Agile FrameWork for Digital Transformation at Post-Pandemic

Pandemic and Requirements for agile changes

Organizations still struggle to advance digital transformation. A common language that transcends technology could be the key to strategic transformation. From disruptors and disruptive tech to pandemics, political unrest, and climate change, winning the future depends on agile adaptation. To survive and thrive, leaders should determine how to maintain a competitive advantage and enable an ability to win in a way that doesn’t just withstand change but embraces it to generate new strategic possibilities.

An adaptive business in the 21st century is typically a digitally powered business, leading many organizations to pursue digital transformation. But why do so many transformations fail to deliver concrete impact? Why is it so hard to drive cross-functional change, plan beyond one technology at a time, or create a strategy that can adapt as technology evolves and organizations shift their core assumptions? Creating a common, strategically linked language for digital transformation could be the answer to achieving digital advantage and adaptability.

Traditionally, companies were slow to incorporate innovative digital technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), cloud, and the Internet of Things (IoT) in their operations. But as the COVID-19 pandemic began, companies were forced to prioritize investments in digital innovation and instill it into every aspect of work. Digital transformation road maps spanning years were suddenly executed in months, bringing about radical changes in how companies conduct operations. It confirmed the importance of having Agile training for having Agile team, Agile management and Agile mindset within organization, an structure who has the flexibility and expertise to adopt with radical changes within environment and technology advancement. 

Recent inviromental changes within business section convinced organization to rethink regarding adoption of agile and agile training for more successful digital transformation. The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the convergence of several trends within industries, particularly consumers prioritizing convenience and access to services. Leading service providers view digital transformation as a way to become more consumer-friendly while simultaneously changing their operations, culture, and use of technology.

Agile: A new language for rapid adoptation

When it comes time to make a rapid change to face changing market needs, organizations with an oversized application portfolio will have a harder time course-correcting. They may also miss out on vital changes and be at a competitive disadvantage. This is why application portfolio management is so critical for organizations interested in innovation, improved business process and controlled costs.

Agile digital transformation is founded on proof that successful digital transformations take place through continuous innovation. When companies radically change their business models and capabilities in measured steps over time, they are empowered to launch, learn, and re-launch digital initiatives – rapidly responding to market changes and customer needs.

Digital transformation involves implementing digital technology to transform business by replacing and modifying manual processes with digital processes. In fact, this kind of transformation is geared towards streamlining internal processes and elevating the customer experience. Digital solutions enable companies to automate tasks and procedures, enabling foundational changes to the organisation and increasing value to its clients.

Enterprises that cannot innovate and adapt quickly to the changing digital competitive landscape will lose out to competitors that offer superior digital products and services. But to innovate and adapt, an organization requires a deep understanding of the connection between its:

• Technology portfolio

• Operational processes

• Supported business units

An organization needs innovation roadmaps to achieve results and business outcomes quickly while minimizing waste and mitigating risk. Without a comprehensive view of the entire enterprise, true digital transformation will be beyond reach.

What is the difference between Agile Transformation and Digital one?

Agile refers to project management for software development which is used for methodologies like Scrum or other framework types. In sum, Agile is a set of principles that are applied to software creation. These principles have also spread into other functions and other aspects of modern businesses.

An agile transformation plans to deliver functions across the entire organization to adopt the ideal blend of lean principles by cultivating engagement and collaboration.

Digital transformation transforms businesses by radically changing processes and business models. This type of transformation allows companies to rethink their business model while keeping a strategic digital mindset. Of course, Digital transformation is a customer-oriented process that seeks to fundamentally change and enhance the customer experience through digital automation tools.

Similarly, technology is a vital component of a digital transformation methodology that leverages emerging technologies and delivers on customer outcomes.

If applied correctly, Agile project management will provide value to the end-users. Implementation of Agile methodology with an emphasis on Agile values/principles would provide the desired outcome and can result in greater satisfaction for a customer as well as other stakeholders. Other benefits of Agile include:

• Increased communication between testing and development teams

• Heightened protection against error

• Risk reduction and cost control

• Shorter time to market and product delivery flexibility

• Ability to pivot without disrupting the development process

• Total transparency

 Although transforming the way your business operates can be difficult, companies that have successful digital transformation initiatives can expect to see a 17% return on investment (ROI) over the next year. Some additional benefits of digital transformation include:

• End-to-end user-friendly experience

• Enhanced resource management

• Automated workflow processes

• Increased efficiency

• The digitalisation of business operations

• Innovative products and services

• Growth of new and existing market opportunities

This highlights the importance of agile training through a qualified and reputable organization with similar expertise in digital transformation.

