In January – about midway through the pandemic era – management consulting firm McKinsey & Company made a series of projections about trends that would “characterize 2021.” Among those was the pace of what popularly is called “digital transformation.”
“What can be said is that digitization will be everywhere,” McKinsey consultants wrote when they updated predictions several months ago. “And it will be critical to both national productivity and the success of individual companies and sectors.”
McKinsey surveys showed the business community agreed. Early in the year, only 11% of respondents believed their “current business models would be economically viable through 2023.” Nearly two-thirds said their companies needed to invest in digital technologies to enable continuing growth and productivity.
Indeed, per McKinsey analysts, “This wasn’t just talk,” as business leaders at organizations large and small continued to fund technology initiatives during the course of the year – in fact, in many cases increase them despite making “painful cuts elsewhere.”
Yet, transforming businesses across the spectrum of industries into digital operations has had continual challenges. A midyear study shared by tech information service
Betanews revealed that 70% of “automation initiatives” were hampered by traditional IT issues, such as “security concerns” and “data silos.”
In the face of these obstacles,
Diginomica columnist Neil Raden charged executives to focus on transformation’s potential, not its difficulties: “If all you achieve is automation, you are just automating old, inefficient and disjointed processes.”
So, as this year closes and another draws near, we ask readers how’s your transformation advancing?