Yih-Wen Lin wrote about the fastest path to digital transformation and how taking a look at your people, processes, and technology helps you get there. With 95 percent of organizations predicted to measure their success in the digital economy by 2023, chances are that your business is on a possible journey toward enabling modern technologies. Like many organizations, you might be eager to try the latest and greatest. Buzzwords like artificial intelligence, machine learning, blockchain, or Internet of Things might sound familiar to you.

A recent IDC survey showed that 97 percent of “digitally determined” organizations want fully connected processes across their entire business. In reality, only 5 percent were fully integrated. These organizations cited benefits around revenue, efficiency, and operational insights when connected processes were put into practice.

The Fastest Path to Digital Transformation

In order to achieve the fastest path to digital transformation, you will need to:

• Take a look at business processes
• Find far-reaching business value
• Round up all enabling technologies
• Connect with the right people
• Tell your story

Business Processes

Business processes show how work is done from beginning to end. It is a good idea to describe how people are working together today, how they would like to work together ideally, and how their work will be shaped with the introduction of new technology. By having an end-to-end picture, you will be better equipped to assess the costs/benefits of your technology projects. When done right, business processes can help you paint a complete picture of your business.

Far-Reaching Business Value

Not only does new technology help business users gain efficiency and new capabilities, but it also reaches far outside of one specific line of business. Connected business processes can help you find the optimal impact. It can also enable the reduction of manual troubleshooting – allowing engineers to spend more time analyzing problems and designing new products.

Furthermore, with IoT, a new service can be introduced to allow customers to see the production status of their orders in real-time. In this case, the connected business process benefit extends from production to R&D to Sales to the customer.

Enabling Technologies

The advanced technology that interests you in the beginning may lead to other technology needs in order to achieve your business goals. Take blockchain as an example – it is touted as a game-changing technology that can revolutionize the world. It works great for use cases like streamlining financial transactions or automating paper trails – among many others. However, if you wanted to track the supply chain of physical goods, you will need to add IoT to the mix. When you use business process flows to map your requirements, it is easier to see all of the technology that you may need in each step and get the complete picture.

Connect with the Right People

Management support is often cited as a key factor for successful projects. By mapping out connected business processes across your organization, you can identify leaders who can benefit from your project and enroll them to be a project advocate. Don’t forget, there are people who do not interact with you directly that might also benefit from the new data and insights created from your initiatives, thereby extending the benefits to a wider audience.

Tell Your Story

Processes representing your business practices naturally grab the attention of others. It’s similar to how people immediately try to place him/herself in a group photo. By tailoring the level of detail to others, you can communicate up, down, and across the organization in the same language – keeping people informed and committed.