A few months ago ago I\u00a0attended the Digital Transformation 2017 conference at Dynamic Earth in Edinburgh,\u00a0bringing together professionals from private and public sector industries to talk about how we can, and must be better at delivering what our customers need.<\/p>\n
Organised by DIGIT (formerly Scot-Tech), it was a full day of talks and discussions that were energetic and engaging right to the end.<\/p>\n
One of the overriding messages that I kept hearing was that you must understand your customer in order to provide them with the products or services that they need, and the only way that you can really gain that understanding is to listen, listen, listen. And you have to talk their language, have no assumptions of what their needs are, and if you still don’t have your answers keep asking questions until you do.<\/p>\n
There is no doubt that everybody there was on the same page whether you’re delivering a commercial product or \u00a0public service, we all understand the why and the how of digital transformation as well as the challenges that determine the scale of your success.<\/p>\n
As a reiteration of something I said about the ambitions\u00a0of the Digital Engagement Team<\/a>, Bill Gemmell of Leidos said that digital leaders need to be: pioneers, team players, humble and driven; but he also said – forget ‘digital’, we just need leaders. I cannot stress how important this is, that by removing this term you also remove the idea that there’s a\u00a0separation of responsibility. You might not have the word digital in your job title, but that doesn’t mean that the role of innovating and changing practices is the remit of only those that do.<\/p>\n A key fact from the day was that 70% of digital transformation projects fail. Part of the reason for this is the culture of the people, organisation, and industry that is affecting that change. A driver of this is perhaps understanding the impact of the change – or a lack thereof?<\/p>\n George Elliott wrapping up the programme at #digiscot<\/a> speaking about the need for cultural change across the Scottish tech ecosystem<\/p>\n \u2014 DIGIT (@digitfyi) February 23, 2017<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\nCulture change<\/h2>\n
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