How digital transformation and a challenging environment are building agility and resilience

The pandemic has pushed CEOs to move more quickly in transforming their businesses to meet a dynamic and uncertain operating environment. Increasingly, competitors, investors, and boards are also applying pressure to evolve.

While the imperative to transform may be clear, the path is challenging. CEOs are pressed to prioritize digital solutions that meet the needs of the present while building a platform for innovation and competitive advantage. This can require changes in processes and infrastructure, such as shifting workloads to the cloud, deploying artificial intelligence (AI) across the enterprise, and reevaluating how, where, and by whom work is done. For some, it may include transforming network capabilities and deploying edge computing infrastructure.6 Such change may demand new, continuously evolving workforce skills in an environment where diversity, equity, and inclusion are highly valued.

Digital technologies can help virtualize and better manage infrastructure and processes, empower sales to get closer to customers, integrate remote and in-person networks, and enhance competitive advantage. The challenge for business leaders is how best to plan—and accelerate—digital transformation.

Businesses should cease floating “safe” proofs of concept while keeping outdated legacy systems on life support—doing so can lead to innovation stagnating, flanks becoming more exposed, and brand reputation decaying.

The pandemic has tested our ability to respond quickly, innovate, and adapt in the face of fast-moving change. Although it’s been challenging for organizations—as well as for people at every level—it has created great opportunities, removing obstacles and expanding horizons for what is possible. There is no going back to the old normal, but there are clear pathways to define a more flexible, adaptive, and beneficial environment for businesses, partners, and customers. CEOs should seize this moment to release the burdens of the past and create a better future.

Digital Transformation Success Relies on Agile Approach to Change

The principles and practices of the agile movement are quickly moving beyond the IT department and into how firms run their day-to-day business. This new way of organizing and running a business gains further impetus by the headlong rush to use digital transformation to gain competitive advantage, which often requires changing a company’s operating model through many iterative steps known as a journey. Using the agile approach, they minimize risks and validate that their efforts meet the desired outcome as they move forward on their journey. Unfortunately, many companies see these benefits of an agile approach, but they struggle to do that.

Many firms miss the key element is the necessity to change their corporate culture to support an agile environment. At the heart of this cultural change is the long-standing practice of penalizing failure. In traditional organizations, executives and managers are not allowed to fail. They are given targets, held accountable to those targets, and failure is not tolerated. This understanding is deeply ingrained in business psyche.

In an agile environment, we hear a lot of talk about failing fast and failing forward; however, organizations don’t allow failure in projects. True digital transformation can only be accomplished in an agile framework, so experimentation must be allowed.

One of the keys to navigating through the unknowns of the deep change that most digital transformation demands is the willingness to experiment to learn and test. Failure, or at least some level of dissatisfaction with results, is often the norm. Failures – doing things and finding they don’t work or don’t work as well as we had anticipated – is part of how we move into the unknown, and much of the details of a transformation journey are unknown and evolve on the journey.

Resolving the issue and truly embracing the agile philosophy for transformation requires a mindset change from companies’ traditional view of failure not being allowed. Experimentation is an essential element. Companies need to celebrate the fact that they fail, that they do things to learn and test, rather than penalize failure.

The agile approach to transformation is a very different world than big, major projects with managers holding teams accountable for the delivery of predefined workstreams. In the agile approach, the company sets the goal but not the time or cost. Breaking the journey down into sprints or phases with goals for each sprint allows adjusting to get to the desired impact. Each goal aims to prove the viability of the change coming about because of the transformation.

Pandemic and Requirements for agile changes Organizations still struggle to advance digital transformation. A common language that transcends technology could be the key to strategic transformation. From disruptors and disruptive tech to pandemics, political unrest, and climate change, winning the future depends on agile adaptation. To survive and thrive, leaders should determine how to maintain…

Pandemic and Requirements for agile changes Organizations still struggle to advance digital transformation. A common language that transcends technology could be the key to strategic transformation. From disruptors and disruptive tech to pandemics, political unrest, and climate change, winning the future depends on agile adaptation. To survive and thrive, leaders should determine how to maintain…