number of digital initiatives at scale. While still true, we also find that digitally mature companies report scale across the full range of initiatives, as shown in the nearly full outer circle (representing Visionaries)
Cultural barriers to progress, not technological
Respondents said their technological barriers are declining, but human hurdles persist. Compared with last year, all barriers decreased. Notably, the very human challenges of lack of change management and lack of talent show the smallest decline.
The world is filled with tech explorers, and we need mad scientists and risk-takers
While Companies made progress on other challenges, quick experimentation and overcoming risk-averse cultures proved more difficult in 2019, survey respondents say.
The synergy of sustainability and technology
To break through the digital ceiling, companies must bring a different mindset to their technology initiatives. By expanding focus from profits to customers, employees, and society, companies bring human concerns into harmony with business objectives. This holistic view enables enterprises to accomplish more than traditional program success metrics and achieve the emerging goals of stakeholder capitalism.
Breaking through the ceiling: The next evolution never ends
Companies that break through the digital ceiling bring a different mindset: They apply technology with employees and customers in mind. That broader outlook enables them to be more effective in harnessing the power of advanced technologies in a more natural sensing-responding-learning-evolving fashion. In short, more like a living enterprise.
