How Covid-19 Brings a Digital Transformation Boom Across the Enterprise
Published on : Monday 06-04-2020
The integration of digital infrastructure to streamline public health to respond to the Covid-19 pandemic is very crucial in the context of epidemic forecasting and decision-making. This digital infrastructure implementation increasingly fuels the digital transformation initiatives within an organization. But due to the pandemic, the transition will see significant changes in industries especially in technology, food delivery services, customer service, and virtual events.
In the present situation, we are seeing major occurrences worldwide, including soaring adoption of online services, an enormous requirement for internet services, and enhanced connectivity among industries, regardless of their sizes.
The impact of the Covid-19 pandemic has demonstrated the value of IT and digital transformation across industries and businesses must utilize this time to speed up the transition. To understand the impact of the virus on corporate business, IDC surveyed the opinions of 32 CXOs from 10 industries. They also conducted the survey on the value of IT and digital transformation to combat the pandemic and after moment of digital transformation.
The report found inability to visit customers, a tremendous decline in sales performance, and the inability to resume production as the top negative impacts of Covid-19 on enterprise-level. On the other hand, the enhanced corporate ability of long-distance collaborative work, wide recognition of the value of digital transformation and information technology among all employees, and the ability to market online and business development were the top positive impact.
According to a report from Harvard Business Review, in 2018 there were $1.3 trillion spent on digital transformation, of which an estimated $900 billion was wasted when initiatives didn’t meet their goals. This indicates that most companies realize the importance of digital transformation, while many are bewildered with the idea of having to refurbish their entire digital initiative and struggle due to the lack of understanding of how to execute a transformation.
How to Get Started with Digital Transformation
Many companies have a digital transformation initiative in its place, but a true digital transformation always starts with a strategic mind and continually evolves and adopts new digital solutions internally and externally. While starting your digital transformation developing a digital culture is very crucial that defines your way and strategy towards transformation journey. It is also significant to consider that digital culture cannot thrive if your company runs in silos with disconnected or under-connected business functions.
Being customer-focused instead of being the product-centric business will be critical to implement effective digital transformation within your company. It usually requires customers to be your driving force behind technology and decision-making. Moreover, enterprises must communicate early and often attain buy-in for digital projects not just with digital leaders but also with everyone. Developing digital projects and relationships between teams takes time, enabling executives and leaders on board with a new digital vision.
When it comes to focusing on digital solutions for customers, businesses also need to consider their internal employees and partners. Receiving employee feedback and delivering consumer-grade technology solutions gives employees the access to provide an effective customer experience.
Covid-19 to Drive Digital Transformation
In the time of coronavirus crisis, digital infrastructure plays a vital role in envisioning and modeling outbreaks. As the pandemic continues to spread around the world, it will become imperative for organizations to look for new solutions or ways to stay ahead of the competition. Because most enterprises will fail to spot their financial targets due to supply chain disruptions and lowered customer demand.
However, experts assume that businesses should see this situation as an opportunity and place their focus much on daily operational needs at the expense of investing in digital business and long-term resilience. Organizations that adapt their technological capacity and investments on digital platforms can alleviate the impact of the Covid-19 and keep their businesses running in the long term.
So, as companies move to become more digital, we believe they can drive more value in terms of customer experience as digital solutions enable business-customer relationships on screens rather than in person.